Quote:Once, Alex was given several different colored blocks. Pepperberg asked him, "What color three?" expecting him to say blue. However, as Alex had been asked this question before, he seemed to have become bored. He answered "five!" This kept occurring until Pepperberg said "Fine, what color five?" Alex replied "none". This was said to suggest that parrots, like humans, get bored. Sometimes, Alex answered the questions incorrectly, despite knowing the correct answer.
In July 2005, Pepperberg reported that Alex understood the concept of zero. If asked the difference between two objects, he also answered that; but if there was no difference between the objects, he said "none", which meant that he understood the concept of nothing or zero.
Alex's death on 6 September 2007, at age 31, came as a surprise, as the average life span for a grey parrot in captivity is 45 years. His last words ("You be good, I love you. See you tomorrow.") were the same words that he would say every night when Pepperberg left the lab.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_(parrot)
https://alexfoundation.org/the-birds/alex
https://www.thevintagenews.com/2016/11/2...lor-am-i-2
