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Picture-Sorting Dogs Show Human-Like Thought
ComputerDog writes "A new study shows they can sort photographs into categories in a similar way to humans. In experiments, dogs were shown photographs of a landscape and of a dog, and were rewarded if they selected the latter using 'a paw-operated computer touch-screen'. Later they were able to correctly categorize dogs shown on an unfamiliar background landscape. '' "
Picture-sorting Humans show Dog-like thought. Who are we to claim that dogs behave like humans? Humans behaving like dogs makes just as much sense.
Everything is subjective.
... the dogs are learning provide whatever results the higher-ups want them to provide, and are rewarded or punished accordingly?
Sounds like doing science for the U.S. government.
http://outcampaign.org/
Any animal that couldn't tell the difference between another animal and a rock or between different types of animals would soon become some carnivores dinner or fall off a cliff. Why would anyone (least of all supposedly intelligent researchers) find this ability to differentiate objects surprising? I'd imagine you'd probably have to go much further down the evolutionary tree to find an animal that couldn't do this.
Seeing eye dogs are more intelligent than the editor of this article.
Trackball users will be first against the wall.
All I can say is finally! We are starting to break through the chains. We are a smart respectable species, one worthy of inclusion among the most intelligent of all. Now I know we have things to be ashamed of, like the toilet drinking, the vendettas against postal workers, the fetch syndrome, but we are working to improve ourselves. If we could just get a little help a long the way, we could make things so much better. This article is proof positive that we dogs are honorable. So please pay us respect as we pay you respect.
P.S. Thanks to all those who bow to their new photograph sorting, canine overlords, but it's really not necessary. We are a humble species and have no designs on taking over earth. Unless... a mailman should ever come into power, then of course we would have no recourse but violence. Until then, thank you but no thank you.
I got a catholic block.
Now can the dogs determine the gender of the other dog ... without having to resort to sniffing the other dog's butt?
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Of course they do. I'd go so far to say that most predators should show similar tendencies. We use our sight for a lot of things that the average mutt wouldn't use it's sight for, but at the most basic level, it has the exact same function for both of us. Predator/Prey identification, basic navigation, threat recognition and response.
The examples in the article are all "A dog can tell the difference between a landscape and a dog, even if the dog is on a landscape" which just shows that, like us, their eyes are drawn to the animal before the scenery. Classic response for an animal concerned with predator/prey responses. The mountains are nice, but you have to make sure of the animal first.
The main differences in visual perception would be dealing with stuff like ranging, depth perception, night-vision, day-vision, etc...All stuff to do with the actual hardware of the eye, not in the basic ability to distinguish between two similar objects.
This should be obvious from a dog's ability to tell one person from another. I've witnessed similar behavior in herbivores as well, so I'd not be surprised to find that they had the same sort of abilities, though it would be difficult to test.
ad logicam Claiming a proposition is false because it was presented as the conclusion of a fallacious argument.
I saw a show on a Discovery-like channel in which during WW2 they successfully trained birds to recognize different makes of vessels and peck a steering panel in the right direction. They were trying to build a guided bomb. I don't remember why they canceled the program, but it was not due to the bird's skills.
Birds rely heavily on their eyesight to find or distinguish food and prey. Thus, they may be as good or better than dogs, who use mostly hearing and smell. Plus, dogs are partly color blind.
Table-ized A.I.
Even better, any animal that can't distinguish between members of its own species and rocks, would probably have a hard time passing such stupidity on to the next generation, no?
...can't tell the difference between a dog and your leg.
OTOH, if you could get CATS to do that, I'd be impressed.
OTOH if you could make a cat do anything, I'd be impressed.
I apologize for that behavior hiccup. It's just hard sometimes to control ourselves. Blame evolution not us. Your leg probably just looks "appetizing." I would suggest wearing wiskers on your pants leg or painting a picture of a rolled up newspaper on your pants leg. Either of those should alleviate the problem. Alternatively, you could try being the bigger person and speak to your dog, but I understand the deserved apprehension you might have about this.
I hope this has helped. BTW, I'm working on a gpl'ed evolutionary firmware update that moves the urge in question from the leg to the shoe, as this is less disturbing. I've tried to get rid of the trait altogether, but it's tough. A lot of the code is proprietary, and well God just doesn't like to give the darn stuff up. We're working on it though. Link to our project www.opensourceevolutionarydogimprovement.org.
I got a catholic block.
We need more semiotics taught in the schools.
The animals weren't responding to other dogs and landscapes. They were responding to _photographs_ of dogs and landscapes. And dealing with them accordingly.
Do not confuse the finger with the moon, Grasshopper.
Just asking.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Previously it was thought that dogs could only catagorize other dogs or people by the tried and true butt sniffing technique. This experiment shows that dogs, possibly due to their proximity to human DNA, have evolved more advanced ways to perceive others.
It's hotly debated whether mosquitos have transferred blood and DNA from humans to dogs to give them this power, as there are many other methods of transmission. Needless to say, the Bird Flu has helped that process greatly among many other species, but it has yet to be shown that is has factored into the human-dog element.
As for the dog to human question you posed... Have you seen furries?
Up until very recently, I always thought of dogs as generally being playful but incredibly stupid animals outside of spirit-breaking intensive training... at least, until we just got our recent dog, a pit bull/boxer mix. Unlike most dogs I've owned over the years, this one isthe first I known to preemptively develop strategies on the fly under ever-changing conditions. (In other words, she doesn't do the whole "repeat the same process over and over expecting a different result each time" thing.)
For example, take a piece of food being dropped on the floor just out of her reach behind a barrier. Most dogs would simply shove their snout under the barrier and root at it with their tongue for hours. With this dog though, she only did the snout rooting thing once, stopped, reached under the barrier with her paws trying to grip the food, stopped and finally removed the barrier itself to get at the food.
In my previous experience, only a cat would have ever made it to step 2.
Needless to say, the dog is now quite an escape artist, having deciphered how to use doors, removing collars like houdini and bypassing six foot tall chain-link fences.
8==8 Bones 8==8
The project to which you are referring was the work of Skinner, and called Project Pigeon. It was canceled.
On the other hand, virtually the same experiment as the one conducted with dogs was conducted with pigeons, in 1964, by Herrnstein and Loveland. So, someone beat you to it. =)
Have you been touched by his noodly appendage?
Try with cats. They can eventually teach you to respond to a word or two in their language ;)
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
There's not much difference between training a dog to recognize photos of dogs and training a human child to recognize Latin characters. The only difference between us and dogs is neural capacity, learning rules, and societal environment.
What studies like this one do is help us to further understand what those hard-wired rules in animals are, allowing us to get a better grasp of the big learning picture across all forms of life.
Buckle your ROFL belt, we're in for some LOLs.
My dog growing up (a miniature collie) was raised by a cat who had lost her kittens (to the CO gas chamber). She used a litter box, or buried her business when relieving herself outside. She wouldn't go in lawns (too hard to dig), but looked for leaf or sand covered areas.
Otherwise, they are very hard to tell from rocks
"The Constitution, the WHOLE Constitution, and nothing but the CONSTITUTION."
Another good one is "monkey in the middle". Two humans sit 10 or 20 feet apart, with a small plush toy. One of the humans makes the plush toy wiggle like a small mammal, and peep temptingly from behind his leg or back. The cat crouches low to the ground, his tail lashing with small movements, and his eyes shifting back and forth. When you're least expecting it he springs, and if he caught you off guard, grabs the toy with his claws and stalks triumphantly with it in his teeth and drops it in the middle. The other human then takes the toy and makes it wiggle. If the human has managed to stay focused when the cat leaps, he tosses the toy over the cats head to the other human. The cat then leaps high into the air in an attempt to intercept it - often succeeding.
I have a neutered male cat named "BeBe". That's because he has a bb in his behind, put there by an obviously non-animal lover, who was handy with a Red Rider BB Gun.
Now, on the the intelligent part...
He is constantly on the lookout for "enemy cats" that want to move in on his territory. So, he has no problem with that normal cat function.
Food gathering...
Open the Refrigerator, or try and make something to eat, and he suddenly appears, telling you that he is a good cat, and deserves some of whatever you are fixing. Gets in the way, you have to step over him.
He gets "dry" cat food, it keeps, since he won't eat anything that has "Yesterday" written on it, even if it is still tasty. Mice, Rats and Squirrels are not food, they are something he kills to bring to you to bolster his case that he is, indeed, a "good cat". Still wants whatever you are having for dinner tonight.
Picture sorting?, well I didn't want to mention this, but he has a unique method for sorting the Sunday newspaper according to the advertisement flyers therein for Office Depot, Circuit City, and others that might be hawking Big Screen Televisions, or his personal favorite, those external USB Hard Drives. He's still having real difficulty telling the 160 GB ones from the 250 GB ones, but he and I are working on it. Biggest problem he seems to have is holding the Sharpie Permanent Marker pen that he likes to use to circle the Drives that he thinks I need to take a closer look at, perhaps doing some online research, to uncover any apparent bugs that any may have, that would affect the overall quality of the product. Time and Time again, BeBe has given me a "cat-o-gram" concerning the Per-GB cost factor. Big problem in the Cat World, having ones master pay too much for a given Techno-Toy, only to short the budget for necessary Veterinary care, yearly vaccinations including annual physical exams, intestinal worm tests, heartworm tests, and the all important annual wellness screens.
The Method, You Say?
1. Prepare his litter pan with newspaper advertisement flyers.
2. Wait.
3. Your results will be ready in the morning.
Rapidweather's Linux Screenshots.