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Parrot Drives Robotic Buggy
grrlscientist writes "Proving that robots aren't just for people any longer, an African grey parrot, Pepper, has learned to drive a robot that was specially designed for him. Pepper, whose wings are clipped to preventing him from flying around his humans' house and destroying their things, now manipulates the joystick on his riding robot to guide it to where ever he wishes to go. This robotic 'bird buggy' was the brainchild of his human companion, Andrew Gray, a 29-year-old electrical and computer engineering graduate student at the University of Florida."
...that the same human who had the birds wings clipped so it can't move has had to build him a fucking go kart so he's able to move around again.
Fuck you, Andrew Gray, and the horse you rode in on. IF you haven't clipped its hooves at the knee, that is!
The bird is well looked after and you can tell that just by looking at it's feathers. The very fact that the bird knows how to *drive* the buggy means that it is getting enough attention to be healthy and the fact that his wings are clipped means that the bird has appropriate flight power for being indoors - from which we can deduce that the bird is completely domesticated and thinks of it's cage as it's own 'room' - so it also has it's own territory.
From the video the bird only flapped it's wings to maintain it's balance, that means the bird *chooses* to play with the cart. Parrots are fast, manuverable birds, and just because it's wings are clipped doesn't mean it can't fly - it just means that it won't get out of control, frustrated, scared and hurt itself inside a house. If it was a wild bird then you might have a point. The guy owns a parrot, that's a 25-60 year commitment to a pet, so before you go judging the guy ask yourself if you could do the same thing.
Honestly settle down with the political correctness, it's far more offensive than a parrot with it's wings clipped.
My ism, it's full of beliefs.