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SUMMARY:Memories of Tomorrow: Do Animals Remember the Past and Plan for th
 e Future? - Nicola S. Clayton\, Professor of Comparative Cognition\, Direc
 tor of Studies in Natural Sciences (Biological) for Clare College\, Tutor 
 for Clare College
DTSTART:20070613T153000Z
DTEND:20070613T163000Z
UID:TALK7450@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Laurence Tiley
DESCRIPTION:According to the mental time travel hypothesis only humans can
  mentally dissociate themselves from the present\, travelling backwards in
  time to recollect specific past events about what happened where and when
  (episodic memory) and travelling forwards in time to anticipate future ne
 eds (future planning). Studies on the behaviour of food-caching western sc
 rub-jays question this assumption. In terms of retrospective cognition\, t
 hese birds remember the 'what\, where and when' of specific past caching e
 pisodes\, they keep track of how long ago they cached different types of p
 erishable foods that decay at different rates\, and also remember whether 
 another individual was present at the time of caching\, and if so\, which 
 bird was watching when. Recent work demonstrates that the jays also make p
 rovision for a future need\, caching more food in places in which they wil
 l not be given breakfast the next morning than in places where they will b
 e receive breakfast the next morning even though there is plenty of food a
 vailable to them when they cache the food.  Taken together these results c
 hallenge the mental time travel hypothesis by showing that some elements o
 f both retrospective and prospective mental time travel appear not to be u
 niquely human.\n
LOCATION:Lecture Theatre 1\, Department of Veterinary Medicine
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