Pre cro-magnon. Give them 50 to 100 thousand years
crow-magnon?
You could set up monastery* where you wrap the science with sufficient doctrine to attract great devotees. Their real mission?, selectively breed intelligent crows. Then vary the methods and open 10 more monasteries. That would speed things up or fail in interesting ways.
* A conventional research lab won't do.
Not grad students who would only give 5 years to the cause.
Integrate other tool-using animals like dolphins and chimps, and see if interesting nontrivial interactions arise.
While a fun idea, I think we are already breading intelligent crows.
Human trash provides high energy food, good for developing and supporting large brains. And the urban landscape is a complex environment with many dangers, but high reward for the curious and smart bird.
Actually, urban environments are probably a lot safer for birds than the wilderness. Unlike predator species, humans in cities don't actively hunt birds. In fact many people feed them. Buildings also provide really good shelter.
What makes human development much faster/different (IMO) is that we can store and pass on information to the next generations.
And as soon as the crows understand the way to do it, their development will accelerate drastically too.
Try pissing off a crow sometime. If you irritate it enough, it will tell its friends how to recognize you.
You'll know when this happens.
The radio announced today that if one is especially nice to crows, certain ones will bring you gifts such as shiny bits of glass and trinkets
Yes, that with "hands."
Give them actual hands like us and u have no doubt they'd be able to do even more impressive things.