Would you consider the following to be a human mannerism: reacting violently due to being pressured into an action against your own will? Of course you would.
Now, have you ever tried to put a cat in a cat carrier?
Dogs require conditioning to communicate with any semblance of reliability...cats are already trained, you just have to communicate on the same level as them (i.e. with body language.) As previously mentioned, this is based on my own experience of owning 7 dogs and 4 cats. naturally, this doesn't mean it applies to EVERY cat and dog, but it certainly applies to every cat and dog I've ever owned. That accounts for something, even if not a definitive answer on the cat vs dog question.
If you still don't get it, then I think we're done here.
Now I am not against treats and toys but I am careful to only offer them in play time to avoid associating them with obedience.
Our neighbors follow the same line of thinking (they have a Husky who's big for her age, and is highly energetic...as husky's tend to be, lol.) They have her VERY well crate-trained, and she responds to both verbal and gesture commands almost immedeatly (and, on a rare occasion, even from people she's meeting for the first time.)
To assist in crate-training her, whenever she got too riled up, they would give her the standard sit/lay down/stay commands, and if she responded accordingly, she got a treat. If after consuming the treat, she got up before she was told to, or got up after she was told to but continued to be too energetic, into the crate she went.
She's trained now to the point where you just say crate, and she goes on her own, sits down, and doesn't move an inch until you close the door.
However, I do want to point out that some of that attitude you are reading may very well be anthropomorphizing your cat as has been pointed out earlier.
I was referring to shifting your method of interaction, not the animal's.
Conditioning point of view means providing them treats/praise to teach them, attitude point of view means to ignore the compulsion of treating them like humans or equals.
You will see in other posts in this same thread wherein I describe the need to respond to a cat the way another cat would respond, rather than the way a human would respond. This applies feline characteristics to humans, which is the opposite of anthropomorphizing a pet.
I was referring to shifting your method of interaction, not the animal's.
Conditioning point of view means providing them treats/praise to teach them, attitude point of view means to ignore the compulsion of treating them like humans or equals.
You will see in other posts in this same thread wherein I describe the need to respond to a cat the way another cat would respond, rather than the way a human would respond. This applies feline characteristics to humans, which is the opposite of anthropomorphizing a pet.
Mine does the opposite. As soon as she hears the jingling of the little clip on the side of a laser pointer, she looks at my hand, and immedeatly starts looking at the ground for the dot. As soon as it shows up, she plays "hunter". Rather than chasing after it, she prowls and hunts it.
You are right though, the trick to communicating with a cat is to communicate with the cat, rather than expecting everyone and everything to speak English.
When our current cat Fizzgigg does something wrong, we motion as if we're going to spray her with a water bottle (we only had to actually spray her once. Now, just the gesture of "spraying" is enough to stop her dead in her tracks, even without holding a spray bottle.) On the rare occasion that it's really messed up (such as chewing on paper for my wife's work, lol), we gesture-spray her AND yell at her as if she were human.
She may respond mostly to the gesture, but she still picks up on the addition of verbal abuse that what she did was not just wrong, but REALLY wrong. She occasionally repeats gesture-spray offenses, but she has never repeated a gesture-spray and verbal abuse offense.
The blinking you are referring to is generally accepted as a friendly gesture meant to signify safety and contentment. If their ears are half-flattned and loose, they are not only content, but almost completely uncaring of their surroundings.
For a better effect, don't look directly back at her/him when you do it...look slightly to the right or left of their head. Feline pack leaders rarely look at their subordinates directly in the eyes, even when their subordinates stare directly at theirs.
It's tempting to treat a cat like your equal, but that's a mistake a lot of people make...no matter how much you think that cat cares about you, if you treat it as an equal, it will walk all over you (sometimes literally!)
True, but whether it be praise or a treat, conditioning is still conditioning.
I'm not implying that because conditioning works is an indicator of a lack of intelligence...I'm just saying that cats come with those capabilities built-in with their instincts, whereas with a dog they have to be "learned".
It's more a comment on the difference between methods of communication, rather than a comment on the relative intelligence of either.
Aside from mentioning it, I'll ignore the numerous grammatical errors while simultaneously implying that I'm misguided.
Cat's are not more intelligent. Theya re unable to be trained in ost cases, and even then ti's in the csinmplest of response.
So, because you can't force them to do what you want them to do, they're automatically stupid?
Cats are stupid, but since you are confusing there lack of intellegence with 'attitude'. Basically you think there independent and there for more intelligent.
Cats understand much of what humans say to them, they just don't care. Have you ever seen the way a cat looks at you when you give them a "command"? It's not a blank look, it's a "you gotta be kidding me" look.
Their independence DOES denote intelligence. They have the brainpower to determine they don't have to do what you want them to do, which is why conditioning doesn't work on a cat nearly as well as it does on a dog.
Stop anthropomorphizing animals.... they hate that~
I've done the exact opposite...in numerous posts, I've said that humans need to interact with cats as if they themselves are a cat. How is that, in any way, pushing human qualities on cats? If anything, it's pushing feline qualities on humans!
YOU EXPERIENCE counts fro diddley squat. It's nearly the worse kind on anecdote.
Of course. The fact that I've had 7 dogs and 4 cats in my 26 years of life means absolutely nothing when it comes to understanding how to communicate with both. Thanks for pointing that out.
Science shows Dogs are smarter. And yeah, I have owned both but I would llet my anecdote determine what's real
"Science"? So you're down to all-encompassing generalized labels now to support your meager attempt at an argument?
Ours plays fetch with just about anything, but her achilles heel is a stretchy hair tie. No matter what she's doing, the moment she sees a hair tie, she focuses solely on that hair tie.
Watching her follow one when it's on my wife's wrist never gets old, lol.
My point was that a cat doesn't really have to be trained...they just need to be interacted with in a different way than dogs.
Cats are "pre-trained" by instinct and pack mentality. All you have to do is communicate with them on that basis (mostly through physical cues, rather than aural), and you'll be able to have things running smoothly.
I've never met a cat that could respond to its name, let alone do tasks as complex as dogs.
That's because people tend to communicate with cats the same way they communicate with dogs, which just plain doesn't work. If you communicate with a cat the way other cats do (primarily through physical rather than aural communication), it works quite well.
Body language makes up 80-90% of communication between cats, whereas with dogs this is closer to 40-60%.*
When you attempt to train a dog, conditioning comes into play. The dog knows it will get rewarded if it does what it's told, and as such becomes trained. You train a dog similar to how you train a human, through a reward system.
When you attempt to train a cat, attitude comes into play. The cat doesn't care what you tell it to do, because it's a cat. Bribary doesn't work...you have to train a cat the way a mother cat would train her kittens. If you can read their body language (and learn how to physically communicate without the use of a tail), you can communicate with them on a fairly deep level.
I've had pets my whole life, both cats and dogs. In my own experience, dogs make for better companions, but cats are more intelligent.
The discussion at hand has just cemented, in my mind, the notion that discrete sound cards are a niche product.
On that, I completely agree. The difference is noticable, but as far as I'm concerned, on-board is "good enough". I'd rather spend that $50-$300 on more RAM, a better CPU, or a better video card.
The moment the line blurs for someone between reality and video game is when we need to start worrying. I wonder...why is it that people who don't play them can't seem to tell the difference?/strawman
No biggie...the bulb isn't very bright, and because of how I position myself while gaming, the light is more in line with the top of my head rather than eye-level. Being short helps:-)
Most of the time, I use my ATH-AD700s, but when I want to show people a youtube video or if I'm gaming and watching a movie, I'll just use the speakers built into the monitor. My main monitor is an Asus VH236H (secondary is a Dell 2005FPW). I gotta say, considering they are just speakers built into the back of a monitor, the VH236H has some decent built-ins. They are tinny and devoid of bass, just like any built-in speaker on a budget monitor...but I'm constantly surprised by the amount of detail that manages to come through.
Space concerns and volume are the only reasons I do it. Curse you, 3rd floor apartment!
Slashdot Mirror
Would you consider the following to be a human mannerism: reacting violently due to being pressured into an action against your own will? Of course you would.
Now, have you ever tried to put a cat in a cat carrier?
For the third time:
Dogs require conditioning to communicate with any semblance of reliability...cats are already trained, you just have to communicate on the same level as them (i.e. with body language.) As previously mentioned, this is based on my own experience of owning 7 dogs and 4 cats. naturally, this doesn't mean it applies to EVERY cat and dog, but it certainly applies to every cat and dog I've ever owned. That accounts for something, even if not a definitive answer on the cat vs dog question.
If you still don't get it, then I think we're done here.
Now I am not against treats and toys but I am careful to only offer them in play time to avoid associating them with obedience.
Our neighbors follow the same line of thinking (they have a Husky who's big for her age, and is highly energetic...as husky's tend to be, lol.) They have her VERY well crate-trained, and she responds to both verbal and gesture commands almost immedeatly (and, on a rare occasion, even from people she's meeting for the first time.)
To assist in crate-training her, whenever she got too riled up, they would give her the standard sit/lay down/stay commands, and if she responded accordingly, she got a treat. If after consuming the treat, she got up before she was told to, or got up after she was told to but continued to be too energetic, into the crate she went.
She's trained now to the point where you just say crate, and she goes on her own, sits down, and doesn't move an inch until you close the door.
However, I do want to point out that some of that attitude you are reading may very well be anthropomorphizing your cat as has been pointed out earlier.
See here:
I was referring to shifting your method of interaction, not the animal's.
Conditioning point of view means providing them treats/praise to teach them, attitude point of view means to ignore the compulsion of treating them like humans or equals.
You will see in other posts in this same thread wherein I describe the need to respond to a cat the way another cat would respond, rather than the way a human would respond. This applies feline characteristics to humans, which is the opposite of anthropomorphizing a pet.
I was referring to shifting your method of interaction, not the animal's.
Conditioning point of view means providing them treats/praise to teach them, attitude point of view means to ignore the compulsion of treating them like humans or equals.
You will see in other posts in this same thread wherein I describe the need to respond to a cat the way another cat would respond, rather than the way a human would respond. This applies feline characteristics to humans, which is the opposite of anthropomorphizing a pet.
I see. So I'm not allowed to present my own opinion, even when including the qualifier "In my own experience?"
Would you mind explaining to me the point of a forum like Slashdot if I'm not allowed to express my opinion, even when explicitly labeling it as such?
Mine does the opposite. As soon as she hears the jingling of the little clip on the side of a laser pointer, she looks at my hand, and immedeatly starts looking at the ground for the dot. As soon as it shows up, she plays "hunter". Rather than chasing after it, she prowls and hunts it.
You are right though, the trick to communicating with a cat is to communicate with the cat, rather than expecting everyone and everything to speak English.
When our current cat Fizzgigg does something wrong, we motion as if we're going to spray her with a water bottle (we only had to actually spray her once. Now, just the gesture of "spraying" is enough to stop her dead in her tracks, even without holding a spray bottle.) On the rare occasion that it's really messed up (such as chewing on paper for my wife's work, lol), we gesture-spray her AND yell at her as if she were human.
She may respond mostly to the gesture, but she still picks up on the addition of verbal abuse that what she did was not just wrong, but REALLY wrong. She occasionally repeats gesture-spray offenses, but she has never repeated a gesture-spray and verbal abuse offense.
The blinking you are referring to is generally accepted as a friendly gesture meant to signify safety and contentment. If their ears are half-flattned and loose, they are not only content, but almost completely uncaring of their surroundings.
For a better effect, don't look directly back at her/him when you do it...look slightly to the right or left of their head. Feline pack leaders rarely look at their subordinates directly in the eyes, even when their subordinates stare directly at theirs.
It's tempting to treat a cat like your equal, but that's a mistake a lot of people make...no matter how much you think that cat cares about you, if you treat it as an equal, it will walk all over you (sometimes literally!)
True, but whether it be praise or a treat, conditioning is still conditioning.
I'm not implying that because conditioning works is an indicator of a lack of intelligence...I'm just saying that cats come with those capabilities built-in with their instincts, whereas with a dog they have to be "learned".
It's more a comment on the difference between methods of communication, rather than a comment on the relative intelligence of either.
Aside from mentioning it, I'll ignore the numerous grammatical errors while simultaneously implying that I'm misguided.
Cat's are not more intelligent. Theya re unable to be trained in ost cases, and even then ti's in the csinmplest of response.
So, because you can't force them to do what you want them to do, they're automatically stupid?
Cats are stupid, but since you are confusing there lack of intellegence with 'attitude'. Basically you think there independent and there for more intelligent.
Cats understand much of what humans say to them, they just don't care. Have you ever seen the way a cat looks at you when you give them a "command"? It's not a blank look, it's a "you gotta be kidding me" look.
Their independence DOES denote intelligence. They have the brainpower to determine they don't have to do what you want them to do, which is why conditioning doesn't work on a cat nearly as well as it does on a dog.
Stop anthropomorphizing animals.... they hate that~
I've done the exact opposite...in numerous posts, I've said that humans need to interact with cats as if they themselves are a cat. How is that, in any way, pushing human qualities on cats? If anything, it's pushing feline qualities on humans!
YOU EXPERIENCE counts fro diddley squat. It's nearly the worse kind on anecdote.
Of course. The fact that I've had 7 dogs and 4 cats in my 26 years of life means absolutely nothing when it comes to understanding how to communicate with both. Thanks for pointing that out.
Science shows Dogs are smarter. And yeah, I have owned both but I would llet my anecdote determine what's real
"Science"? So you're down to all-encompassing generalized labels now to support your meager attempt at an argument?
We communicate with dogs the way w communicate with intelligent creatures.
By giving them biscuits when they do what you tell them to do? Sounds more like oppression to me.
Ours plays fetch with just about anything, but her achilles heel is a stretchy hair tie. No matter what she's doing, the moment she sees a hair tie, she focuses solely on that hair tie.
Watching her follow one when it's on my wife's wrist never gets old, lol.
I've gotten ours to respond well to different whistles, each one noting a different message. "Food is in your bowl", "This is a warning", etc.
Still, she generally responds much better to body language.
My point was that a cat doesn't really have to be trained...they just need to be interacted with in a different way than dogs.
Cats are "pre-trained" by instinct and pack mentality. All you have to do is communicate with them on that basis (mostly through physical cues, rather than aural), and you'll be able to have things running smoothly.
I've never met a cat that could respond to its name, let alone do tasks as complex as dogs.
That's because people tend to communicate with cats the same way they communicate with dogs, which just plain doesn't work. If you communicate with a cat the way other cats do (primarily through physical rather than aural communication), it works quite well.
Body language makes up 80-90% of communication between cats, whereas with dogs this is closer to 40-60%.*
*Numbers taken from my own experience.
I think you're confused here.
When you attempt to train a dog, conditioning comes into play. The dog knows it will get rewarded if it does what it's told, and as such becomes trained. You train a dog similar to how you train a human, through a reward system.
When you attempt to train a cat, attitude comes into play. The cat doesn't care what you tell it to do, because it's a cat. Bribary doesn't work...you have to train a cat the way a mother cat would train her kittens. If you can read their body language (and learn how to physically communicate without the use of a tail), you can communicate with them on a fairly deep level.
I've had pets my whole life, both cats and dogs. In my own experience, dogs make for better companions, but cats are more intelligent.
"Body scans and genital fondlings would save more lives if our government was paying to have them done in hospitals rather than airports."
This of course assumes the scans are safe, but you get the idea...
The discussion at hand has just cemented, in my mind, the notion that discrete sound cards are a niche product.
On that, I completely agree. The difference is noticable, but as far as I'm concerned, on-board is "good enough". I'd rather spend that $50-$300 on more RAM, a better CPU, or a better video card.
But that's just me.
Joe Schmuckatelli also doesn't know what a sound card is other than "the thing I plug my speakers into", if even that.
I don't think Joe Schmuckatelli would have a place at the table where this discussion would be taking place...do you?
One of the many things capitalism has a vastly negative effect on is art,
Usually.
Art + Capitalism = a product or "brand".
Say it with me now:
It's. A. Video. Game.
The moment the line blurs for someone between reality and video game is when we need to start worrying. I wonder...why is it that people who don't play them can't seem to tell the difference? /strawman
No biggie...the bulb isn't very bright, and because of how I position myself while gaming, the light is more in line with the top of my head rather than eye-level. Being short helps :-)
I don't have $400 speakers plugged in to my TV!
I didn't say $400 speakers, I said setup. There is a very, VERY big difference.
People producing music are not your "average" setup.
You sure about that? You'd be surprised how low-budget you can go and still produce a great-quality sound.
Most of the time, I use my ATH-AD700s, but when I want to show people a youtube video or if I'm gaming and watching a movie, I'll just use the speakers built into the monitor. My main monitor is an Asus VH236H (secondary is a Dell 2005FPW). I gotta say, considering they are just speakers built into the back of a monitor, the VH236H has some decent built-ins. They are tinny and devoid of bass, just like any built-in speaker on a budget monitor...but I'm constantly surprised by the amount of detail that manages to come through.
Space concerns and volume are the only reasons I do it. Curse you, 3rd floor apartment!