Study Aims To Read Dogs' Thoughts

jjp9999 writes "A new study at Emory University is trying to figure out what dogs think. The study uses functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI) to scan the dogs' brains while they're shown different stimuli. Results from the first study will be published by the Public Library of Science, where the dogs were shown hand signals from their owners. 'We hope this opens up a whole new door for understanding canine cognition and inter-species communication. We want to understand the dog-human relationship, from the dog's perspective,' said Gregory Berns, director of the Emory Center for Neuropolicy and lead researcher of the dog project."

Comments

Hello?

[dolo724]

Yes, this is Dog.

Re:Hello?

[Katakaa]

I think it would be more interesting to study cats. Last night I was swimming at my pool (drunk), and the cats around my apartment building seemed interestingly intelligent. They come up on the bench to watch my computer screen, wanted to be hugged and generally seemed to have advanced thought process.

On top of this, geckos seem rather intelligent too. Their callsign "gecko" is not that easy to make, as it has tons of variations in the tune. If you have ever heard the noise a gecko makes you know what I'm talking about. On top of that the reasoning behind the sign is rather intelligent too - it messages to other geckos that "I'm here" and wants to meet with them.

It's almost funny that geeks seek to find intelligent life outside earth when there is so many around us.

Re:Hello?

[HornWumpus]

Cats thoughts: Kill the human? No, need food, human bad to eat. Kill the human? No, need catnip. Kill the human? No, need water. DOG. RUN.

Re:Hello?

[xevioso]

Yeah, I used to think my cats jump up on the bed in the morning to see if I am awake so they can say hello and greet me as I start the new day. Actually I have figured out they are checking to see if I am alive or not so the feasting on my still-warm corpse can begin.

Re:Hello?

[Paracelcus]

Anybody that thinks that there can be no bond between Humans and cats has not had a close friendship with one!

In 1970 a few years after my dog Lady had died at age sixteen, a badly mauled little white tomcat was sitting in the hallway of the bldg in which I lived (it was open to the ally in the rear), I opened my door and said "you OK cat?" and with no warning he darted under my still opened sofa bed. Not wanting to lose any fingers by pulling him out I tried to coax him out with pieces of fried beef liver, he ate all the liver and a frankfurter (most of it from my hand) and finally got him to come out with a bowl of milk.

I named him Casey Cat, he was the toughest, most pugnacious, scarred up, feisty little runt I had ever seen! He was an American short haired all white alley cat, with one eye damaged, chewed up ears and a missing canine tooth. He weighed in at about six pounds.

Casey came and went as he pleased through an open window, He'd wake me by purring on my chest and when my eyes opened he'd grunt in my face with cat food breath (he could not meow). He was a very memorable friend!
   

Re:Hello?

[History's Coming To]

"That's mine! That too! All that's mine, that's mine, but not that bit. It's been a good morning, I've eaten three times, slept six times and made a lot of things mine...next I'm going to see if I can't have sex with something!"

(That line is the one which got Red Dwarf commissioned in the first place.)

Re:Hello?

[gstrickler]

A cat's thoughts

Cats and dogs are both quite intelligent. They're very different, dogs are typically more loyal, and they're social/pack oriented. They want to be part of a heirarchy with a leader (usually an alpha male). They want approval and acceptance into the pack.

Cats are more possessive (they "own" you) and independent. Cats have a "language", their different vocalizations have different meanings. I learned to tell the difference such that I could recognize when I cats were asking for food, water, attention, going outside, caution, or when they just wanted to "talk" (be social). It's simplistic as a "language", but it's effective, and appears to be common to most cats, so it fulfills the requirements of being a "language".

Re:Hello?

[flappinbooger]

Cats thoughts: Kill the human? No, need food, human bad to eat. Kill the human? No, need catnip. Kill the human? No, need water. DOG. RUN.

According to watching my 2 dogs, dog thoughts are thus:

Squirrel! No, false alarm. Hey, what's that? I need to sniff it. Can I eat it? No. Can I pee on it? No. I'll bark at it! Hey, my humans are home! It's been 10 minutes that seemed like forever I need to sniff them. Hey, what's that? I need to sniff it.

Wash, rinse, repeat.

Re:Hello?

[gtall]

Cats certainly have higher mental functions, I had two Siamese sisters. Both would sulk when I pushed them away. In the last year of Tinkerbell's life, she started snuggling up real close to my chest at night in bed. This went on including her last night before I had to take her in for that last vet visit, kidney disease. That last night, Ariel was inconsolable, and she demanded to be right on the other side of Tinkerbell. Every night since Tinkerbell's last, Ariel snuggled up just like Tinkerbell had...including her last night before I had to take her in for her last vet visit, kidney disease. They made it 16 and 17 yrs old respectively and broke my heart.

I theorize they both felt bad from the kidney problems, although both were snuggling up before their blood test showed they'd be in any distress. It was almost like they either knew the end was near and it made them feel better. In a sense, the reason doesn't matter. What mattered was that it was important to them.

Re:Hello?

[gtall]

Cats pack, or pride. There was TV doc on cats and they had one story where a dog was terrorizing cats in a neighborhood. One day, they set up a trap. The dog went after a cat as bait and the rest jumped him.

Re:Hello?

[arth1]

Cats have no sense of loyalty.

Cats are territorial lone hunters.
Dogs are roaming pack hunters.

So, yes, cats will be both more territorial and less loyal.
It's not that it loves you less, it loves you plenty here and now, but it's not a real attachment.

Add that cats have different sleep needs, and aren't always active when their human companions are, while dogs will adjust their sleep and wake periods to fit the pack and situation.

When I come home, and the dogs are at the door and the cats in the window, the dogs think "oh boy, oh boy, he's home, HE'S HOME, oh boy, oh boy!", while the cats think "feed me".

Already done

[Anonymous Coward]

Bacon? Is that Bacon? Got to have that bacon! Bacon!

Re:Ignoring the more important question....

[Trepidity]

Probably the case with any relationship, actually. Do we really want to know what other people are thinking? Or cats?

They could have just played Black & White 2...

[dryriver]

You know, the excellent God-Game by Lionhead Studios where you have to create & educate a "Creature" to fight for your people and interests. The creature in B&W 2, though artificial, is probably about as smart as your average dog. Oh well. Happy studying...

Read their diaries

[naroom]

Why bother with MRI? We can just read the dog's diary.

Re:Read their diaries

[JoshWurzel]

I prefer this one: http://textfromdog.tumblr.com/

Combine with the FX show "Wilfred" and you've got everything you need to peer into a dog's psyche.

Old news.

[AragornSonOfArathorn]

Gary Larson figured this out ages ago.

Re:Old news.

[Dogtanian]

You bet he did!

Squirrel!

[Frequency Domain]

Darn the minimal post requirement! Subject says it all.

Re:Squirrel!

[Terrasque]

This. First thought I had when seeing the headline.

And now to contribute a bit here.. Meet Doug

Re:Dogs?

[Just Some Guy]

Why not try to figure out what attractive women think instead of

"I bet that guy posts on Slashdot. Shun! Shun!

Re:Gary Larson is still a genius

[tverbeek]

Or this one:
https://www.blogmutt.com/images/farside.jpg

In other news

[brunes69]

A similar study to try to discover what cat's think, was foiled when the cats refused to participate fully in the study. Before they left, initial results showed the following thought: "Get out! The're onto us!"

Profit

[Frankie70]

1) Read dog's thoughts.
2) .......
3) Profit.

What's the missing 2nd step here?
Only a dog would know. If only we could read their thoughts. Wait.....

Canine Decoder

[goombah99]

The Canine speech decoder already exists:
http://d1syadvoyajtpr.cloudfront.net/534fa0b9aacaf866a8eb6c6f51fa1388_500.jpg

Scrabble tiles

[0111 1110]

Have they tried Scrabble tiles?

It's about time, we can learn from other species.

[elucido]

I think this is a very good idea and there should be lots of research in this area. If we discover that animals have thoughts similar enough to ours then we will have to give them rights. Depending on how complex the thoughts they might require person status.

This would at least in theory suggest we will need to consider animal rights when making political or economic decisions. Dogs in specific if they could communicate with us could completely change the relationship humans have with them.

Although I'm going to be honest I don't expect talking dogs anytime soon.

I CAN HAZ TRANSLATION?

[Guppy]

Cats thoughts

Good attempt but your dialect and accent are off. As a long-time scholar of Cat, let me translate for you:

I CAN KILLZ HOOMAN? No, need füdz, hoomanz is made of bad füdz.
I CAN KILLZ HOOMAN? No, give catnipz plz. Kthnxbai.
I CAN KILLZ HOOMAN? No, give waterz plz. Kthnxbai.
DOG. RUN.

It has already been decoded.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

An aspiring entomologist, named Gary Larson, had already published a short paper on what dogs hear. Unfortunately I don't have a link but it goes something like this:

You: Stupid dog Bingo, Why did you do that Bingo? Should you always shred the paper like this Bingo? How can I read it now Bingo! You dimwit Bingo!

Dog hears: xxxxxx xxx Bingo, xxx xxx xxx xxx xxxx Bingo? xxxxx xxx xxxxxx xxxxx xxx xxxxx xxxx xxxx Bingo? xxx xxx X xxxx xx xxx Bingo! xxx xxxxxx Bingo!

Vomit!

[kid_wonder]

I forget which comedian this was from:

"What would your dog say if it could talk? Probably 'You know, vomit really ain't half bad!'"

They already talk

[Tablizer]

But dogs can already talk. I swear, here's an absolutely true conversion I had with my dog:

Me: "Sparky, what's on top of a house?"

Dog: "Roof!"

Me: "Sparky, how does sand-paper feel?"

Dog: "Rough!"

Me: "Sparky, who is the best baseball player of all time?"

Dog: "Ruthf!"

Try asking.

[pubwvj]

Try asking the dog. I have a large pack of working livestock dogs on our farm. We use sign language with them. They use some of the signs back to us. There are some limitations, they can't finger spell or do certain moves, but we have have developed a dog-gin mix of sign and vocal language. I also understand some of their own language. All told we have about 300 words that we use back and forth. This is enough language to talk about a lot of things.

If you want to know what they're thinking, ask.

Re:It's about time, we can learn from other specie

[Eightbitgnosis]

How complex do you exactly think the mind of a being who eats cat turds out of a littler box actually is?