Hosted by the School of Psychological Science: Conwy Lloyd-Morgan Lecture

Abstract: Cognitive illusions reveal a number of fascinating features about the psychology and biology of the mind; not just perception but also mental time travel, the ability to remember the past and anticipate the future. Magic effects also illuminate some important things about Theory of Mind, the ability to assess the thoughts of others, both on the part of the audience and on the part of the magician. In this talk I will evaluate the extent to which corvids, known for their impressive cognitive abilities, exploit such principles in their natural caching behaviour~ i.e., their ability to hide food from the prying eyes of their competitors and protect their caches from being pilfered. I will also investigate whether and to what extent these birds are fooled by human magic effects. Finally, I will discuss what this approach might reveal about the intersection between the ability to manually produce an action, and the ability to anticipate the actions of others: for sleight of hand magic capitalises on the observer’s predictions of specific manual movements, particularly those of the hands

Bio: Professor Nicola Clayton FRS is the Professor of Comparative Cognition in the Department of Psychology at the University of Cambridge, UK, and Founding Director of the Cambridge Centre for the Integration of Science, Technology and Culture at the University of Cambridge. She is also Visiting Professor at the Nanging University’s Institute of Technology and Beijing University of Language and Culture, and Honorary Professor at Hangzhou Diangi University, China. She is interested in the processes of thinking with and without words, and comparisons between the cognitive abilities of corvids, cephalopods and children. She was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 2010. She is also Scientist-in-Residence and associate Artist at Rambert (formerly Ballet Rambert), a position held since 2011. Her H index is 88.