004 Learning from the Fallen
Hey Crow, when one of you dies, the others gather around. Afterwards, you stay away from that place and remember the danger.
Do we learn from others' mistakes, or wait to make our own?
Do you learn from other people's mistakes, or do you wait to make your own?
A crow lies still on the ground. Within minutes, the sky is full of noise. Crows arrive from every direction, landing on walls and wires, calling loudly, circling the fallen bird.
It looks like grief. It may be something more useful.
What really happens
When scientists studying wild crows placed a dead crow in the open, other crows gathered around it, calling and mobbing. Afterwards, the crows stayed away from that spot, and stayed wary of the person they had seen near the body, even when food was offered there.
In other words, the crows were learning: this place, this person, this kind of danger. One crow's death became a lesson for all of them.
How we know: Swift and Marzluff, Animal Behaviour, 2015, in a study of American crows. The gathering itself is a familiar sight to anyone who has watched crows in India.
The turn
Most of us only learn the hard way, by falling into the same pit ourselves.
The crows do something wiser. When one of them falls, they all stop, look and remember.
Three takeaways
- Other people's mistakes are free lessons.
- Paying attention to a loss can prevent the next one.
- Sharing what went wrong helps everyone stay safe.
The wise learn from the fallen. The rest learn by falling.
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.