You already know that dancing is a physical release with many physiological and emotional benefits for hippies, hipsters, and the emo-crowd alike. But did you know that Darwinists postulate that human brains have been specially wired by natural selection for dancing, because dancing confers survival benefits through group bonding? The New York Times reports that this evolution argument has long been thought irrefutable based on the evidence that humans are the only species who has a history of music and dance.Enter Snowball the Cockatoo to really show science what's up:
Aniruddh Patel, senior fellow at the Neurosciences Institute in California, was sent the link to the video, and approached the owners at Bird Lovers Only Rescue Service to ask if he could study Snowball's moves.
He concluded that, “Like a child, he synched to the music for stretches of time, then danced a little faster or a little slower, but always in a rhythmic way. Statistically those periods when he’s locked onto the beat are not by chance — they really do indicate sensitivity to the beat and an ability to synchronize with it.”
The surprising part of the article is that Patel asserts that our ability to dance is not hard-wired,
but it is a communicative feature related to our vocal abilities. This makes sense when you consider that parrots, like humans, have the capacity for vocal learning (which involves hearing sounds and then coordinating the series of complex movements needed to reproduce those sounds). There are few other species that have such talents, but among them are dolphins, seals, and whales.So you may have to keep an eye out for Flipper copping your moves out there on the waves when you sail away on Jamcruise, you little hippies.
