slothropCrows are intelligent birds and learn quickly – even from each other.In Sweden, they are used to collect cigarette butts and bring them to a machine that automatically rewards them with peanuts.
DevialThe issue is the crows are going to learn about this, and start just fishing rubbish out of bins, because it’s the easiest way to get their reward.
There was once a Parisian dog who kept trying to push children into the Seine, because he had learned that if he ha saved a drowning child he gets tons of rewards.
This phenomenon is called Perverse Incentive , also known as the Cobra Effect.
It’s basically just another version of Goodharts Law:
When a measure (in this case “the amount of rubbish the crow brings”) becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.
See also: The NYT best seller list. Once that became popular, publishers started buying their own books during certain times, to make the list. Now basically every book in existence is a “NYT best seller” and the metric has become effectively worthless.