sciencenews.org— The article explains how dogs determine optimal paths on a moment-by-moment basis. Interesting stuff for all you dog loving mathematicians.
Feb 17, 2006View in Crawl 4
Cool article. Reminds me of the movie Cabin Fever:Dude introduces dog: This is Dr. MamboChick: Doctor like medical, or doctor like professor?Dude: Yes, he's a professor. Of being a dog.Except this do is a really a professor.
I have 2 dogs. One is always calculating the shortest way on our walk, getting me to go ahead so she can cut off the path. The other one (he) runs around like mad, walking at least twice as far. He also ways quite a bit less. So that goes to show you: Less calculus is healthier; but every engineering student inherently knows that.
This is ridiculous. The dogs aren't consciously doing calculus, their neurons are. Much like how most of us don't understand differential equations, but we can still move our arms around and pick things up, which require those complex calculations to be made in our brain.
According to some ancient Greek philosophers, in the tradition following Pyrrho, it is said that dogs were known to have 'reasoning.' The observable demonstration of this is:if a dog is tracking, sniffing the ground, perhaps chasing a rabbit, and the dog comes to a place where the road divides into three roads--after he tracks (sniffs) the first road, and the second, determining that the rabbit didn't go that way....the dog will immediately run down the third road, without sniffing it, thus concluding, by REASON, that -- if the rabbit didn't go down the first two roads, it had to have gone down the third road! This is rudimentary 'reasoning! 'I guess that is why I never liked dogs. My cat is a lot cooler than that! ...Not so mechanistic and predictable!
I love dogs. The story was cute. I dugg it as a person who owns a c**ker spaniel who both loves to chase tennis balls but also loves to swim.I can say this as a person who hated Calculus. It took me three times to pass it and the C I got was more a reflection of the gratitude of my prof. for leaving the Department of Engineering than my understanding of it.
No s**t. Catch is a calculus problem - measuring the rate of change of angle of ball to eye and knowing where to put one's hand (or mouth). This doesn't mean that dogs or anyone who can catch a ball are maths genii. It means that their brains have developed heuristics to handle such situations. The more they do it the better the heuristic gets. This is called "learning"
doghumpsmonkeyFeb 17, 2006
Cool article. Reminds me of the movie Cabin Fever:Dude introduces dog: This is Dr. MamboChick: Doctor like medical, or doctor like professor?Dude: Yes, he's a professor. Of being a dog.Except this do is a really a professor.
entheosFeb 18, 2006
I have 2 dogs. One is always calculating the shortest way on our walk, getting me to go ahead so she can cut off the path. The other one (he) runs around like mad, walking at least twice as far. He also ways quite a bit less. So that goes to show you: Less calculus is healthier; but every engineering student inherently knows that.
pupaFeb 18, 2006
This is ridiculous. The dogs aren't consciously doing calculus, their neurons are. Much like how most of us don't understand differential equations, but we can still move our arms around and pick things up, which require those complex calculations to be made in our brain.
shaunjordanFeb 18, 2006
Am I the only one who could give 2 f**ks about if i dog can do math or not?I want my dog to FETCH and SIT.
waterdragonFeb 18, 2006
According to some ancient Greek philosophers, in the tradition following Pyrrho, it is said that dogs were known to have 'reasoning.' The observable demonstration of this is:if a dog is tracking, sniffing the ground, perhaps chasing a rabbit, and the dog comes to a place where the road divides into three roads--after he tracks (sniffs) the first road, and the second, determining that the rabbit didn't go that way....the dog will immediately run down the third road, without sniffing it, thus concluding, by REASON, that -- if the rabbit didn't go down the first two roads, it had to have gone down the third road! This is rudimentary 'reasoning! 'I guess that is why I never liked dogs. My cat is a lot cooler than that! ...Not so mechanistic and predictable!
aaplmacguyFeb 18, 2006
I love dogs. The story was cute. I dugg it as a person who owns a c**ker spaniel who both loves to chase tennis balls but also loves to swim.I can say this as a person who hated Calculus. It took me three times to pass it and the C I got was more a reflection of the gratitude of my prof. for leaving the Department of Engineering than my understanding of it.
drbhoneydewFeb 18, 2006
No s**t. Catch is a calculus problem - measuring the rate of change of angle of ball to eye and knowing where to put one's hand (or mouth). This doesn't mean that dogs or anyone who can catch a ball are maths genii. It means that their brains have developed heuristics to handle such situations. The more they do it the better the heuristic gets. This is called "learning"
blizFeb 18, 2006
dugg just for this '...you dog loving mathematicians'I love dogs and maths.