Slashdot Mirror
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.
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.
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?
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.
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?
We had a dog capable of opening all sorts of doors, he could even open the back door against the swing, ie: turn the handle and pull the door towards himself.
He also used to get agitated if you wore a hat because he couldn't recognise you if you did, he would even bark at my uncle if he was wearing a hat and stop immediately if he removed it.
Having been a building site dog he developed a strange habit of barking when you called "FIRING!" which they used to do before anyone used a nail gun, he would as a result bark on demand any time any place, quite an amusing party trick.
He also used to have what can only be described as a guilty look that he would give you when he had done something wrong, sometimes he would even give the look before doing something wrong and then go and do it!
All in all I think we are not giving dogs nearly enough credit on the smarts front.
Sam "to lazy to register" Look
Mind that this was a Border Collie. Even if she was small for her kind it caused some consternation among his friends seeing the dog in unfamiliar dog locations.
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
So there's a dog who demonstrated an understanding of strategy, tactics, and deception. He lured her away from the food under false pretenses. He knew the back route into the kitchen was unguarded. Most importantly, he put a multi-step plan together in his little canine brain before executing it.
Humans don't have a monopoly on thought. We just have all the components of intelligence wrapped up in a meat package that can orchestrate them. If that dog had had opposable thumbs, there's no telling where it would have stopped!
John
Otherwise, they are very hard to tell from rocks
"The Constitution, the WHOLE Constitution, and nothing but the CONSTITUTION."