From the interview: The main takeaway is that humans are special, but so are birds and reptiles. So our brains are amazing, but bird brains are even as amazing. We have neurons other species do not have. But the chicken, even the chicken, they do have neurons that we don’t have. So evolution has found so many different ways to generate complex brains, not just only one direct pathway from amphibians to humans. In this case, the tree of intelligence is a tree. It’s not just a single branch.

Their population is 135,000 as of 2018 according to Wikipedia. Although local populations ie in the Arabian Sea might be at risk having been genetically isolated for up to 70,000 years and in smaller numbers

Our boy won’t talk to humans. He has appointed the girl as his spokescat and will headbutt her till she gets human attention. If she is sleeping elsewhere he gets quite confused how to ask for food. Why can’t they just read my ears then??!