full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Lauren Pharr: How vultures can help solve crimes

Unscramble the Blue Letters


[This talk contains graphic images] My parents always wanted me to be a doctor. But a doctor that sidteus how vultures eat dead things is probably not the type of doctor my parents had in mind.

(ltughear)

I study vulture scavenging behavior and how vultures affect crime scenes. I'm here to talk to you about how we take vultures for granted in fisnreoc science. Before we do that, I want to tell you a story. So we're going to take a trip, all 1,000 of us. It's May 2014 and we're standing in a park in Nashville, Tennessee, because we've been at a horse race. As we wait for the porta potty, we see two ladies in their Sunday best: heels, pearls and lovely, fplopy dbrey hats. At any mnoemt, we expect them to start talking about their grandma's fine china. But they don't. Instead, we hear them say, "Oh, look. Something must be dead." We look up and to the left and see vultures circling round and round. It occurred to me at this very moment that if these ladies at the derby are aware of vulture's connection to daeth, then why aren't we talking more about these brids at cirme sneecs?

Open Cloze


[This talk contains graphic images] My parents always wanted me to be a doctor. But a doctor that _______ how vultures eat dead things is probably not the type of doctor my parents had in mind.

(________)

I study vulture scavenging behavior and how vultures affect crime scenes. I'm here to talk to you about how we take vultures for granted in ________ science. Before we do that, I want to tell you a story. So we're going to take a trip, all 1,000 of us. It's May 2014 and we're standing in a park in Nashville, Tennessee, because we've been at a horse race. As we wait for the porta potty, we see two ladies in their Sunday best: heels, pearls and lovely, ______ _____ hats. At any ______, we expect them to start talking about their grandma's fine china. But they don't. Instead, we hear them say, "Oh, look. Something must be dead." We look up and to the left and see vultures circling round and round. It occurred to me at this very moment that if these ladies at the derby are aware of vulture's connection to _____, then why aren't we talking more about these _____ at _____ ______?

Solution


  1. crime
  2. laughter
  3. floppy
  4. moment
  5. death
  6. scenes
  7. derby
  8. forensic
  9. birds
  10. studies

Original Text


[This talk contains graphic images] My parents always wanted me to be a doctor. But a doctor that studies how vultures eat dead things is probably not the type of doctor my parents had in mind.

(Laughter)

I study vulture scavenging behavior and how vultures affect crime scenes. I'm here to talk to you about how we take vultures for granted in forensic science. Before we do that, I want to tell you a story. So we're going to take a trip, all 1,000 of us. It's May 2014 and we're standing in a park in Nashville, Tennessee, because we've been at a horse race. As we wait for the porta potty, we see two ladies in their Sunday best: heels, pearls and lovely, floppy derby hats. At any moment, we expect them to start talking about their grandma's fine china. But they don't. Instead, we hear them say, "Oh, look. Something must be dead." We look up and to the left and see vultures circling round and round. It occurred to me at this very moment that if these ladies at the derby are aware of vulture's connection to death, then why aren't we talking more about these birds at crime scenes?

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
turkey vulture 6
vulture scavenging 5
crime scene 4
pine cone 4
vulture evidence 3
scavenging behavior 2
forensic science 2
vultures circling 2
detective thinks 2
start pulling 2
subject matter 2
forensic scientists 2
kidnapping case 2
shallow grave 2
body farm 2
brain matter 2
studying vulture 2
vulture behavior 2

ngrams of length 3

collocation frequency
vulture scavenging behavior 2
studying vulture behavior 2

Important Words


  1. affect
  2. aware
  3. behavior
  4. birds
  5. china
  6. circling
  7. connection
  8. crime
  9. dead
  10. death
  11. derby
  12. doctor
  13. eat
  14. expect
  15. fine
  16. floppy
  17. forensic
  18. granted
  19. graphic
  20. hats
  21. hear
  22. heels
  23. horse
  24. images
  25. ladies
  26. laughter
  27. left
  28. lovely
  29. mind
  30. moment
  31. nashville
  32. occurred
  33. parents
  34. park
  35. pearls
  36. porta
  37. potty
  38. race
  39. scavenging
  40. scenes
  41. science
  42. standing
  43. start
  44. story
  45. studies
  46. study
  47. sunday
  48. talk
  49. talking
  50. tennessee
  51. trip
  52. type
  53. vulture
  54. vultures
  55. wait
  56. wanted