Dogs show capacity to understand some human points of view, scientifically
Offline Many dog owners think their pets are clever or that they understand humans but, until now, this has not been tested by science.
Dr Juliane Kaminski, of the University of Portsmouth's Department of Psychology, has shown that when a human forbids a dog from taking food, dogs are four times more likely to disobey in a dark room than a lit room, suggesting they take into account what the human can or cannot see.
Dr Kaminski said: "That's incredible because it implies dogs understand the human can't see them, meaning they might understand the human perspective."
This is the first study to examine if dogs differentiate between different levels of light when they are developing strategies on whether to steal food. It is published in the journal Animal Cognition. The research was funded by the Max Planck Society, Dr Kaminski's former employer.
Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.
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Dr Kaminski said: "Humans constantly attribute certain qualities and emotions to other living things. We know that our own dog is clever or sensitive, but that's us thinking, not them.
"These results suggest humans might be right, where dogs are concerned, but we still can't be completely sure if the results mean dogs have a truly flexible understanding of the mind and others' minds. It has always been assumed only humans had this ability."
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Dr Kaminski ran a series of experiments in varied light conditions. In each test, a dog was forbidden by a human from taking the food. When the room was dark, the dogs took more food and took it more quickly than when the room was lit.
The tests were complex and involved many variables to rule out that dogs were basing their decisions on simple associative rules, for example, that dark means food.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/02/130211090840.htm
Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.
Well, this "surprise" on some individual's parts about something like this is because humans are ignorant of evolution and do not understand that other mammals can and do learn and have emotions and more tactical cognition than we think. I other words, this should not be a shock to anyone.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
Makes sense to me. Our dogs sneak around at night looking for something to eat. They even eat paper. They have a sense how loud they are being so as not to get caught. Years ago my wife and I stayed at a B&B. The owner was religious and we got into a discussion do animals feel pain and emotion. She said they don't because they have no soul. When we sighted examples for our pets, she said pets that live with humans gain a soul or something close to that. My wife and I were dumbfounded, but it had been a quote we throw at each other now and again for humor.
Religion Kills !!!
Numbers 31:17-18 - Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.
http://jesus-needs-money.blogspot.com/
The problem isn't lack of knowledge of evolution, it's anthropomorphism. The application of human behaviours and characteristics to other species without evidence is as bad as belief in gods.
Enlightened Atheist, Gaming God.
I believe it was Atheist Extremist that once quoted something along the line of (paraphrasing) "If horses could paint and had gods, they would paint pictures of gods with hooves that graze in fields and have tails".
“It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.”
― Giordano Bruno
Actually they got that from an ancient Greek, I forgot which one though, maybe not put in to AEs words, but that is where AE got it from. That meme quote came originally from an ancient Greek.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2011/10/on-the-gods-of-horses.html
The famous Xenophanes fragment runs as follows:
If horses or oxen or lions had hands
or if they could draw with their hands and
produce works like men,
horses would draw the figures of the gods as
similar to horses, and oxen as similar to oxen,
and they would make the bodies
of the sort which each of them had.
Thanks guys, I am going to have to use that somewhere.
“It is proof of a base and low mind for one to wish to think with the masses or majority, merely because the majority is the majority. Truth does not change because it is, or is not, believed by a majority of the people.”
― Giordano Bruno