There was an African gray parrot named Alex. He was famous for his cognitive abilities. Famous among humans, that is. A human researcher named Irene Pepperberg spent thirty years studying Alex. She found that not only did Alex know the words for shapes and colors, he actually understood the concepts of shape and color. Many scientists were skeptical that a bird could grasp abstract concepts. Humans like to think they’re unique. But eventually Pepperberg convinced them that Alex wasn’t just repeating words, that he understood what he was saying. Out of all my cousins, Alex was the one who came
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