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(单词翻译:双击或拖选)
This is Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin. This will just take a minute.
Forget “Polly wanna cracker1.” Polly wants to boogie. Or so say scientists in a pair of papers in the April 30th issue of the journal Current Biology. They found that some birds, especially parrots, can bob their heads, tap their feet and sway their bodies to a musical beat.
It’s long been thought that dancing is a uniquely human hobby. Chimps2 don’t move to the groove3. And when was the last time you saw Fido or Fluffy4 shake their furry5 booties? But Snowball the cockatoo is another story. That bird’s got rhythm. Researchers found that Snowball can adjust the tempo6 of his dance moves to coincide with the speed of the music. In this study, the tune7 was “Everybody” by the Backstreet Boys, one of the cockatoo’s faves.
But Snowball’s not the only bird who likes to boogie. In a separate study, researchers searched YouTube for videos of dancing animals. Of the 1,000 they turned up, only 15 critters actually moved in sync with the beat. Fourteen of those were parrots, one was an elephant. Pachyderms, parrots and people are all vocal8 mimics9. So the neural10 circuits for vocal learning may also enable moving to the beat.
Thanks for the minute for Scientific American's 60-Second Science. I'm Karen Hopkin.
1 cracker | |
n.(无甜味的)薄脆饼干 | |
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2 chimps | |
(非洲)黑猩猩( chimp的名词复数 ) | |
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3 groove | |
n.沟,槽;凹线,(刻出的)线条,习惯 | |
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4 fluffy | |
adj.有绒毛的,空洞的 | |
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5 furry | |
adj.毛皮的;似毛皮的;毛皮制的 | |
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6 tempo | |
n.(音乐的)速度;节奏,行进速度 | |
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7 tune | |
n.调子;和谐,协调;v.调音,调节,调整 | |
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8 vocal | |
adj.直言不讳的;嗓音的;n.[pl.]声乐节目 | |
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9 mimics | |
n.模仿名人言行的娱乐演员,滑稽剧演员( mimic的名词复数 );善于模仿的人或物v.(尤指为了逗乐而)模仿( mimic的第三人称单数 );酷似 | |
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10 neural | |
adj.神经的,神经系统的 | |
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