Jeff Ricker quoted Michael Shermer:
> For example, Morgana was looking at
> a photograph of a couple embracing, and N'Kisi allegedly says "Can I
> give you a hug?" THAT was counted as a hit. Of course, we are not told
> how often N'Kisi blurts out that particular phrase,
My earlier comment may have been lost on folks who don't follow
Major League Baseball. On Opening Day, a rather top-heavy blond woman named
"Morgana" runs out onto the field somewhere, hugs and kisses a coach or
player or umpire. She is known as "Morgana, the kissing bandit". As far as I
know, this is just something that she does on her own (for attention), not a
publicity piece for a company.
For that reason, on top of the (terribly) incomplete data problem,
I'm a little suspicious that this might be some kind of a intentional hoax
(with Sheldrake the victim). The "Comedy Central" connection makes that a
bit more likely. Of course, it could very well not be the same Morgana, in
which case that little coincidence just increases the background likelihood
that the parrot would have tended to make the cited responses (that is,
regardless of what the "target" was - making the incomplete data problem
even more problematic).
Paul Smith
Alverno College
Milwaukee
