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Without injecting anything new into the raven discussion,
I note that 'flock' is one of those words that tends to confuse rather
than convey meaning. Personally, I would like to see it confined to a
socially cohesive group, but that goal is, I fear, unattainable. For
too many people it is simply a collective for a number of birds that happen to
be together at a given moment, whether seagulls, silvereyes, shearwaters
or Swift Parrots. Many birds that do not 'flock' will gather at a food
source.
That being so, I think the 'socially cohesive' school should
retreat, avoid 'flock', and use new language to describe what their 'socially
cohesive' group is, or is doing. As with other things that
are papered over by imprecise language, this could lead to new insights -
in this case, exactly what the difference is between A Raven and L Raven
behaviour. If that is too difficult, you could, for the time being, use
'flocking flock' and 'non-flocking flock'.
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