Hacker News Reader

Comment by petercooper | Hacker News Reader

Birds see very differently to humans [0] and standard RGB displays aren't able to reproduce the full experience for them. I wonder if the results would be any different if we could produce something more realistic to them.

[0]: https://www.reddit.com/r/parrots/comments/7itlyx/can_budgies...

View on HN

Budgies will try to socialize (in vane) with extremely unrealistic plastic budgies. Parrots actually recognize each other by voice, the colors of the feather doesn't matter hardly at all (maybe for mating...), we know that because certain species do have different colors in different breeds.

I think RGB displays are fine for this particular purpose.

I don't have the context of the research you read, but I've seen my budgies try to socialize and play with all of the following in a similar fashion:

- other budgies

- my green cheek conure (who isn't sure what they're doing exactly, but still tries to humor them)

- cuttlebones

- my fingers and tip of my nose

- my wife

- various parts of their cage

- toys

Honestly, I think budgies are happy go lucky little birds that like to play with anything and everything

Yes, let's be clear: I'm not saying it's the worst animal cruelty there is, just that animal welfare has to be seen on a spectrum.

Our avian medicine professor said that budgies will get frustrated from trying to socialize with plastic birds or people. How bad you think this is is up to you. I'd compare it with an immigrant in a country with extremely different culture and language. And it's worse because birds can't relearn certain innate things.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com