> The final example though, where a Crow returns the camera-lens cap to the family requires some pretty advanced thinking.
I think the article (and probably the podcast? haven't listened yet) make too big a deal of this. We don't know that the crows realized that the lens cap belonged to those people. Perhaps they just saw it as another neat thing to gift. Perhaps they smelled the family on it, and just returned it to a place that smelled similarly.
I can't, but I have no idea what that's supposed to prove. That animals have abilities I don't? I can't fly, either, or swim in the arctic ocean and catch fish with my mouth.
I think the article (and probably the podcast? haven't listened yet) make too big a deal of this. We don't know that the crows realized that the lens cap belonged to those people. Perhaps they just saw it as another neat thing to gift. Perhaps they smelled the family on it, and just returned it to a place that smelled similarly.