• Quick note - the problem with Youtube videos not embedding on the forum appears to have been fixed, thanks to ZiprHead. If you do still see problems let me know.

dogs

Piggy said:
It depends on your definition of "worth".

For instance, do you think that a greater understanding of the extent and limits of plasticity in visual and auditory cortex is "worth" re-wiring ferrets' brains so that signals from their eyes go instead to the parts of the brain meant to be hooked up to their ears?
Click to expand...

I'll retract the question then. This is what ethics committees have to wrestle with I guess.

I'm not guilt-free either. My name is on a paper somewhere about Dapsone metabolism using CP450 from rat livers. Rats died in that experiment by the dozens. Even in that case, one I am intimately familiar with, I can't say it was worthwhile or not. Like many experiments, it didn't have a clear outcome and didn't advance the store of human knowledge much, if at all.

There was another one I still remember (unfortunately) that used beagles. It was the only time I've been physically sick in the presence of surgical gore. The idea was to cut and repair one of the two back tendons on the beagle's legs and then compare how it healed with the untouched tendon. I was just an observer on that one.

I think that particular study did help move the art of tendon repair forward, but I can't match it up one-to-one. The fact that healthy dogs were being cut into (under anesthesia) and then crippled intentionally made me ill though. I've got a strong bias towards dogs and not rats.

That was many, many years ago. A decade later, I accidentally sliced one of my own tendons (hand). Did the beagle research play into the repair I got that has me guessing now which hand it was? (I found the scar -- it was the right, not the left.)

About a year ago I took a dog in to be euthanized because of a huge tumor on his neck. My wife and I drove for a couple hours to a Veterinary School that was doing research on dog tumors to have it done. This time, the research was aimed at helping other dogs instead of humans. Still, it was incredibly hard to take him in.
 
Kleonaptra said:
SIR?! You would not say that if you were looking at my chest...SIR!:D

BTW clever Hans is one of my favourite stories.
Click to expand...

I figured you probably were not a sir, but hey, you can't mess with a classic quote! ;)
 
marplots said:
I'll retract the question then. This is what ethics committees have to wrestle with I guess.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I find myself in the same situation.

Much of the brain research I read is based on experiments with monkeys, cats, ferrets, and other mammals.

Sometimes I just have to put the text down and rub my eyes.

I really don't know if it's worth it or not.
 
RANT! I don't want to start a thread but I want to vent. :( I just got back from walking my dogs and we had a really close call with a stupid owner whose dog was out loose running in the neighborhood. My dogs are small and they have the annoying behavior of barking viciously at other dogs. I've tried to train them and normally I make them sit behind me, I face them and stop them from barking until the other dog goes past.

But this dog was loose and its owner nowhere around so it came toward us. As I was trying to stop one dog, the other got within inches of the loose dog who looked like it was going to attack. It was 4 times the size of my little dog. It was a very close call. I managed to get my other dog away and some neighbors who were also out walking their dog and recognized the loose dog helped distract him.

God that pisses me off. People are so irresponsible. They think because they have a friendly dog that nothing bad will ever happen with their off leash dog. I was worried my dog would be killed or seriously injured. I'm going to talk to the owners tomorrow if the neighbors who were out can tell me where they live. :(


Sorry... back to the thread.
 
Last edited:
So how come my dogs that are so clever about my cues don't get it that they are small and the dog they are barking ferociously at is dangerous to them?
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
RANT! I don't want to start a thread but I want to vent. :( I just got back from walking my dogs and we had a really close call with a stupid owner whose dog was out loose running in the neighborhood. My dogs are small and they have the annoying behavior of barking viciously at other dogs. I've tried to train them and normally I make them sit behind me, I face them and stop them from barking until the other dog goes past.

But this dog was loose and its owner nowhere around so it came toward us. As I was trying to stop one dog, the other got within inches of the loose dog who looked like it was going to attack. It was 4 times the size of my little dog. It was a very close call. I managed to get my other dog away and some neighbors who were also out walking their dog and recognized the loose dog helped distract him.

God that pisses me off. People are so irresponsible. They think because they have a friendly dog that nothing bad will ever happen with their off leash dog. I was worried my dog would be killed or seriously injured. I'm going to talk to the owners tomorrow if the neighbors who were out can tell me where they live. :(


Sorry... back to the thread.
Click to expand...

Most people are woefully uninformed about dog etiquette.

We were out walking our dogs with a friend a couple of weeks ago when we came across another group of people also walking their dogs. They immediately let their dogs loose so they could come over and play with our dogs.

In this case, it turned out fine...all the dogs got along with each other. However, HOW DID THEY KNOW EVERYTHING WOULD BE FINE? They didn't. They did not bother to ask us if it was OK for their dogs to play with ours.

Well-meaning, but frankly stupid behavior.
 
According to a documentary on the evolution of dogs I saw recently (NOVA: Dogs Decoded), they are the only animal other than humans that understands the significance of pointing at something.
Click to expand...
My dog lacks this ability. He's kind of stupid.

Except that somehow he knows, to the inch, exactly where to position himself artfully in the bed so that he is right in the middle.

And, once he escaped into the garage, and damaged absolutely nothing... except chew through the white wires on either side of the garage door that open and close it.

Hubby claims that he will start pacing the house when it's near time for me to get home (he's recorded this twice), and that if I am 30 minutes late he will start howling outside, and when forced inside, he'll resort to howling in the front window. It's probably that he recognizes the sound of my vehicle, because when hubby comes home he is clueless until he hears the garage door open and then I have to tell him it's "Daddy" because otherwise he has no idea what the hell is going on.
 
I lived with dogs forever. They know plenty. That's what I keep taking away from our relationships.
But the wooiest part, for me, is how they are able to bolt into thick woods on a pitch dark night, at high speed, chasing coyotes or whatever, and not smack into stuff?
Their eyesight isn't great. their sense of smell can hardly be expected to work at high speeds to detect trees.
I've never figured it out.
Perhaps they are smelling the animal's trail, and because the other beast didn't smack a tree, they can simply follow that scent trail without fear of getting clobbered?

Well, how does the coyote manage this, then?

baffling.
 
Tacita said:
Quote:
According to a documentary on the evolution of dogs I saw recently (NOVA: Dogs Decoded), they are the only animal other than humans that understands the significance of pointing at something.

My dog lacks this ability. He's kind of stupid.
Click to expand...

My dog seems to lack the ability, but she's otherwise way too smart for her own good. She knows to wait until I'm gone before chasing the cat, digging in the trash, and jumping on my dog-fur-free bed. She also has a vocabulary of dozens of words (especially "bath", "outside" and -- the dreaded S-word -- "squirrel").
 
Humans can "read dog minds" as well. I had a single dog, just her and me, for 15 1/2 years. She had a large vocabulary of squeaks, huffs, yaps, barks, whines, and other noises. By the time she was old, I would actually hear a voice in my head when she used certain tones: it was like an instant translation that I didn't have to think about anymore.

Now I have two dogs, and they are focused as much on each other as they are on me, and I don't seem to have developed that ability with either of them (one I've had 7 1/2 years). Nor do they seem to be as good at reading my body language. I think it comes about because of focused attention, both on the dog's part and the person's.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top Bottom