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European Magpie
The Eurasian magpie or common magpie (''Pica pica'') is a resident breeding bird throughout the northern part of the Eurasian continent. It is one of several birds in the crow family (corvids) designated magpies, and belongs to the Holarctic radiation of "monochrome" magpies. In Europe, "magpie" is used by English speakers as a synonym for the Eurasian magpie: the only other magpie in Europe is the Iberian magpie (''Cyanopica cooki''), which is limited to the Iberian Peninsula. The Eurasian magpie is one of the most intelligent birds, and it is believed to be one of the most intelligent of all non-human animals. The expansion of its nidopallium is approximately the same in its relative size as the brain of chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans and humans. It is the only bird known to pass the mirror test, along with very few other non-avian species. Taxonomy and systematics The magpie was described and illustrated by Swiss naturalist Conrad Gessner in his '' Historiae anima ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Toulouse
Toulouse ( , ; oc, Tolosa ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and from Paris. It is the fourth-largest city in France after Paris, Marseille and Lyon, with 493,465 inhabitants within its municipal boundaries (2019 census); its metropolitan area has a population of 1,454,158 inhabitants (2019 census). Toulouse is the central city of one of the 20 French Métropoles, with one of the three strongest demographic growth (2013-2019). Toulouse is the centre of the European aerospace industry, with the headquarters of Airbus, the SPOT satellite system, ATR and the Aerospace Valley. It hosts the CNES's Toulouse Space Centre (CST) which is the largest national space centre in Europe, but also, on the military side, the newly created NATO space centre of excellence and the French Space Command and Space Acad ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Orangutan
Orangutans are great apes native to the rainforests of Indonesia and Malaysia. They are now found only in parts of Borneo and Sumatra, but during the Pleistocene they ranged throughout Southeast Asia and South China. Classified in the genus ''Pongo'', orangutans were originally considered to be one species. From 1996, they were divided into two species: the Bornean orangutan (''P. pygmaeus'', with three subspecies) and the Sumatran orangutan (''P. abelii''). A third species, the Tapanuli orangutan (''P. tapanuliensis''), was identified definitively in 2017. The orangutans are the only surviving species of the subfamily Ponginae, which diverged genetically from the other hominids (gorillas, chimpanzees, and humans) between 19.3 and 15.7 million years ago. The most arboreal of the great apes, orangutans spend most of their time in trees. They have proportionally long arms and short legs, and have reddish-brown hair covering their bodies. Adult males weigh about , while f ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
American Ornithologists' Union
The American Ornithological Society (AOS) is an ornithological organization based in the United States. The society was formed in October 2016 by the merger of the American Ornithologists' Union (AOU) and the Cooper Ornithological Society. Its members are primarily professional ornithologists, although membership is open to anyone with an interest in birds. The society publishes the two scholarly journals, '' The Auk'' and '' The Condor'' as well as the '' AOS Checklist of North American Birds''. In 2013, the American Ornithologists' Union announced a close partnership with the Cooper Ornithological Society, including joint meetings, a centralized publishing office, and a refocusing of their respective journals to increase efficiency of research. In October 2016, the AOU announced that it was ceasing to operate as an independent union and was merging with the Cooper Ornithological Society to create the American Ornithological Society. History The American Ornithologists' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Conspecific
Biological specificity is the tendency of a characteristic such as a behavior or a biochemical variation to occur in a particular species. Biochemist Linus Pauling stated that "Biological specificity is the set of characteristics of living organisms or constituents of living organisms of being special or doing something special. Each animal or plant species is special. It differs in some way from all other species...biological specificity is the major problem about understanding life." Biological specificity within ''Homo sapiens'' ''Homo sapiens'' has many characteristics that show the biological specificity in the form of behavior and morphological traits. Morphologically, humans have an enlarged cranial capacity and more gracile features in comparison to other hominins. The reduction of dentition is a feature that allows for the advantage of adaptability in diet and survival. As a species, humans are culture dependent and much of human survival relies on the culture and soc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Black-billed Magpie
The black-billed magpie (''Pica hudsonia''), also known as the American magpie, is a bird in the corvid family found in the western half of North America. It is black and white, with black areas on the wings and tail showing iridescent hints of blue or blue-green. It is one of only four North American songbirds whose tail makes up half or more of the total body length (the others being the yellow-billed magpie, the scissor-tailed flycatcher, and the fork-tailed flycatcher). This species prefers generally open habitats with clumps of trees. It can therefore be found in farmlands and suburban areas, where it comes into regular contact with people. Where persecuted it becomes very wary, but otherwise it is fairly tolerant of human presence. Historically associated with bison herds, it now lands on the backs of cattle to glean ticks and insects from them. Large predators such as wolves are commonly followed by black-billed magpies, who scavenge from their kills. The species also w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Classical Latin
Classical Latin is the form of Literary Latin recognized as a literary standard by writers of the late Roman Republic and early Roman Empire. It was used from 75 BC to the 3rd century AD, when it developed into Late Latin. In some later periods, it was regarded as good or proper Latin, with following versions viewed as debased, degenerate, or corrupted. The word ''Latin'' is now understood by default to mean "Classical Latin"; for example, modern Latin textbooks almost exclusively teach Classical Latin. Cicero and his contemporaries of the late republic referred to the Latin language, in contrast to other languages such as Greek, as or . They distinguished the common vernacular, however, as Vulgar Latin (''sermo vulgaris'' and ''sermo vulgi''), in contrast to the higher register that they called , sometimes translated as "Latinity". ''Latinitas'' was also called ("speech of the good families"), ''sermo urbanus'' ("speech of the city"), and in rare cases ''sermo nobilis'' ("n ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mathurin Jacques Brisson
Mathurin Jacques Brisson (; 30 April 1723 – 23 June 1806) was a French zoologist and natural philosopher. Brisson was born at Fontenay-le-Comte. The earlier part of his life was spent in the pursuit of natural history; his published works in this field included ''Le Règne animal'' (1756) and the highly regarded ''Ornithologie'' (1760). As a young man, he was a disciple and assistant of René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur. For a period of time he was an instructor of physical sciences and natural history to the family of the monarch. He held the chair of physics at the College of Navarre, and from 1759 was a member of the Academy of Sciences. A significant work involving the " specific weight of bodies" was his ''Pesanteur Spécifique des Corps'' (1787). In his investigations of electricity, Brisson was opposed to the theories of Priestley and Franklin. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pica (genus)
''Pica'' is the genus of seven species of birds in the family Corvidae in both the New World and the Old. They have long tails and have predominantly black and white markings. One species ranges widely from Europe through Asia, one occurs in western North America, one is restricted to California, one is restricted to southwestern Saudi Arabia, and one occurs across North Africa; the last two are often considered subspecies of the Eurasian. They were previously considered closely related to the blue and green magpies of Asia, but recent research suggests their closest relatives are instead the Eurasian crows. Taxonomy The genus ''Pica'' was introduced by the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson in 1760. He derived the name by tautonymy from the specific epithet of the Eurasian magpie ''Corvus pica'' introduced by Linnaeus in 1758. ''Pica'' is the Latin word for the Eurasian magpie. A molecular phylogenetic study published in 2018 found that the Eurasian magpie consisted ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Genus
Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nomenclature, the genus name forms the first part of the binomial species name for each species within the genus. :E.g. ''Panthera leo'' (lion) and ''Panthera onca'' (jaguar) are two species within the genus '' Panthera''. ''Panthera'' is a genus within the family Felidae. The composition of a genus is determined by taxonomists. The standards for genus classification are not strictly codified, so different authorities often produce different classifications for genera. There are some general practices used, however, including the idea that a newly defined genus should fulfill these three criteria to be descriptively useful: # monophyly – all descendants of an ancestral taxon are grouped together (i.e. phylogenetic analysis should clea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Binomial Nomenclature
In Taxonomy (biology), taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, both of which use Latin grammar, Latin grammatical forms, although they can be based on words from other languages. Such a name is called a binomial name (which may be shortened to just "binomial"), a binomen, name or a scientific name; more informally it is also historically called a Latin name. The first part of the name – the ''generic name (biology), generic name'' – identifies the genus to which the species belongs, whereas the second part – the specific name or specific epithet – distinguishes the species within the genus. For example, modern humans belong to the genus ''Homo'' and within this genus to the species ''Homo sapiens''. ''Tyrannosaurus rex'' is likely the most widely known binomial. The ''formal' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Systema Naturae
' (originally in Latin written ' with the ligature æ) is one of the major works of the Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) and introduced the Linnaean taxonomy. Although the system, now known as binomial nomenclature, was partially developed by the Bauhin brothers, Gaspard and Johann, Linnaeus was first to use it consistently throughout his book. The first edition was published in 1735. The full title of the 10th edition (1758), which was the most important one, was ' or translated: "System of nature through the three kingdoms of nature, according to classes, orders, genera and species, with characters, differences, synonyms, places". The tenth edition of this book (1758) is considered the starting point of zoological nomenclature. In 1766–1768 Linnaeus published the much enhanced 12th edition, the last under his authorship. Another again enhanced work in the same style and titled "'" was published by Johann Friedrich Gmelin betwee ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Historiae Animalium (Gessner)
''Historia animalium'' ("History of the Animals"), published at Zurich in 1551–1558 and 1587, is an encyclopedic "inventory of renaissance zoology" by Conrad Gessner (1516–1565). Gessner was a medical doctor and professor at the Carolinum in Zürich, the precursor of the University of Zurich. The ''Historia animalium'', after Aristotle's work of the same name. is the first modern zoological work that attempts to describe all the animals known, and the first bibliography of natural history writings. The five volumes of natural history of animals cover more than 4500 pages. Overview The ''Historia animalium'' was Gessner's magnum opus, and was the most widely read of all the Renaissance natural histories. The generously illustrated work was so popular that Gessner's abridgement, ''Thierbuch'' ("Animal Book"), was published in Zurich in 1563, and in England Edward Topsell translated and condensed it as a ''Historie of foure-footed beastes'' (London: William Jaggard, 1607). ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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