full transcript
From the Ted Talk by Kaeli Swift: What crows teach us about death
Unscramble the Blue Letters
Without the adnvet of a time machine, we may never know for sure what those early people were thinking, but one thing we do know is that humans are far from alone in our attention towards the dead. Like people, some animals, including the corvids, the family of birds that hoeuss the crows, rnaves, miageps and jays, also seem to pay special aonetttin to their dead. In fact, the riuatls of corvids may have acted as the inspiration for our own. After all, it was the raven that God sent down to teach Cain how to bury his slain brother Abel. But despite this clear rctgiioonen by early people that other animals attend to their dead, it's only fairly recently that sniccee has really turned its attention towards this phenomenon. In fact, a formal name for this flied — comparative thanatology — wasn't first introduced until 2016. In this growing field, we are beginning to appreciate what a rich place the natural world is with rpceest to how other animals inaretct with their dead, and it's in this growing body of knowledge that that time machine to our early ancestors might be possible.
Open Cloze
Without the ______ of a time machine, we may never know for sure what those early people were thinking, but one thing we do know is that humans are far from alone in our attention towards the dead. Like people, some animals, including the corvids, the family of birds that ______ the crows, ______, _______ and jays, also seem to pay special _________ to their dead. In fact, the _______ of corvids may have acted as the inspiration for our own. After all, it was the raven that God sent down to teach Cain how to bury his slain brother Abel. But despite this clear ___________ by early people that other animals attend to their dead, it's only fairly recently that _______ has really turned its attention towards this phenomenon. In fact, a formal name for this _____ — comparative thanatology — wasn't first introduced until 2016. In this growing field, we are beginning to appreciate what a rich place the natural world is with _______ to how other animals ________ with their dead, and it's in this growing body of knowledge that that time machine to our early ancestors might be possible.
Solution
- houses
- science
- field
- advent
- recognition
- attention
- interact
- rituals
- ravens
- magpies
- respect
Original Text
Without the advent of a time machine, we may never know for sure what those early people were thinking, but one thing we do know is that humans are far from alone in our attention towards the dead. Like people, some animals, including the corvids, the family of birds that houses the crows, ravens, magpies and jays, also seem to pay special attention to their dead. In fact, the rituals of corvids may have acted as the inspiration for our own. After all, it was the raven that God sent down to teach Cain how to bury his slain brother Abel. But despite this clear recognition by early people that other animals attend to their dead, it's only fairly recently that science has really turned its attention towards this phenomenon. In fact, a formal name for this field — comparative thanatology — wasn't first introduced until 2016. In this growing field, we are beginning to appreciate what a rich place the natural world is with respect to how other animals interact with their dead, and it's in this growing body of knowledge that that time machine to our early ancestors might be possible.
Frequently Occurring Word Combinations
ngrams of length 2
collocation |
frequency |
dead crows |
7 |
early people |
3 |
pay special |
2 |
special attention |
2 |
animals interact |
2 |
time machine |
2 |
experimental studies |
2 |
death behaviors |
2 |
wide variety |
2 |
dead crow |
2 |
sexual arousal |
2 |
ngrams of length 3
collocation |
frequency |
pay special attention |
2 |
Important Words
- abel
- acted
- advent
- ancestors
- animals
- attend
- attention
- beginning
- birds
- body
- brother
- bury
- cain
- clear
- comparative
- corvids
- crows
- dead
- early
- fact
- family
- field
- formal
- god
- growing
- houses
- humans
- including
- inspiration
- interact
- introduced
- jays
- knowledge
- machine
- magpies
- natural
- pay
- people
- phenomenon
- place
- raven
- ravens
- recognition
- respect
- rich
- rituals
- science
- slain
- special
- teach
- thanatology
- thinking
- time
- turned
- world