Dog Attacks Whilst Biking.

[F1fanatic]

Getting back to the topic..... - if any dog chases you, just STOP.

The dog was enjoying the chase and will back away as soon as you stop and look at him.

[Thaddeus]

When I was 12 I may have believed in things like animals using telepathy, and I could probably write that much too. When I grew up and learned a little about reality I stopped believing such childish things. I think most people follow the same path. I don't know any adults that voice such nonsense, hence my comment.

No offense if English is not your first language, but your post is a little difficult to decipher, init.

It is exactly why we lose the ability of telepathy. Adults tells us it's nonsense. You should not have listen to them,

Adults tell us?

[aneliane]

Getting back to the topic..... - if any dog chases you, just STOP.

The dog was enjoying the chase and will back away as soon as you stop and look at him.

Thank you for this 1st sensible comment

[partington]

When I was 12 I may have believed in things like animals using telepathy, and I could probably write that much too. When I grew up and learned a little about reality I stopped believing such childish things. I think most people follow the same path. I don't know any adults that voice such nonsense, hence my comment.

No offense if English is not your first language, but your post is a little difficult to decipher, init.

It is exactly why we lose the ability of telepathy. Adults tells us it's nonsense. You should not have listen to them, it's quite difficult to re-learn.

I think you might be impervious to rational critical thinking , because you are emotionally invested in believing this kind of thing. For some reason you think it makes the world more exciting and wonderful.

But reality is wonderful enough already.

You don't need to suggest telepathy as an explanation for your pets' behaviour, there are already completely satisfying and amazing explanations that are much more fascinating than supernatural wishful thinking...

It's been known since the early 1900's that animals have an extraordinary, almost unbelievable, sensitivity to visual and other non-verbal cues that their owners provide, completely unconsciously. It's called the "Clever Hans" effect, and anyone doing studies of how animals behave has to go to huge lengths to try to eliminate this source of error in their experiments.

Clever Hans was a horse that became famous in the early 1900's because he could apparently add, subtract, and divide numbers when asked questions orally, or even in written form. He could answer by tapping his hoof the correct number of times. He could correctly answer questions like "if Tuesday is the 2nd, what date is the next Saturday?" Everyone was amazed! He was right 90% of the time.

But they didn't just think: "ah telepathy!", or "this is a supernatural horse!", and leave it at that. They studied the horse and his owner by (direct quote here from wiki):

"Isolating horse and questioner from spectators, so no cues could come from them

Using questioners other than the horse's master

By means of blinders, varying whether the horse could see the questioner

Varying whether the questioner knew the answer to the question in advance.

Using a substantial number of trials, (they) found that the horse could get the correct answer even if (the owner) himself did not ask the questions, ruling out the possibility of fraud. However, the horse got the right answer only when the questioner knew what the answer was, and the horse could see the questioner. He observed that when (the owner) knew the answers to the questions, Hans got 89 percent of the answers correct, but when (the owner) did not know the answers to the questions, Hans only answered six percent of the questions correctly.

(They) then proceeded to examine the behaviour of the questioner in detail, and showed that as the horse's taps approached the right answer, the questioner's posture and facial expression changed in ways that were consistent with an increase in tension, which was released when the horse made the final, correct tap. This provided a cue that the horse could use to tell it to stop tapping.

The social communication systems of horses probably depend on the detection of small postural changes, and this may be why Hans so easily picked up on the cues given by (the owner) (who seemed to have been entirely unaware that he was providing such cues)."

Extraordinarily, once the psychologist doing the studies recognised what the cues were, even though he tried to stop making these involuntary signals, he couldn't! The horse could tell anyway, despite his best efforts.

This effect has since been observed in many many different animal species. As Wiki says, if you want to study learning or behaviour in animals:

" it is necessary to find some way of testing the animals' achievements which eliminates the risk of Clever Hans effects. However, simply removing the trainer from the scene may not be an appropriate strategy, because where the social relationship between trainer and subject is strong, the removal of the trainer may produce emotional responses preventing the subject from performing. It is therefore necessary to devise procedures where none of those present knows what the animal's likely response may be....."

So we know that signals so tiny we don't know we're making them, and can't prevent making even if we try, have a huge effect on animals' knowledge of our intentions and can alter their behaviour.

We also know that animals can hear sounds that are completely inaudible to human ears: you can buy whistles in shops to train dogs that to us make no noise at all.

We know that animals sense of smell is hundreds or thousands of times more sensitive than our own, to the extent that they have a whole sensory system that is basically missing from us.

Given that all these things are known as an absolute certainty, and do not need to invoke any mystical powers to explain, why would you not think these are more likely explanations for your animals sensing things in ways you don't understand rather than jumping to telepathy, for which evidence is non existent??? Because you want it to be true?

I know you might say "oh it doesn't matter, let people believe any nonsense they want if it makes their lives more colourful", but I don't agree.

If you don't use your brain and your intelligence to critically sift and analyse your experiences, you become foolish. A nation that is not taught to value critical thinking becomes backward and uncompetitive, (not that I'm thinking of any particular country here )

A person who doesn't think logically and critically can't do science, can't make the world work properly. I would not trust them to do surgery or fly a plane. Critical thinking is important! You can't just believe anything you want. Some things are true and some are just not.

So: homework: if my hypothesis is that your cat knows when it's going to the vet because you tense up (knowing your cat doesn't like it) and your cat smells or sees these signs of tension (Clever Hans effect) and not because it's telepathic, as an exercise in critical thinking, what tests could you do to show me I was wrong?

That's how you prove yourself right - by trying to prove yourself wrong....

[F1fanatic]

When I was 12 I may have believed in things like animals using telepathy, and I could probably write that much too. When I grew up and learned a little about reality I stopped believing such childish things. I think most people follow the same path. I don't know any adults that voice such nonsense, hence my comment.

No offense if English is not your first language, but your post is a little difficult to decipher, init.

It is exactly why we lose the ability of telepathy. Adults tells us it's nonsense. You should not have listen to them, it's quite difficult to re-learn.

I think you might be impervious to rational critical thinking , because you are emotionally invested in believing this kind of thing. For some reason you think it makes the world more exciting and wonderful.

But reality is wonderful enough already.

You don't need to suggest telepathy as an explanation for your pets' behaviour, there are already completely satisfying and amazing explanations that are much more fascinating than supernatural wishful thinking...

It's been known since the early 1900's that animals have an extraordinary, almost unbelievable, sensitivity to visual and other non-verbal cues that their owners provide, completely unconsciously. It's called the "Clever Hans" effect, and anyone doing studies of how animals behave has to go to huge lengths to try to eliminate this source of error in their experiments.

Clever Hans was a horse that became famous in the early 1900's because he could apparently add, subtract, and divide numbers when asked questions orally, or even in written form. He could answer by tapping his hoof the correct number of times. He could correctly answer questions like "if Tuesday is the 2nd, what date is the next Saturday?" Everyone was amazed! He was right 90% of the time.

But they didn't just think: "ah telepathy!", or "this is a supernatural horse!", and leave it at that. They studied the horse and his owner by (direct quote here from wiki):

"Isolating horse and questioner from spectators, so no cues could come from them

Using questioners other than the horse's master

By means of blinders, varying whether the horse could see the questioner

Varying whether the questioner knew the answer to the question in advance.

Using a substantial number of trials, (they) found that the horse could get the correct answer even if (the owner) himself did not ask the questions, ruling out the possibility of fraud. However, the horse got the right answer only when the questioner knew what the answer was, and the horse could see the questioner. He observed that when (the owner) knew the answers to the questions, Hans got 89 percent of the answers correct, but when (the owner) did not know the answers to the questions, Hans only answered six percent of the questions correctly.

(They) then proceeded to examine the behaviour of the questioner in detail, and showed that as the horse's taps approached the right answer, the questioner's posture and facial expression changed in ways that were consistent with an increase in tension, which was released when the horse made the final, correct tap. This provided a cue that the horse could use to tell it to stop tapping.

The social communication systems of horses probably depend on the detection of small postural changes, and this may be why Hans so easily picked up on the cues given by (the owner) (who seemed to have been entirely unaware that he was providing such cues)."

Extraordinarily, once the psychologist doing the studies recognised what the cues were, even though he tried to stop making these involuntary signals, he couldn't! The horse could tell anyway, despite his best efforts.

This effect has since been observed in many many different animal species. As Wiki says, if you want to study learning or behaviour in animals:

" it is necessary to find some way of testing the animals' achievements which eliminates the risk of Clever Hans effects. However, simply removing the trainer from the scene may not be an appropriate strategy, because where the social relationship between trainer and subject is strong, the removal of the trainer may produce emotional responses preventing the subject from performing. It is therefore necessary to devise procedures where none of those present knows what the animal's likely response may be....."

So we know that signals so tiny we don't know we're making them, and can't prevent making even if we try, have a huge effect on animals' knowledge of our intentions and can alter their behaviour.

We also know that animals can hear sounds that are completely inaudible to human ears: you can buy whistles in shops to train dogs that to us make no noise at all.

We know that animals sense of smell is hundreds or thousands of times more sensitive than our own, to the extent that they have a whole sensory system that is basically missing from us.

Given that all these things are known as an absolute certainty, and do not need to invoke any mystical powers to explain, why would you not think these are more likely explanations for your animals sensing things in ways you don't understand rather than jumping to telepathy, for which evidence is non existent??? Because you want it to be true?

I know you might say "oh it doesn't matter, let people believe any nonsense they want if it makes their lives more colourful", but I don't agree.

If you don't use your brain and your intelligence to critically sift and analyse your experiences, you become foolish. A nation that is not taught to value critical thinking becomes backward and uncompetitive, (not that I'm thinking of any particular country here )

A person who doesn't think logically and critically can't do science, can't make the world work properly. I would not trust them to do surgery or fly a plane. Critical thinking is important! You can't just believe anything you want. Some things are true and some are just not.

So: homework: if my hypothesis is that your cat knows when it's going to the vet because you tense up (knowing your cat doesn't like it) and your cat smells or sees these signs of tension (Clever Hans effect) and not because it's telepathic, as an exercise in critical thinking, what tests could you do to show me I was wrong?

That's how you prove yourself right - by trying to prove yourself wrong....

Perhaps this discussion is best suited to the 'Plants, Pets and Vets' forum?

[aneliane]

When I was 12 I may have believed in things like animals using telepathy, and I could probably write that much too. When I grew up and learned a little about reality I stopped believing such childish things. I think most people follow the same path. I don't know any adults that voice such nonsense, hence my comment.

No offense if English is not your first language, but your post is a little difficult to decipher, init.

It is exactly why we lose the ability of telepathy. Adults tells us it's nonsense. You should not have listen to them, it's quite difficult to re-learn.

I think you might be impervious to rational critical thinking , because you are emotionally invested in believing this kind of thing. For some reason you think it makes the world more exciting and wonderful.

But reality is wonderful enough already.

You don't need to suggest telepathy as an explanation for your pets' behaviour, there are already completely satisfying and amazing explanations that are much more fascinating than supernatural wishful thinking...

It's been known since the early 1900's that animals have an extraordinary, almost unbelievable, sensitivity to visual and other non-verbal cues that their owners provide, completely unconsciously. It's called the "Clever Hans" effect, and anyone doing studies of how animals behave has to go to huge lengths to try to eliminate this source of error in their experiments.

Clever Hans was a horse that became famous in the early 1900's because he could apparently add, subtract, and divide numbers when asked questions orally, or even in written form. He could answer by tapping his hoof the correct number of times. He could correctly answer questions like "if Tuesday is the 2nd, what date is the next Saturday?" Everyone was amazed! He was right 90% of the time.

But they didn't just think: "ah telepathy!", or "this is a supernatural horse!", and leave it at that. They studied the horse and his owner by (direct quote here from wiki):

"Isolating horse and questioner from spectators, so no cues could come from them

Using questioners other than the horse's master

By means of blinders, varying whether the horse could see the questioner

Varying whether the questioner knew the answer to the question in advance.

Using a substantial number of trials, (they) found that the horse could get the correct answer even if (the owner) himself did not ask the questions, ruling out the possibility of fraud. However, the horse got the right answer only when the questioner knew what the answer was, and the horse could see the questioner. He observed that when (the owner) knew the answers to the questions, Hans got 89 percent of the answers correct, but when (the owner) did not know the answers to the questions, Hans only answered six percent of the questions correctly.

(They) then proceeded to examine the behaviour of the questioner in detail, and showed that as the horse's taps approached the right answer, the questioner's posture and facial expression changed in ways that were consistent with an increase in tension, which was released when the horse made the final, correct tap. This provided a cue that the horse could use to tell it to stop tapping.

The social communication systems of horses probably depend on the detection of small postural changes, and this may be why Hans so easily picked up on the cues given by (the owner) (who seemed to have been entirely unaware that he was providing such cues)."

Extraordinarily, once the psychologist doing the studies recognised what the cues were, even though he tried to stop making these involuntary signals, he couldn't! The horse could tell anyway, despite his best efforts.

This effect has since been observed in many many different animal species. As Wiki says, if you want to study learning or behaviour in animals:

" it is necessary to find some way of testing the animals' achievements which eliminates the risk of Clever Hans effects. However, simply removing the trainer from the scene may not be an appropriate strategy, because where the social relationship between trainer and subject is strong, the removal of the trainer may produce emotional responses preventing the subject from performing. It is therefore necessary to devise procedures where none of those present knows what the animal's likely response may be....."

So we know that signals so tiny we don't know we're making them, and can't prevent making even if we try, have a huge effect on animals' knowledge of our intentions and can alter their behaviour.

We also know that animals can hear sounds that are completely inaudible to human ears: you can buy whistles in shops to train dogs that to us make no noise at all.

We know that animals sense of smell is hundreds or thousands of times more sensitive than our own, to the extent that they have a whole sensory system that is basically missing from us.

Given that all these things are known as an absolute certainty, and do not need to invoke any mystical powers to explain, why would you not think these are more likely explanations for your animals sensing things in ways you don't understand rather than jumping to telepathy, for which evidence is non existent??? Because you want it to be true?

I know you might say "oh it doesn't matter, let people believe any nonsense they want if it makes their lives more colourful", but I don't agree.

If you don't use your brain and your intelligence to critically sift and analyse your experiences, you become foolish. A nation that is not taught to value critical thinking becomes backward and uncompetitive, (not that I'm thinking of any particular country here )

A person who doesn't think logically and critically can't do science, can't make the world work properly. I would not trust them to do surgery or fly a plane. Critical thinking is important! You can't just believe anything you want. Some things are true and some are just not.

So: homework: if my hypothesis is that your cat knows when it's going to the vet because you tense up (knowing your cat doesn't like it) and your cat smells or sees these signs of tension (Clever Hans effect) and not because it's telepathic, as an exercise in critical thinking, what tests could you do to show me I was wrong?

That's how you prove yourself right - by trying to prove yourself wrong....

Perhaps this discussion is best suited to the 'Plants, Pets and Vets' forum?

Animal communicators are now used in daily practice by vets and pet owners, namely in the horse race business. That is a fact.

sorry to disappoint you, but it's not about me having to prove anything, it's just you lacking common knowledge.

Edited June 23, 2011 by aneliane

[aneliane]

Animal communicators are now used in daily practice by vets and pet owners, namely in the horse race business. That is a fact.

sorry to disappoint you, but it's not about me having to prove anything, it's just you lacking common knowledge.

here is a link that would answer your question about sensing instead of using telepathy :

Animal communicators don't sometimes even meet the animals and are able to give info about the animal that no one else would know.

[Atmos]

where did the bicycle aspect go in this thread?

Are any of you even cyclists?

now it's all animal psychology?

[partington]

Animal communicators are now used in daily practice by vets and pet owners, namely in the horse race business. That is a fact.

sorry to disappoint you, but it's not about me having to prove anything, it's just you lacking common knowledge.

here is a link that would answer your question about sensing instead of using telepathy :

Animal communicators don't sometimes even meet the animals and are able to give info about the animal that no one else would know.

OK I'll stop now...I think we think too differently to be able to communicate.

I'm aware that animal communicators exist, but, like mediums and astrologers I have no belief that they can do what they say they are doing.

Moreover my idea of evidence is not an animal communicator facing a camera and saying is this real? Well yes it is 'cos me and my friends are very good at it!

I mean she would, wouldn't she?

cheers

[aneliane]

Animal communicators are now used in daily practice by vets and pet owners, namely in the horse race business. That is a fact.

sorry to disappoint you, but it's not about me having to prove anything, it's just you lacking common knowledge.

here is a link that would answer your question about sensing instead of using telepathy :

Animal communicators don't sometimes even meet the animals and are able to give info about the animal that no one else would know.

OK I'll stop now...I think we think too differently to be able to communicate.

I'm aware that animal communicators exist, but, like mediums and astrologers I have no belief that they can do what they say they are doing.

Moreover my idea of evidence is not an animal communicator facing a camera and saying is this real? Well yes it is 'cos me and my friends are very good at it!

I mean she would, wouldn't she?

cheers

I'm sorry but it would be preposterous to try to convince someone who doesn't believe in telepathy on a chat forum.

If I would give you links to experiences made by TV reporters to prove the use of telepathy by animals and animal communicators -and they're plenty online as you know - you would probably say that reporters are also just trying to make money.

Edited June 23, 2011 by aneliane

[aneliane]

where did the bicycle aspect go in this thread?

Are any of you even cyclists?

now it's all animal psychology?

Well as it happens dogs have a brains, and trying to know how it operates might be of help when avoiding to be bitten. (more than learning how the pedal works)

[Richb2004v2]

When I was 12 I may have believed in things like animals using telepathy, and I could probably write that much too. When I grew up and learned a little about reality I stopped believing such childish things. I think most people follow the same path. I don't know any adults that voice such nonsense, hence my comment.

No offense if English is not your first language, but your post is a little difficult to decipher, init.

It is exactly why we lose the ability of telepathy. Adults tells us it's nonsense. You should not have listen to them, it's quite difficult to re-learn.

I think you might be impervious to rational critical thinking , because you are emotionally invested in believing this kind of thing. For some reason you think it makes the world more exciting and wonderful.

But reality is wonderful enough already.

You don't need to suggest telepathy as an explanation for your pets' behaviour, there are already completely satisfying and amazing explanations that are much more fascinating than supernatural wishful thinking...

It's been known since the early 1900's that animals have an extraordinary, almost unbelievable, sensitivity to visual and other non-verbal cues that their owners provide, completely unconsciously. It's called the "Clever Hans" effect, and anyone doing studies of how animals behave has to go to huge lengths to try to eliminate this source of error in their experiments.

Clever Hans was a horse that became famous in the early 1900's because he could apparently add, subtract, and divide numbers when asked questions orally, or even in written form. He could answer by tapping his hoof the correct number of times. He could correctly answer questions like "if Tuesday is the 2nd, what date is the next Saturday?" Everyone was amazed! He was right 90% of the time.

But they didn't just think: "ah telepathy!", or "this is a supernatural horse!", and leave it at that. They studied the horse and his owner by (direct quote here from wiki):

"Isolating horse and questioner from spectators, so no cues could come from them

Using questioners other than the horse's master

By means of blinders, varying whether the horse could see the questioner

Varying whether the questioner knew the answer to the question in advance.

Using a substantial number of trials, (they) found that the horse could get the correct answer even if (the owner) himself did not ask the questions, ruling out the possibility of fraud. However, the horse got the right answer only when the questioner knew what the answer was, and the horse could see the questioner. He observed that when (the owner) knew the answers to the questions, Hans got 89 percent of the answers correct, but when (the owner) did not know the answers to the questions, Hans only answered six percent of the questions correctly.

(They) then proceeded to examine the behaviour of the questioner in detail, and showed that as the horse's taps approached the right answer, the questioner's posture and facial expression changed in ways that were consistent with an increase in tension, which was released when the horse made the final, correct tap. This provided a cue that the horse could use to tell it to stop tapping.

The social communication systems of horses probably depend on the detection of small postural changes, and this may be why Hans so easily picked up on the cues given by (the owner) (who seemed to have been entirely unaware that he was providing such cues)."

Extraordinarily, once the psychologist doing the studies recognised what the cues were, even though he tried to stop making these involuntary signals, he couldn't! The horse could tell anyway, despite his best efforts.

This effect has since been observed in many many different animal species. As Wiki says, if you want to study learning or behaviour in animals:

" it is necessary to find some way of testing the animals' achievements which eliminates the risk of Clever Hans effects. However, simply removing the trainer from the scene may not be an appropriate strategy, because where the social relationship between trainer and subject is strong, the removal of the trainer may produce emotional responses preventing the subject from performing. It is therefore necessary to devise procedures where none of those present knows what the animal's likely response may be....."

So we know that signals so tiny we don't know we're making them, and can't prevent making even if we try, have a huge effect on animals' knowledge of our intentions and can alter their behaviour.

We also know that animals can hear sounds that are completely inaudible to human ears: you can buy whistles in shops to train dogs that to us make no noise at all.

We know that animals sense of smell is hundreds or thousands of times more sensitive than our own, to the extent that they have a whole sensory system that is basically missing from us.

Given that all these things are known as an absolute certainty, and do not need to invoke any mystical powers to explain, why would you not think these are more likely explanations for your animals sensing things in ways you don't understand rather than jumping to telepathy, for which evidence is non existent??? Because you want it to be true?

I know you might say "oh it doesn't matter, let people believe any nonsense they want if it makes their lives more colourful", but I don't agree.

If you don't use your brain and your intelligence to critically sift and analyse your experiences, you become foolish. A nation that is not taught to value critical thinking becomes backward and uncompetitive, (not that I'm thinking of any particular country here )

A person who doesn't think logically and critically can't do science, can't make the world work properly. I would not trust them to do surgery or fly a plane. Critical thinking is important! You can't just believe anything you want. Some things are true and some are just not.

So: homework: if my hypothesis is that your cat knows when it's going to the vet because you tense up (knowing your cat doesn't like it) and your cat smells or sees these signs of tension (Clever Hans effect) and not because it's telepathic, as an exercise in critical thinking, what tests could you do to show me I was wrong?

That's how you prove yourself right - by trying to prove yourself wrong....

That's a great post. I've a feeling that critical thinking may be a foreign concept to our telepathic friend.

[Richb2004v2]

Back to the subject of being attacked by dogs. Over the last couple of months I've been running more each week and of course encountering many dogs. I've learnt that if I ignore them and continue running at exactly the same pace without any change in my posture or expression they simple ignore me or stop when they are still well away from me. I do of course concentrate and send out the message 'come any closer and you get a kick in the balls' too.

[IanForbes]

Thank you for that, partington. I always suspected something like that but could never prove it. Animals DO have the ability to "read" a human in subtle ways we can't comprehend. It's probably why I've had success with them. I'm neither afraid or threatening to them... unless I am in hunting mode, and an animal knows instantly when I am. I can turn it on or off in a second and it's interesting in the animal's reaction. I can do it with family pets as well as animals in the wild. I can even do it with deadly snakes. I have done it with bears, wolves and cougars. I can get a look in my eye that my ex wife used to call "frightening". It is the predator look. You can watch it happen with the plains animals of Africa. Predators and prey can mix easily around water holes and the open grasslands. But when a lion, leopard or cheetah goes into hunting mode the gazelles start running for cover.

[ozzieovaseas]

Another gem of a thread Rich??

It might be an oldie but rehashing this one makes me think you might be feeling a bit sentimental about saying Adios to LOS after all this time

Or are you spoiling us with threads about all things canine-y before your departure?

Not hard to noticed a bit of a pattern forming here...with all this talk of dogs sh^tting, chasing, biting barking everywhere its no wonder you are legging it back to ol Blighty.

I reckon even the soi dogs will miss you..maybe you could throw a going away party with them

[aneliane]

When I was 12 I may have believed in things like animals using telepathy, and I could probably write that much too. When I grew up and learned a little about reality I stopped believing such childish things. I think most people follow the same path. I don't know any adults that voice such nonsense, hence my comment.

No offense if English is not your first language, but your post is a little difficult to decipher, init.

It is exactly why we lose the ability of telepathy. Adults tells us it's nonsense. You should not have listen to them, it's quite difficult to re-learn.

I think you might be impervious to rational critical thinking , because you are emotionally invested in believing this kind of thing. For some reason you think it makes the world more exciting and wonderful.

But reality is wonderful enough already.

You don't need to suggest telepathy as an explanation for your pets' behaviour, there are already completely satisfying and amazing explanations that are much more fascinating than supernatural wishful thinking...

It's been known since the early 1900's that animals have an extraordinary, almost unbelievable, sensitivity to visual and other non-verbal cues that their owners provide, completely unconsciously. It's called the "Clever Hans" effect, and anyone doing studies of how animals behave has to go to huge lengths to try to eliminate this source of error in their experiments.

Clever Hans was a horse that became famous in the early 1900's because he could apparently add, subtract, and divide numbers when asked questions orally, or even in written form. He could answer by tapping his hoof the correct number of times. He could correctly answer questions like "if Tuesday is the 2nd, what date is the next Saturday?" Everyone was amazed! He was right 90% of the time.

But they didn't just think: "ah telepathy!", or "this is a supernatural horse!", and leave it at that. They studied the horse and his owner by (direct quote here from wiki):

"Isolating horse and questioner from spectators, so no cues could come from them

Using questioners other than the horse's master

By means of blinders, varying whether the horse could see the questioner

Varying whether the questioner knew the answer to the question in advance.

Using a substantial number of trials, (they) found that the horse could get the correct answer even if (the owner) himself did not ask the questions, ruling out the possibility of fraud. However, the horse got the right answer only when the questioner knew what the answer was, and the horse could see the questioner. He observed that when (the owner) knew the answers to the questions, Hans got 89 percent of the answers correct, but when (the owner) did not know the answers to the questions, Hans only answered six percent of the questions correctly.

(They) then proceeded to examine the behaviour of the questioner in detail, and showed that as the horse's taps approached the right answer, the questioner's posture and facial expression changed in ways that were consistent with an increase in tension, which was released when the horse made the final, correct tap. This provided a cue that the horse could use to tell it to stop tapping.

The social communication systems of horses probably depend on the detection of small postural changes, and this may be why Hans so easily picked up on the cues given by (the owner) (who seemed to have been entirely unaware that he was providing such cues)."

Extraordinarily, once the psychologist doing the studies recognised what the cues were, even though he tried to stop making these involuntary signals, he couldn't! The horse could tell anyway, despite his best efforts.

This effect has since been observed in many many different animal species. As Wiki says, if you want to study learning or behaviour in animals:

" it is necessary to find some way of testing the animals' achievements which eliminates the risk of Clever Hans effects. However, simply removing the trainer from the scene may not be an appropriate strategy, because where the social relationship between trainer and subject is strong, the removal of the trainer may produce emotional responses preventing the subject from performing. It is therefore necessary to devise procedures where none of those present knows what the animal's likely response may be....."

So we know that signals so tiny we don't know we're making them, and can't prevent making even if we try, have a huge effect on animals' knowledge of our intentions and can alter their behaviour.

We also know that animals can hear sounds that are completely inaudible to human ears: you can buy whistles in shops to train dogs that to us make no noise at all.

We know that animals sense of smell is hundreds or thousands of times more sensitive than our own, to the extent that they have a whole sensory system that is basically missing from us.

Given that all these things are known as an absolute certainty, and do not need to invoke any mystical powers to explain, why would you not think these are more likely explanations for your animals sensing things in ways you don't understand rather than jumping to telepathy, for which evidence is non existent??? Because you want it to be true?

I know you might say "oh it doesn't matter, let people believe any nonsense they want if it makes their lives more colourful", but I don't agree.

If you don't use your brain and your intelligence to critically sift and analyse your experiences, you become foolish. A nation that is not taught to value critical thinking becomes backward and uncompetitive, (not that I'm thinking of any particular country here )

A person who doesn't think logically and critically can't do science, can't make the world work properly. I would not trust them to do surgery or fly a plane. Critical thinking is important! You can't just believe anything you want. Some things are true and some are just not.

So: homework: if my hypothesis is that your cat knows when it's going to the vet because you tense up (knowing your cat doesn't like it) and your cat smells or sees these signs of tension (Clever Hans effect) and not because it's telepathic, as an exercise in critical thinking, what tests could you do to show me I was wrong?

That's how you prove yourself right - by trying to prove yourself wrong....

That's a great post. I've a feeling that critical thinking may be a foreign concept to our telepathic friend.

Critical thinking only works if both parties are honest which obviously is not the case here.

[Richb2004v2]

Another gem of a thread Rich??

It might be an oldie but rehashing this one makes me think you might be feeling a bit sentimental about saying Adios to LOS after all this time

Or are you spoiling us with threads about all things canine-y before your departure?

Not hard to noticed a bit of a pattern forming here...with all this talk of dogs sh^tting, chasing, biting barking everywhere its no wonder you are legging it back to ol Blighty.

I reckon even the soi dogs will miss you..maybe you could throw a going away party with them

Well, you know, one does ones best . I would have liked to have opened a thread recounting the time I was in a beach front restaurant with Thai friends and behind us, inside the restaurant, were two dogs back to back stuck together yelping. The Thais never batted an eye at it, even when I suggested we do something. Ah, happy times.

As far as I could tell neither dog was telapathic.

Edited June 23, 2011 by Richb2004v2

[aneliane]

Another gem of a thread Rich??

It might be an oldie but rehashing this one makes me think you might be feeling a bit sentimental about saying Adios to LOS after all this time

Or are you spoiling us with threads about all things canine-y before your departure?

Not hard to noticed a bit of a pattern forming here...with all this talk of dogs sh^tting, chasing, biting barking everywhere its no wonder you are legging it back to ol Blighty.

I reckon even the soi dogs will miss you..maybe you could throw a going away party with them

Well, you know, one does ones best . I would have liked to have opened a thread recounting the time I was in a beach front restaurant with Thai friends and behind us, inside the restaurant, were two dogs back to back stuck together yelping. The Thais never batted an eye at it, even when I suggested we do something. Ah, happy times.

As far as I could tell neither dog was telapathic.

Laughing at animal suffering ... this is getting better and better ... What's next ? Torture as joke ?

[Semper]

Can't see the problem with this topic. Just stop your bike, get off and give the dog a good whack

with the bamboo stick or plastic pipe. Problems solved.

I can't understand why a grownup man is asking questions like this.

Edited June 23, 2011 by Semper

[aneliane]

Can't see the problem with this topic. Just stop your bike, get off and give the dog a good whack

with the bamboo stick or plastic pipe. Problems solved.

I can't understand why a grownup man is asking questions like this.

Some defence animal groups are going to Thai schools to try to educate youth to have a more responsible approach to dogs.

I now realise some western countries have also huge failings in their educating systems

[Semper]

Can't see the problem with this topic. Just stop your bike, get off and give the dog a good whack

with the bamboo stick or plastic pipe. Problems solved.

I can't understand why a grownup man is asking questions like this.

Some defence animal groups are going to Thai schools to try to educate youth to have a more responsible approach to dogs.

I now realise some western countries have also huge failings in their educating systems

Well, I'm not a youth. And belive me, I know how to handle dogs.

[Richb2004v2]

Another gem of a thread Rich??

It might be an oldie but rehashing this one makes me think you might be feeling a bit sentimental about saying Adios to LOS after all this time

Or are you spoiling us with threads about all things canine-y before your departure?

Not hard to noticed a bit of a pattern forming here...with all this talk of dogs sh^tting, chasing, biting barking everywhere its no wonder you are legging it back to ol Blighty.

I reckon even the soi dogs will miss you..maybe you could throw a going away party with them

Well, you know, one does ones best . I would have liked to have opened a thread recounting the time I was in a beach front restaurant with Thai friends and behind us, inside the restaurant, were two dogs back to back stuck together yelping. The Thais never batted an eye at it, even when I suggested we do something. Ah, happy times.

As far as I could tell neither dog was telapathic.

Laughing at animal suffering ... this is getting better and better ... What's next ? Torture as joke ?

This is Thailand. Sometimes you have to laugh at worse than this.

[aneliane]

Another gem of a thread Rich??

It might be an oldie but rehashing this one makes me think you might be feeling a bit sentimental about saying Adios to LOS after all this time

Or are you spoiling us with threads about all things canine-y before your departure?

Not hard to noticed a bit of a pattern forming here...with all this talk of dogs sh^tting, chasing, biting barking everywhere its no wonder you are legging it back to ol Blighty.

I reckon even the soi dogs will miss you..maybe you could throw a going away party with them

Well, you know, one does ones best . I would have liked to have opened a thread recounting the time I was in a beach front restaurant with Thai friends and behind us, inside the restaurant, were two dogs back to back stuck together yelping. The Thais never batted an eye at it, even when I suggested we do something. Ah, happy times.

As far as I could tell neither dog was telapathic.

Laughing at animal suffering ... this is getting better and better ... What's next ? Torture as joke ?

This is Thailand. Sometimes you have to laugh at worse than this.

Nope this is plain lack of humanity coming from an Expat.

[watcharacters]

It never ceases to amaze me how little people know about dogs.

They are a non-nomadic pack animal, in remote locations they are on the verge of becoming feral..... a lone stranger entering their territory will always be treated the same way, lots of gesturing accompanied with loud barking, they are sussing you out as an unknown quantity, throwing rocks or sticks may alleviate the situation temporarily but if you take that action once, you will have to do it every time.

Hit the brakes and stare out the leader of the pack, you will normally be considerably bigger than him, so he will not make the first aggressive move, if you manage to out-stare him and pass him without violent action, the pack will remember and let you pass without incident the next time..... you are just a big dog passing through.

If you don't manage to out-stare him (i.e. more than twelve seconds and he hasn't looked away) retreat from whence you came and never go back.

Try suggesting that to a friend of mine who used to be fearless around strange dogs until he used the "show them you aren't afraid technique" and along with his father ended up in the hospital for 10 days after the pack attack they endured.

Staring down a dog signals aggression to the dog. It's actually safer to show submissive behavior.

[Chonburiram]

Another gem of a thread Rich??

It might be an oldie but rehashing this one makes me think you might be feeling a bit sentimental about saying Adios to LOS after all this time

Or are you spoiling us with threads about all things canine-y before your departure?

Not hard to noticed a bit of a pattern forming here...with all this talk of dogs sh^tting, chasing, biting barking everywhere its no wonder you are legging it back to ol Blighty.

I reckon even the soi dogs will miss you..maybe you could throw a going away party with them

Well, you know, one does ones best . I would have liked to have opened a thread recounting the time I was in a beach front restaurant with Thai friends and behind us, inside the restaurant, were two dogs back to back stuck together yelping. The Thais never batted an eye at it, even when I suggested we do something. Ah, happy times.

As far as I could tell neither dog was telapathic.

Laughing at animal suffering ... this is getting better and better ... What's next ? Torture as joke ?

,

aneliane they where actually not really suffering...

Richb2004v2, next time you look at shagging dogs be aware that doing so, can give you a nervous eyelid (old Thai tale).

Edited June 23, 2011 by Chonburiram

[aneliane]

Another gem of a thread Rich??

It might be an oldie but rehashing this one makes me think you might be feeling a bit sentimental about saying Adios to LOS after all this time

Or are you spoiling us with threads about all things canine-y before your departure?

Not hard to noticed a bit of a pattern forming here...with all this talk of dogs sh^tting, chasing, biting barking everywhere its no wonder you are legging it back to ol Blighty.

I reckon even the soi dogs will miss you..maybe you could throw a going away party with them

Well, you know, one does ones best . I would have liked to have opened a thread recounting the time I was in a beach front restaurant with Thai friends and behind us, inside the restaurant, were two dogs back to back stuck together yelping. The Thais never batted an eye at it, even when I suggested we do something. Ah, happy times.

As far as I could tell neither dog was telapathic.

Laughing at animal suffering ... this is getting better and better ... What's next ? Torture as joke ?

,

aneliane they where actually not really suffering...

Richb2004v2, next time you look at shagging dogs be aware that doing so, can give you a nervous eyelid (old Thai tale).

Getting stuck by your genitals and pulling it to separate does not hurt ?

This is not Thailand, this is Lalaland , you guys come another planet or what ?

On planet earth pulling genitals of men or dogs when they just retracted DOES hurt

Seriously where are you from? Which educational system ?

Edited June 23, 2011 by aneliane

[cheeryble]

As to the pepper spray. I'm concerned it doesn't have the range and is dependent on the air movement. 3 or even 4 metres would be nice.

I have considered having something to give the pepper weight. Perhaps sand.

So you take some sand. You coat the sand grains with pepper somehow. (Not sure about this stage, maybe just wetting the sand with pepper solution and drying?)

Perhaps it just needs the sand grains being made very very slightly sticky to hold fine dry pepper prik pon.

Then you carry a little open bag on you crossbar. You see some dodgy dogs coming up and you simply scoop out a handful ready. If any bother you throw the special sand in nice spreading motion. The sand will make it carry. (Now thinking fine metallic granules for extra range. I reckon just a hint of pepper on each grain is enough....). You always blow the whistle ready in your mouth when you attack.

Next time you only have to blow the whistle.

Nobel Prize for this?

I pray for wind to blow the other direction and come right into your face !

I suspect that whilst you think you're compassionate you're actually just the opposite.

Try complaining about this to my friend who was attacked by surprise and crashed her motorbike very badly scraping down her whole left side took a year to heal.

She was lucky it could easily have been a broken neck and diapers and wheelchair for her whole life like other people it happens all the time. Try telling it to my ex's son who is petrified of cycling and unable to think about it after a bad attack.

This dog thing is an outrage which like everything else here no-one complains about. I hold the leaders of this country culpable for not leading, but of course they;re happy behind their high walls to hell with the plebs. Same with noise.

I am a dog lover among dog lovers. I've paid for operations for crash victim dogs I've never even seen. What I know clearly is dogs like to know where they stand. It is best to deal with them short and sharp, and after that the problem's gone and everyone can relax. I just tonight came back by bike on a route where I was attacked twice all of a year ago. At that time I took the trouble to chase the main dog down wherever he ran for a few minutes. Even after all that time they stayed put as quiet as mice tonight, and everyone was happy.

Back to subject, I wish to find a sharp method which will deal with the dog as it attacks.

I think just cycling on is not a solution it means you get hassled again and again and so do other's, sometimes dangerously. You have to briefly turn it into a very unpleasant experience for the dog.

[Richb2004v2]

Getting stuck by your genitals and pulling it to separate does not hurt ?

This is not Thailand, this is Lalaland , you guys come another planet or what ?

On planet earth pulling genitals of men or dogs when they just retracted DOES hurt

Seriously where are you from? Which educational system ?

I don't think that you are in any position to accuse anyone of being from lala land.

[ozzieovaseas]

Getting stuck by your genitals and pulling it to separate does not hurt ?

This is not Thailand, this is Lalaland , you guys come another planet or what ?

On planet earth pulling genitals of men or dogs when they just retracted DOES hurt

Seriously where are you from? Which educational system ?

Funny, for something that supposedly hurts so much, that so many would willingly pay for the service

I suspect there are even those here on TV that even do it to themselves..and at an amazing frequency

[ozzieovaseas]

Getting stuck by your genitals and pulling it to separate does not hurt ?

This is not Thailand, this is Lalaland , you guys come another planet or what ?

On planet earth pulling genitals of men or dogs when they just retracted DOES hurt

Seriously where are you from? Which educational system ?

I don't think that you are in any position to accuse anyone of being from lala land.

On the contrary Rich, as a long term resident herself, i think she is well and truelly quailified