The findings emerge in a world enraptured by artificial forms of intelligence, and they could teach us something about how complex circuits in our own brains evolved. In the 1960s, the neuroanatomist Harvey Karten’s research into avian neural circuits changed how the field viewed bird intelligence. This region in the bird brain, the dorsal ventricular ridge (DVR), seemed to be comparable to a neocortex; it just didn’t look like it. “His work was really revolutionary.” He concluded that because avian and mammalian circuits are similar, they were inherited from a common ancestor. During this time, biologists also began to appreciate bird intelligence, starting with their studies of Alex, an African gray parrot who could count and identify objects.