评论
打印
Whether we want to or not, humans spend a great deal of time considering death.
无论我们想不想，人类往往会花很多时间考虑死亡这件事。
And it's possible we've been doing so since shortly after homo sapiens first began roaming the landscape.
而且这样的想法很可能在智人首次在陆地上迁移后不久就已经出现了。
After all, the first intentional human burial is thought to have occurred around 100,000 years ago.
毕竟，据说人类第一个有意举行的葬礼发生在十万年前。
What might those early people have been thinking as they took the time to dig into the earth, deposit the body and carefully cover it up again?
早期人类花时间在地上挖一个洞，把一具尸体放到洞中，再小心地用土覆盖上去的时候，他们到底在想些什么？
Were they trying to protect it from scavengers or stymie the spread of disease?
他们是在防止食腐动物破坏尸体，还是在防止疾病传播？
Were they trying to honor the deceased? Or did they just not want to have to look at a dead body?
他们在缅怀逝者吗？还是他们只是不想看到遗体？
Without the advent of a time machine, we may never know for sure what those early people were thinking,
在时光机器出现之前，我们可能永远不知道当时人们是怎么想的，
but one thing we do know is that humans are far from alone in our attention towards the dead.
但我们可以肯定的一点是，重视死亡的不止是人类。
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.
跟人类相似，有的动物，比如柯维鸟科，像乌鸦、渡鸦、喜鹊和松鸦，也很关注它们的死者。
In fact, the rituals of corvids may have acted as the inspiration for our own.
其实，柯维鸟家庭的仪式可能启发了人类自己的仪式。
After all, it was the raven that God sent down to teach Cain how to bury his slain brother Abel.
毕竟，是上帝派乌鸦下来教该隐怎么埋葬他过世的弟弟亚伯的。
But despite this clear recognition by early people that other animals attend to their dead,
尽管古人对其他动物处理死者有这种清晰的认知，
it's only fairly recently that science has really turned its attention towards this phenomenon.
但这些现象在最近才引起科学的注意。
In fact, a formal name for this field -- comparative thanatology -- wasn't first introduced until 2016.
实际上，这个学科的正式名称--“比较死亡学”--直到2016年才被引入。
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,
在这个发展中的领域，我们开始意识到地球上不同动物在对待死者这个主题上的多样性，
and it's in this growing body of knowledge that that time machine to our early ancestors might be possible.
并且这些逐渐积累的知识可以让我们对祖先有更多的了解。
So what are we learning in this growing field?
那么我们在这个领域学到了什么？
Well, right now we can split our understanding into two main groups.
我们可以先把我们的知识分成两大类。
In the first, we have animals that display stereotyped, predictable behaviors towards their dead,
第一，是那些对死者表现出刻板、可预测行为的动物，
and for whom much of what we understand about them comes from experimental studies.
我们对它们的了解大多来自实验研究。
This group includes things like the social insects -- bees and ants and termites
这些群体包括社会类昆虫--比如蜜蜂、蚂蚁，还有白蚁，
and for all of these animals, colony hygiene is of critical importance, and so as a result these animals display rigorous undertaking behaviors in response to corpses.
对所有这些动物来说，群体卫生至关重要，因此，这些动物对死尸表现出了严格的责任行为。
For example, they may physically remove carcasses from the colony.
例如，它们可能会把死尸从群居中移走。
They may consume them. They may even construct tombs. We see similar hygiene-driven responses in some colony-living mammals.
也可能吃掉它们。甚至会为死去的同伴建造坟墓。我们在一些生活在聚居区的哺乳动物身上也看到了类似的卫生驱动反应。
Rats, for example, will reliably bury cage-mates that have been dead for 48 hours.
例如，老鼠会很负责地埋葬去世24小时的笼中同伴。
In our other group, we have animals that display more variable, perhaps more charismatic behaviors,
在另一些群体中，动物的行为则表现得更加多样化，或者更具魅力，
and for whom much of what we understand about them comes from anecdotes by scientists or other observers.
我们对它们的了解多来自科学家或其他观察者的趣闻轶事。
This is the animals whose death behaviors I suspect might be more familiar to folks.
我猜人们对这种动物对待死者的行为可能更为熟悉。
It includes organisms like elephants, which are well-known for their attendance to their dead, even in popular culture.
这包括大象这样的生物，它们以悼念死者而闻名，即使在流行文化中。
In fact, they're even known to be attracted to the bones of their deceased.
实际上，它们甚至会被死者的尸骨所吸引。
It also includes animals like primates, which display a wide variety of behaviors around their dead,
这也包括灵长类动物，它们对死者也表现出了非常多样化的行为，
from grooming them to prolonged attention towards them, guarding them, even the transportation of dead infants.
从为它们梳毛到长时间关注它们，守卫它们，甚至携带死婴行走。
And that's actually a behavior we've seen in a number of animals, like the dolphins for example.
我们在很多动物身上都看到过类似的行为，比如海豚。
You may remember the story of Tahlequah, the orca in the resident J pod in the Puget Sound,
你可能还记得Tahlequah的故事，它是普吉特湾J族中的一头逆戟鲸，
who during the summer of 2018 carried her dead calf for an unprecedented 17 days.
2018年夏天，它托着她死去的幼崽度过了史无前例的17天。
Now, a story like that is both heartbreaking and fascinating, but it offers far more questions than it does answers.
这样的故事让人心碎而又着迷，但它引出的问题远远多于答案。
For example, why did Tahlequah carry her calf for such a long period of time?
比如，为什么Tahlequah要携带它死去的幼崽如此长的时间？
Was she just that stricken with grief? Was she more confused by her unresponsive infant?
她是如此伤心吗？她是因为自己的婴儿不能反应而困惑吗？
Or is this behavior just less rare in orcas than we currently understand it to be?
还是说这种行为在逆戟鲸中并不像我们现在所理解的那样罕见？
But for a variety of reasons, it's difficult to do the kinds of experimental studies in an animal like an orca,
但因为种种原因，我们很难在逆戟鲸
or many of these other large mammals, that might elucidate those kinds of questions.
或其他大型哺乳动物身上进行这类有可能回答这些问题的实验研究。
So instead, science is turning to an animal whose behaviors around death we've been thinking about since BCE: the crows.
因此，科学把目光转向一种动物，我们从公元前就开始思考它们对待死者的行为：那就是乌鸦。
Like insects and primates, crows also seem to pay special attention to their dead.
跟昆虫和灵长类动物类似，乌鸦也对死者特别关注。
Typically, this manifests as the discovering bird alarm calling, like you can see in this photo,
最典型的表现就是发出鸟类的警鸣，和这张照片中的画面类似，
followed by the recruitment of other birds to the area to form what we call a mob.
随后是召唤其他鸟来到这个区域，形成了我们所说的“乌合之众”。
But it can be a little different than that too.
但实际场景也可能跟照片有点不同。
For example, I've had people share with me seeing prolonged silent vigils by crows in response to deceased or dying crows.
举个例子，有人跟我分享说看到乌鸦长时间对垂死或死去的乌鸦沉默守候的情景。
I've even had people tell me of witnessing crows place objects like sticks and candy wrappers on or near the bodies of dead crows.
有人还告诉我，乌鸦会把树枝和糖纸放到死去乌鸦的身上或身旁。
And this mix of observations puts these birds in a really important place in our scheme,
这些不同的观察让这种鸟在我们的计划上占有重要地位，
because it suggests on the one hand they might be like the insects, displaying these very predictable behaviors,
因为这意味着，一方面，它们可能跟昆虫一样，表现出非常可预测的行为，
but on the other hand we have this handful of observations that are more difficult to explain
但在另一方面，我们的有些观察很难得到合理的解释，
and feel a bit more like what we see in some of the mammals like primates and elephants.
感觉有点像我们看到的一些灵长类动物和大象这类哺乳动物。
And like those animals, crows share an extremely large relative brain size
并且跟这些动物一样，乌鸦大脑的体积也相对更大，
and the kinds of dynamic social lives that might invite more complexity in how they respond to their dead.
并且这种动态的社会生活可能会让它们对待死者的方式更加复杂。
So I wanted to try to understand what was going on when crows encounter a dead crow,
所以我想搞清楚当乌鸦遇到死去的同伴时，到底会发生什么，
and what this might teach us about the role of death in their world, and possibly the worlds of other animals as well, even those early versions of ourselves.
以及这能否告诉我们，死亡到底在它们的世界中扮演着什么角色，并且可能事关其他动物，甚至还有我们的早期版本。
There's a number of different ways that we could explain why crows might be attracted to their dead.
有很多理由可以用来解释乌鸦为什么会被死者吸引。
For example, maybe it's a social opportunity, a way for them to explore why that individual died,
例如，这也许是个社交契机，一个让它们探讨死者为什么死亡，
who they were and what impact this is going to have on the neighborhood moving forward.
死者是谁，这会对社区的发展产生什么影响的方式。
Maybe it's an expression of grief, like our own contemporary funerals.
也许这是一种悲伤的表达，就像我们现在的葬礼一样。
Or maybe it's a way that they learn about danger in their environment.
或者这可能是它们试探环境是否危险的一种方式。
While all of those explanations are worth pursuing, and certainly not mutually exclusive, they're not all testable scientific questions.
所有这些解释都是值得探索的，并且当然不是相互排斥的，它们都不是可以进行测试的科学问题。
But that idea that dead crows might act as cues of danger, that is.
但死去的乌鸦可能意味着危险这一点，是可以进行测试的。
So as a graduate student, I wanted to explore that question, particularly with respect to two ideas.
作为一名研究生，我很想探究这个问题，尤其是其中两点。
The first was whether they might be able to learn new predators, specifically people, based on their association with dead crows.
第一点是，它们能否习得谁是新的天敌，特别是人类，基于他们和死乌鸦的联系。
And the second was if they might learn places associated with where they find crow bodies.
第二点是，它们能否习得发现死乌鸦位置的能力。
So to do this, I would go out into some unsuspecting Seattle neighborhood and I would start to feed a breeding pair of crows over the course of three days,
为了实现这些，我前往了一些毫无戒备的西雅图社区，开始在三天的时间中投喂一对正在繁殖的乌鸦，
and this provided a baseline for how quickly the crows would come down to a food pile, which, as you'll see in a minute, was really important.
这为乌鸦多快到达食物堆提供了一个基准，各位马上就会看到，这点非常重要。
Then, on the fourth day, we would have our funeral.
然后，第四天，我们会举行葬礼。
This is Linda. Linda is one of seven masks whose job was to stand there for 30 minutes with her little hors d'oeuvre plate of dead crow while I documented what happened.
这是琳达。琳达是被放置在实验场地30分钟的七个面具人之一，端着一只死乌鸦，而我则记录了之后发生的事情。
Most importantly, though, her job was to come back after a week, now without the dead crow, so that we could see if the birds would treat her just like any old pedestrian,
最关键的是，她的工作是一周后再一次出现，但不再端着死乌鸦，这样我们就可以观察鸟儿们是像对待路人那样对待她，
or if, instead, they would exhibit behaviors like alarm calling or dive bombing that would indicate that they perceived her as a predator.
还是相反，它们会发出报警呼叫或俯冲轰炸等行为，把她视为捕食者。
Now, given that we already knew crows were capable of learning and recognizing human faces,
现在我们已知，乌鸦有学习能力，并可以识别人类面孔，
it may come as no surprise that the majority of crows in our study
那么我们研究的大多数乌鸦
did treat the masks that they saw handling dead crows as threats when they saw them over the course of the next six weeks.
在未来的6周中把端着死乌鸦的面孔视为威胁就不让人惊讶了。
Now, if you're sitting there thinking, alright, give me a break, look at that face, it is terrifying,
如果你们现在正在想，得了吧，看看这个面孔，多可怕呀，
anyone would treat that as a threat if they saw it walking down the street, know that you are not alone.
如果人们走在街上看到她，都会将其视为威胁，不是只有你会这样看。
As it turns out, a lot of the folks whose houses we did these experiments in front of felt the same way, but we'll save that for another time.
结果，让我们在他们的家门口进行这个实验的人中，很多人都有同样的感觉，但这就是另一个话题了。
So you may be comforted to know that we did control tests to make sure
好消息是，我们做了对照测试以确保
that crows don't share our preconceived bias against masks that look a bit like the female version of Hannibal Lecter.
乌鸦不会像我们一样，对有点像汉尼拔·莱克特的女性版面孔抱有偏见。
Now, in addition to finding that crows were able to make associations with people based on their handling of dead crows,
那么，除了发现乌鸦可以对处理死乌鸦的人产生联系之外，
we also found that in the days following these funeral events, as we continued to feed them,
在这些葬礼事件后仍然继续喂养它们的日子里，我们还发现，
that their willingness to come down to the food pile significantly diminished, and we didn't see that same kind of decline in our control groups.
它们飞到食物堆的意愿显著减少，但我们的对照组并没有同样水平的减少。
So that suggests that, yes, crows can make associations with particular places where they've seen dead crows.
所以这表明，没错，乌鸦可以与看到死乌鸦的地方产生联系。
So together, what that tells us is that while we certainly shouldn't discount those other explanations,
那么这一系列结果表明，我们显然不该忽视其他解释，
we can feel pretty confident in saying that for crows, attention to their dead might be a really important way that these animals learn about danger.
我们可以充满信心地说，对乌鸦而言，关注死者可能是这些动物试探危险环境的非常重要的方式。
And that's a nice, tidy little narrative on which to hang our hats.
这是一个逻辑严谨的小故事，很有说服力。
But in life and death, things are rarely so neat,
但对于生与死，事情很少如此简单，
and I really came face to face with that in a follow-up experiment, where we were looking at how crows respond to dead crows in the absence of any kind of predator.
在接下来观察捕食者不在场时乌鸦对死者做何反应的实验中，我直击了这个问题。
And suffice it to say, we found that in these cases, the wakes can get a little more weird.
这样说吧，我们发现在这些案例中，乌鸦会变得有些奇怪。
So this is what that experimental setup looks like.
这是实验设置的样子。
You can see our stuffed dead crow alone on the sidewalk, and it's been placed on the territory of a pair.
你可以看到行人道上的乌鸦标本，它被放在一对乌鸦的领地上。
That is the alarm call by one of those territorial birds, and it's coming into frame.
这是其中一只领地鸟发出的警告，它开始进入了画面。
Pretty soon, its mate is going to join it. And so far, this is all very usual. This is what crows do.
很快，它的配偶加入进来。到目前为止，这些行为都很常见。这些是乌鸦的行为。
OK, right now it's getting a little less usual.
好吧，现在有些不太正常了。
Not everyone here might be familiar with what bird sex looks like, so if you are not, this is what it looks like.
并非每个人都熟悉乌鸦交配的样子，如果你不熟悉，大概就是这样子。
You're basically seeing a confluence of three behaviors: alarm, as indicated by the alarm calling;
基本上你看到的是三种行为的混合：警报，类似报警呼叫；
aggression, as indicated by the very forceful pecking by both one of the copulatory birds and one of the excited bystanders; and sexual arousal.
攻击性，体现在交配的鸟儿强有力的啄食行为上，以及一个兴奋的旁观者；还有性兴奋。
Clearly, this is startling, and interesting to think about and talk about.
显然，这很让人吃惊，很容易引起思考和讨论。
But if our goal is to understand the big picture of how animals interact with their dead, then the most important question we should ask is, is this representative?
但我们的目标是理解动物如何与它们的死者互动的整体情况，那我们该问的最重要问题是，这具有代表性吗？
Is this something that's happening consistently?
这是会持续发生的事情吗？
And that's why being able to do systematic studies with crows is so valuable, because after conducting hundreds of these trials,
这就是为何对乌鸦进行系统研究是如此有价值，因为在进行数百次这些实验，
where I was placing these dead crows out on the sidewalks on the territories of hundreds of different pairs, what we found was that, no, it's not.
把死乌鸦放在数百对不同的乌鸦领地的路旁后，我们发现，不是的，这些都并非是持续的行为。
Contact of any kind, whether it was sexual, aggressive or even just exploratory, only occurred 30 percent of the time.
任何形式的接触，不管是交配、攻击，甚至只是探究，发生的几率只有30%。
So given that this wasn't representative, this was the minority, we may be tempted to just dismiss it as irrelevant, odd, creepy, weird crow behavior.
所以鉴于这些行为不具有代表性，只是少数情况，我们可能会忽略它为不相关的、奇怪的，令人毛骨悚然的乌鸦行为。
But what may surprise you is that behaviors like aggression or even sexual arousal aren't all that rare, and certainly aren't constrained to just crows.
但可能会让你惊讶的是，攻击性，甚至性兴奋，都并不罕见，当然也不仅限于乌鸦。
Because while the popular narrative when it comes to animal death behaviors tends to focus on affiliative behaviors like grooming or guarding,
因为当谈到动物对待死者的行为时，主流叙事倾向于关注梳毛或守卫这些友好的行为，
that is far from the complete list of what even our closest relatives do around their dead.
但这些行为与我们的近亲对待死者的方式依然相去甚远。
In fact, we've documented behaviors like biting, beating and even sex itself in a wide variety of animals, including many primates and dolphins.
事实上，我们记录到了各种各样的动物，包括许多灵长类动物和海豚在内的诸如咬、打，甚至性本身的行为。
So where does this leave us in our understanding of animals and their death rituals?
那么这对我们理解动物和它们的死亡仪式提供了什么启示呢？
Well, for crows, it suggests that, like insects, they may have a strong adaptive driver in their interest in their dead.
对乌鸦来说，这意味着，像昆虫一样，它们对死者的兴趣中有强烈的适应性驱动。
In this case, it might be danger learning, and that might have acted as the inspiration for our own rituals as well.
在这个案例中，它可能是习得危险，这可能也是我们人类仪式的灵感来源。
But when we look more closely, we see that there's no one simple narrative that can explain the vast array of behaviors we see in crows and many other animals.
但当我们更仔细地观察，就会发现，并不存在一个简单的叙事，能够解释我们在乌鸦和很多其他动物上看到的大量多样化行为。
And that suggests that we are still far from completing that time machine.
这也意味着，我们离完成时间机器还为时过早。
But it's going to be a really fascinating ride. Thank you.
但这将会是一段非常令人着迷的旅程。谢谢。
