If you read only one book on the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, with the possible exception of Tanner's monograph, make it Woody's Last Laugh. The timing of its publication is almost uncanny, given the US Fish and Wildlife Service's move to declare the ivorybill extinct, which was announced in September 2021. Woody's Last Laugh sheds important light on the wrongheadedness of that decision, but more importantly it challenges everyone with an interest in the species to think carefully about their cognition and their biases. Thus, it has implications that transcend the subject matter, however compelling that may be for some of us. ~ Mark Michaels & Patricia Johnson, Amazon

When I was appointed Co-chair of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service team charged with preparing a preliminary recovery plan for the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, I had naive notions about the work ahead. Dr. Haney’s book would have been an immense help in navigating the many strange behaviors, misconceptions, and bitter disagreements that ensued. Woody’s Last Laugh reveals that I, too, fell to faulty thinking about the Ivory-bill and the question of its continued existence or extinction. I highly recommend this book for anyone involved in endangered species recovery as a way to avoid the many cognitive biases that we all face. ~ Jon Andrew, Co-chair of Ivory-billed Woodpecker Recovery Team (retired)

This delightful book reviews the enduring fascination with alleged sightings of the “extinct" American ivory-billed woodpecker to illuminate the role of well-understood cognitive biases and reasoning errors in science and conservation. Who would have thought that an “extinct" bird can tell us so much about the quirks of the human mind? ~ Dr. Norbert Schwarz, Department of Psychology, University of Southern California

Whether the “extinct” Ivory-billed Woodpecker really survived in the swamps of southern Arkansas might unleash passionate debates only among diehard bird lovers like myself, but Woody's Last Laugh turns an arcane discussion between specialists into a fascinating, witty and easily understandable demonstration of how our very human passions can tempt serious scientists to make avoidable errors in judgment. This book is definitely not just for birders. ~ Jacques Pitteloud, Swiss Ambassador to the United States of America

In Woody's Last Laugh, Haney artfully exposes the foibles of human thought and resulting proclamations regarding the Ivory-billed Woodpecker's assumed demise. When it comes to forming beliefs, we are all subject to cognitive biases, as facts become subordinate to emotions and "truth" becomes what we want it to be. Regardless of whether you're a "believer" or a "denier" of the Ivory-bill's persistence, Haney's meticulous but entertaining dissection of the controversy will inspire self-reflection as to how we navigate evidence and group-think in the Age of Misinformation. ~ William Hayes, Ph.D., Professor of Biology, Loma Linda University

An excellent book, revealing how scientists and environmentalists, like all of us, suffer from the same dangerous judgment errors called cognitive biases. These mental blind spots played a devastating role in the narrative around the ivory-billed woodpecker, even around the basic Schrödinger's cat-like mystery of whether it's dead or alive. Dr. Haney uses an excellent probabilistic thinking approach to have a much more nuanced and thoughtful approach to the question rather than the simple binary approach promoted by cognitive biases. Along the way, Woody's Last Laugh illustrates the numerous dangerous judgment errors that we all need to avoid if we want to have a truthful view of reality. ~ Dr. Gleb Tsipursky, behavioral scientist, trainer in addressing cognitive biases, and best-selling author, including of Pro Truth: A Practical Plan f

As the author observes in Woody's Last Laugh, we are all “the creation of idiosyncratic experience…[who cannot] escape a pull of our genes or the push of our environments when assimilating the perceptions that we come to hold.” Can one illuminate ‘hard’ science through the lens of personal experience? Yes, this book does exactly that in an effective, entertaining fashion. Readers are escorted on a bird’s mysterious journey that uncovers how our flawed preconceptions came to dominate belief on whether and when a big woodpecker even still existed. Painstakingly researched and referenced, Woody draws on such diverse fields as conservation biology, ecology, history, economics, statistics, and psychology to make its penetrating insights. At the same time, and fittingly, it is a highly personal reflection wherein the author provides a window on how his personal origins and passions led him always to question how humans have come to understand the natural world. ~ Dr. Mark Eiswerth, Professor, Department of Economics and Instructor, Environmental and Sustainability Studies, University of Northern Colorado, and

J. Christopher Haney’s Woody’s Last Laugh: How the Extinct Ivory-billed Woodpecker Fools Us into Making 53 Thinking Errors is the most important book on the ivorybill since Tanner, at least. It’s an absolute must for anyone regardless of where they stand on the controversy. ~ Mark Michaels, Project Principalis https://projectcoyoteibwo.com/

[A] wonderful recent volume, Woody’s Last Laugh, a book that I regard as a surprising breath of fresh air. ~ Cyberthrush , Host and moderator of Ivory-bills Live???! THE blog devoted to news and commentary on the most iconic bird in American ornithology https://ivorybills.blogspot.com/