Crazy old bat leaves $8bn to dogs.

[Kanastrous]

I think more money should be spent on controlling the spread of cats, rather than helping them out, as feral cats are a *much* greater problem than feral dogs.

Maybe.

If I had to choose between trying to fight off a pack of feral dogs, or some feral cats, I'd much rather face the cats.

[Glocksman]

I think more money should be spent on controlling the spread of cats, rather than helping them out, as feral cats are a *much* greater problem than feral dogs.

Maybe.

If I had to choose between trying to fight off a pack of feral dogs, or some feral cats, I'd much rather face the cats.

Depends upon the dogs, doesn't it?
I'd rather deal with feral Yorkies than feral Boxers.

[K. A. Pital]

So the point here is that animals like dogs and cats ARE owed something because there is a great feal of positive reinforcement they give us as humans.

Hmm. A valid point that pets are de-stressors. In case they have a tangible psychological and medical benefit, it might be indeed not that bad of an investment. Perhaps I should look to the massive spread of pets among the elderly to understand their true value to humans.

[Darth Wong]

I think more money should be spent on controlling the spread of cats, rather than helping them out, as feral cats are a *much* greater problem than feral dogs.

Maybe.

If I had to choose between trying to fight off a pack of feral dogs, or some feral cats, I'd much rather face the cats.

The size and severity of a problem for society is calculated on a broader scale than that.

[Adrian Laguna]

Aren't dogs more intelligent than cats, too?

That's been debated back and forth, and really depends on what metrics you use.

In the metric of "initiative" and "use of the envioronment", I think cats win. I've never heard of any dog operating doors, opening fridges, or making shelters. I have heard of cats doing such things.

Mind you all, I like hearing what Stas is saying--westerners are to sentimental about animals, and it's always bothered me.

There is a very simple explanation.

Cute

Not Cute

[Darth Wong]

Aren't dogs more intelligent than cats, too?

That's been debated back and forth, and really depends on what metrics you use.

In the metric of "initiative" and "use of the envioronment", I think cats win. I've never heard of any dog operating doors, opening fridges, or making shelters. I have heard of cats doing such things.

You are confusing skills with intelligence. Cats have certain innate skills. They're good at finding their way into things, or around obstacles. But if they're so intelligent, they should be trainable, and they have very poor trainability compared to dogs. How many seeing-eye cats have you seen?

Or to put it another way, how much training do cats require in order to acquire these abilities? Answer: none. Their abilities are not contingent upon their training, hence they are not related to their intelligence.

Humans are intelligent because we can be educated. We can learn skills through hard work and training, rather than simply being very talented at things.

[Kanastrous]

I think more money should be spent on controlling the spread of cats, rather than helping them out, as feral cats are a *much* greater problem than feral dogs.

Maybe.

If I had to choose between trying to fight off a pack of feral dogs, or some feral cats, I'd much rather face the cats.

The size and severity of a problem for society is calculated on a broader scale than that.

Well, yeah. Individual confrontations don't consider them as disease vectors or anything like that.

[Dahak]

Aren't dogs more intelligent than cats, too?

That's been debated back and forth, and really depends on what metrics you use.

In the metric of "initiative" and "use of the envioronment", I think cats win. I've never heard of any dog operating doors, opening fridges, or making shelters. I have heard of cats doing such things.

Well, my mum had to take a lot of meassures so the dogs could not open the doors in the house. And leately, they have learned to open windows, as well (which now had to be made "dog-safe" as well).
Our cats, on the other hand, never tried to open them, they go for the "be as annoying as possible and as long as possible, until human opens door/window of choice".

[Kanastrous]

Proof positive that cats are smarter.

They get us to do the work for them.

[Resinence]

Proof positive that cats are smarter.

They get us to do the work for them.

Children get their parents to do things too, I guess they are smarter than adults then.

[Darth Wong]

Proof positive that cats are smarter.

They get us to do the work for them.

By that brain-damaged logic, pet hamsters are fucking geniuses.

[Vain]

For what it's worth, cats are absolutely trainable. They just aren't motivated by the things dogs are (namely food and social pressure). A lack of motivation isn't the same thing as a lack of ability. Once you understand how to make them 'want' to learn, you can train them to do anything a dog can do, although their small size makes them unsuitable for most tasks that we train working dogs for.

[Darth Wong]

For what it's worth, cats are absolutely trainable. They just aren't motivated by the things dogs are (namely food and social pressure). A lack of motivation isn't the same thing as a lack of ability. Once you understand how to make them 'want' to learn, you can train them to do anything a dog can do, although their small size makes them unsuitable for most tasks that we train working dogs for.

Where are the bomb-sniffing or search and rescue cats, then? Their small size might actually be an advantage there. And do you have a source for this claim that cats are just as trainable as dogs?

[Vain]

For what it's worth, cats are absolutely trainable. They just aren't motivated by the things dogs are (namely food and social pressure). A lack of motivation isn't the same thing as a lack of ability. Once you understand how to make them 'want' to learn, you can train them to do anything a dog can do, although their small size makes them unsuitable for most tasks that we train working dogs for.

Where are the bomb-sniffing or search and rescue cats, then? Their small size might actually be an advantage there.

I assume it has something to do with their respective activity cycles. A bomb sniffing dog works a 10 hour shift. A cat isn't even awake for ten hours in a twenty four hour period, let alone in a contiguous stretch. I would guess that sleeping 16 hours every day in an irregular pattern isn't suitable for rescue work either.

[Darth Wong]

It's great that you have all these excuses, but after a point it sounds like communists making excuses for why the system should have worked but didn't. If all your arguments boil down to "cats should be just as trainable as dogs IMO", then you don't have any real evidence that it can be done, hence you have no basis for the claim. So again, what's your evidence?

[Vain]

What would you accept as evidence? I can give you cites from peer reviewed journals, if you like, although I'm not going to type them out so you'll have to look them up yourself. There is a significant body of research on animal intelligence in general and cat intelligence in particular. Alternately, how about examples of trained cats? Have you ever seen a catfood commercial?

[Darth Wong]

What would you accept as evidence? I can give you cites from peer reviewed journals, if you like, although I'm not going to type them out so you'll have to look them up yourself. There is a significant body of research on animal intelligence in general and cat intelligence in particular. Alternately, how about examples of trained cats? Have you ever seen a catfood commercial?

After years of dealing with fundies who horribly misrepresent real scientific research in pursuit of their beliefs, I don't see why you should expect me to be impressed by your vague allusions to peer-reviewed research. Nor should anyone be impressed by the fact that cat trainability is not zero; no one was claiming that. YOU claimed that it is the equal of dogs in every way, and for that, you bear the burden of proof.

[Vain]

You didn't answer my question. What would constitute acceptable evidence?

[ArmorPierce]

You can start by actually posting something that suggests that cat's trainability or intelligence approaches or exceeds that of a dog rather than telling him it's there and to look it up.

[Darth Wong]

You didn't answer my question. What would constitute acceptable evidence?

Something better than nothing, which is all you've presented so far? The best would be examples of cats being successfully trained in all of the major dog training skills. Even if they aren't commercially successful as working dogs, it should still be possible if you are correct.

[Mr Bean]

You didn't answer my question. What would constitute acceptable evidence?

Reminder, Burden of proof is on you to demonstrate how a cat can be just as trained as a dog, as for evidence...
Let me take a stab at that, how about cats being trained to do useful work?

Lets give a list of jobs Dogs have been trained to do

Disable Assistance Dogs(Seeing Eye, Hearing, Mobility)
SAR(Search and Resecure)
Herding Dogs(Livestock)
Sled Dogs
Mascot Dogs/Heath Dogs
Hunting Dogs(Trained for Flush Prey, bring back ducks ect)
Bomb/Blood/Drug Sniffing Dogs
Guard Dogs

And what jobs have cats been trained for? Hunting does not cut it unless it can be trained to return the prey to it's handler. Cats are know to be useful around farms to hunt rats and the like but that's natural, cats hunt automatically.

[Kanastrous]

Proof positive that cats are smarter.

They get us to do the work for them.

By that brain-damaged logic, pet hamsters are fucking geniuses.

Okay, I guess I was just speaking for myself, there.

[Kanastrous]

You didn't answer my question. What would constitute acceptable evidence?

Something better than nothing, which is all you've presented so far? The best would be examples of cats being successfully trained in all of the major dog training skills. Even if they aren't commercially successful as working dogs, it should still be possible if you are correct.

Regarding animals trained for camera, trainers have told me that a cat can usually be trained to perform one behavior reliably.

I don't know if that means one at a time, or one over the working lifetime of the cat.

[Vain]

You didn't answer my question. What would constitute acceptable evidence?

Something better than nothing, which is all you've presented so far? The best would be examples of cats being successfully trained in all of the major dog training skills. Even if they aren't commercially successful as working dogs, it should still be possible if you are correct.

What do you mean by 'major dog training skills'? Obviously you can't train a cat to herd sheep, no matter how smart they are. So what qualifies? Retrieving objects, coming when called, sit up, roll over, etc? The basic bag of tricks?

I have a stack of psychology journals here discussing things like object permanence, spatial encoding and observational learning in cats, but it seems like we're discussing their aptitude for training rather than their ability to learn and solve problems.

I absolutely agree that the burden of proof is on me; I'm just asking what you'll accept as proof. Everyone has heard anecdotal evidence of cats opening doors, turning on water faucets and using the toilet. What skill would a cat have to learn and perform for you to agree that it is capable of being trained as well as a dog with the right motivation?

[Oni Koneko Damien]

You didn't answer my question. What would constitute acceptable evidence?

Something better than nothing, which is all you've presented so far? The best would be examples of cats being successfully trained in all of the major dog training skills. Even if they aren't commercially successful as working dogs, it should still be possible if you are correct.

Here.

It's a rather long article, but this is the general gist of things:

1) Cats can be trained in many (not all, but many) of the same skills dogs can. Tests have also shown that cats have the ability to learn and retain knowledge.

2) Dogs are much easier to train because they are far more similar to humans in social structure and needs than cats are.

Basically, it's far easier to assess the relative intelligence of a dog and train it than a cat because 1) dogs already exist in social groups very similar to people, and 2) dogs have been selectively bred for thousands of years to be predisposed to easy training.

Dogs are pack animals whose survival in the wild depends on their being accepted into a supportive social group. Thus a rewards system based on something as simple as social recognition, affection, etc., will be highly effective in training a dog. Cats, on the other hand, have evolved to be solitary, opportunistic hunters. Social rewards and consequences have no meaning to them. Denial of food for bad behaviour likewise mean nothing as, in the wild, an average of only one out of three hunts comes out successful.

Maze-tests run on dogs and cats often show dogs performing 'better' because of these instinctual responses. The dogs would quickly press forward until they got to the end of the maze and were rewarded, and would do so faster in subsequent tests. Cats would either spend their time investigating odd corners, or simply sit down and start bathing. Both are performing to their instincts. The dog's instincts are to get back to its pack and be accepted, so it goes to the end as quickly as possible. The cat's instincts are to seek out prey in out-of-the-way locations, or maintain its hygiene if nothing better presents itself, so that's what it does.

It is possible to train cats, and things like the Thorndike puzzle-box experiments show that they have problem-solving abilities and the ability to retain memories of solutions. What sets them apart from dogs is that dogs instinctively respond to many of the positive/negative reinforcements the same way people do. Cats have an entirely different set of circumstances.

Lets give a list of jobs Dogs have been trained to do

Disable Assistance Dogs(Seeing Eye, Hearing, Mobility)
SAR(Search and Resecure)
Herding Dogs(Livestock)
Sled Dogs
Mascot Dogs/Heath Dogs
Hunting Dogs(Trained for Flush Prey, bring back ducks ect)
Bomb/Blood/Drug Sniffing Dogs
Guard Dogs

You'll notice that every one of these things is simply an extension of pack-instincts that have already been hardwired into canine psyches. Disabled assistance? Protecting vulnerable packmates. Search and resecure? Seeking out other pack members, finding young, seeking out prey and bringing the pack to them, etc. Herding? Pack hunting tactics with non-lethal results. Sled dogs? Pack movement, altered so they can do it in a set of restraints. Mascots? Pack social behaviour, conditioned into certain activities. Hunting dogs? Again, pack hunting tactics. Sniffer dogs? A combination of several of the above. Guard dogs? Protecting the pack.

If you base an intelligence test of two different species purely on the instinctual social habits of one and not the other, of course that test's going to favour the one. In the link above, tests based on a cat's instinctual responses (such as investigating small corners, seeking out high vantage points, getting out of or into confined spaces, etc), rather than a dog's (social-based instincts and rewards), shows that cats have a capability to learn and adapt that is at least in the same ballpark as a dog's.