Fascinating article in the UK’s Daily Telegraph newspaper.
This post was written last Monday in the hope that I will be back home from my ‘op’ by today, or more accurately expressed as hoping I was back home yesterday.
Friend, Chris Snuggs, sent me an item that appeared in The Daily Telegraph about measuring the intelligence of your dog. Here’s how it opened:
Quiz: how intelligent is your dog?
Take our special test to gauge your pet’s brainpower
Canine brains: test your dog’s intelligence Photo: Alamy
By Andrew Bake
7:00AM BST 25 Oct 2014
We all love our dogs. They repay us with affection, loyalty, fun and amusement, and we boast of their beauty, athletic prowess and impeccable behaviour. But while we can subtly promote our own academic achievements, and hint heavily at the brightness of our children, it is hard to prove – really prove, beyond reasonable doubt – that our canine companions are as intelligent as we know in our hearts they must be.
There is no doubt that some breeds are more intelligent than others, the result – as so much else about dogs – of selective breeding for many generations. But human classification and stereotyping of breeds has also evolved – not always fairly – and there are exceptions within breeds. So it is perfectly possible for an ostensibly airheaded Chihuahua to perform very well in intelligence tests, while a supposedly sagacious German shepherd will fail to distinguish “sit” from “fetch”.
Behaviour that seems to demonstrate intelligence in dogs is often the result of a combination of breeding and intense training. It is often suggested that Border collies are outstandingly bright, and that may be so: but they have been bred for generations to respond rapidly to complex commands; and sheepdogs – the rock stars of the obedience world – are trained from puppyhood, in many cases at the side of their parents.
Andrew Bake closes his piece, thus:
So how can we arrive at a reasonable estimation of our dog’s mental abilities? The Telegraph canine intelligence test combines observation of the subject’s regular behaviours, some of which may have been influenced by training, habituation and what might loosely be termed upbringing, with a series of simple staged exercises which attempt to measure the dog’s ability to think sequentially and to respond to challenges.
Putting the scores from the two together will produce a fair estimate of general intelligence: good enough, at least, to boast about in the park.
No special equipment is needed — though patience, a new dog-toy and a supply of dog-treats will undoubtedly come in handy.
Then at the bottom of the article is a link ‘Let’s Play‘ that takes you to the test questions.
Australian artist Andy Thomas specializes in creating ‘audio life forms’: beautiful abstract shapes that react to sounds. In this animated short, he visualizes two recorded bird sounds from the archives of the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision in Hilversum.
I was blown away when I came across that video. Then a quick search found this place, from where one reads:
Australian multimedia artist Andy Thomas makes bird songs dance with 3D animations. It’s the latest in his line of “audio life forms.”
Using 3D visualization software and other programs, Thomas breaks down photos of insects, orchids, and birds into their composite parts. He then reassembles the images in a sort of collage and builds trippy animations that react, based on rules he’s set, to sound – in this case, archival bird song.
The resulting multimedia visualizations are stunning. They also suggest what you might see if you stood in the forest listening to the birds, while tripping on acid. The psychedelic feel is enhanced by the constant shape-shifting of the form, which in turn encourages you to be hyper-aware of the full range of tweets and trills.
Thomas has been painting and drawing since he was a child. In 1997 he began exploring the realm of digital art, and in recent years started experimenting with “creating a visual fusion between Nature and Technology.” But he also describes this work a bit moralistically “corrupting nature with technology.”
It was then a moment to go across to Andy’s website; which I strongly encourage you to do – the pictures are stunning: trust me! Just try yesterday’s Insect Friday photograph!
Another of Andy’s wonderful images.
Golly, there are some very clever people out there!
Recognising the incredible contribution made to the world of modern communications.
This blog runs using software called WordPress. The WordPress community is vast. “Over 409 million people view more than 15.8 billion pages each month. Users produce about 43.7 million new posts and 58.8 million new comments each month.” Millions and millions of websites run under WordPress.
No mistake it is a community in every sense of the word. I feel fortunate and humbled to have made so many friends across the ‘bloggersphere’ despite not having met a single person face-to-face. I just can’t imagine a life without my circle of followers and without me, in turn, following so many other bloggers.
Thus it seems entirely appropriate to publish in full a news item sent to all WordPress bloggers in the last twenty-four hours.
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Engaged, Inspired, and Ready to Build a Better Web
One week every year, the entire Automattic staff gets together to connect, work, and laugh. And then, of course, we blog about it! Could you be blogging about your experience with us in 2015?
Automattic is a distributed company — we all work from wherever we are. Right now, “where we are” is 197 cities around the world: New Orleans, USA. Montevideo, Uruguay. Tokyo, Japan. Vilnius, Lithuania.
Once a year, we get together somewhere in the world to meet, work alongside, learn from, and laugh with one another in an exhilarating, exhausting week called the Grand Meetup. This year, 277 Automatticians descended on Park City, Utah, for seven days in mid-September.
Chris Hardie @ChrisHardie
I flew across the country to spend time in a mountain lodge with a bunch of strangers I met on the Internet. And they are wonderful.
We introduced ourselves to new colleagues, reconnected with coworkers we haven’t seen since last year, and worked on ways to make WordPress.com even better. And of course, lots of us blogged about the experience, in words and images.
We were blown away by the brilliance and generosity of our colleagues…
I’m grateful to have met so many Automatticians from around the world who brought such kindness, curiosity, patience, fierce intelligence, creativity and humor to the time we had together. I’m grateful to have learned about their hobbies, families, personal journeys, quirks, pet peeves, amazing skills, unmitigated geekiness, and brilliant senses of humor.
– VIP Wrangler Chris Hardie
We marveled at the range of conversations we had, from the sublime to the absurd…
Here are some of the things I talked about this week:
Scottish independence
Taylor Swift
Goats
Sexism
My children
Other people’s children
Infertility
Tattoos
Swing dancing
Whiskey
Javascript
Waffles (lack thereof)
VideoPress
Houston
Leadership
Fake morning talkshows
Mario Kart
Happiness Engineer Zandy Ring
We soaked in the natural beauty of Utah…
Early morning takeoff, by yours truly.
And some of us got up close and personal with the wide Utah sky…
Happiness Engineer Jeremey DuVall realizes he’s just jumped out of an airplane.
We learned from one another, and had fun doing it…
I learned how to analyze data in Python with Carly, and went skydiving with Prasath. After discussing common security vulnerabilities with Anne, Cami and I plotted a podcast about absolutely nothing, and recorded part of our first episode…
If you asked me four years ago if I thought it were possible to enjoy working, I’d be dubious. If you asked me whether one could ever genuinely love and respect all their coworkers, I’d hesitate.
Over the past four years, the people of Automattic have demonstrated to me that it’s possible to do work you love with people you love. It’s not common — not yet — but it’s possible.
– VaultPress Eclectic Happiffier Chris Rudzki
We burned the midnight oil…
We worked, we played, we ate, we drank, we slept very little. We tried to make the world a better place, and if you think that’s me being dramatic you don’t know the people I have the honor of working with.
On the final day, Automattic founder Matt Mullenweg led us in a toast that summed up the reason we’re all here…
I’m really grateful that I get to work with the people I do, and on the problems that we work on together. It’s far from easy, in fact each year brings new challenges and I make mistakes as often as not, but it is worthwhile and incredibly fulfilling. A few hours ago I gave a closing toast and teared up looking around the room. So many folks that give their passion and dedicate themselves to jobs both large and small, visible and unseen, to help make the web a better place.
– WordPress co-founder and Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg
And when the week was over, heading home was bittersweet…
This morning was filled with so many hugs (and maybe a tear or two). I told myself that I was looking forward to returning home. To my own bed (although the sleep I got in the silence of the Park City night was the best I may have ever experienced). To regular exercise and home cooking. To the routine of my everyday life. And I was looking forward to that. And even though I knew I would miss my colleagues (it’s happened every time I return from a trip), the weight of the fog of sadness still surprises me when it descends.
I read their blogs. I like their Facebook posts. I retweet their Tweets. And I miss them.
– Happiness (w)Rangler Lori McLeese
If you think you might want to work with this motley crew and join us in 2015’s mayhem…
… we’re hiring. (And yes, you’ll get to make up your own job title, too.)
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Seriously, if you think there is any way you can contribute to the success of WordPress, then do go across to this page – from where I note the following employee benefits:
BENEFITS
Open vacation policy (no set number of days per year). We encourage our employees to take the time they need to take vacation, develop interests, and spend time with friends and family.
Health, dental, & vision insurance for US and Canadian employees, their spouses or domestic partners, and children.
401(k) plan and match for US employees and RRSP matching plan for Canadian employees.
We cover all costs of company travel.
We happily provide or reimburse hardware and software you’ll need, as well as books or conferences that promote continued learning.
Home office setup stipend, and co-working office allowance.
The event was the 2014 US Sand Sculpting Challenge and 3D Art Exposition held recently in San Diego, California.
In any case, I wasn’t going to reblog the whole article because it’s much, much better if you go and read about the talented artists directly. Artists who produced this:
and this:
not overlooking this:
or this:
No, you absolutely have to drop into this place and read about these most talented artists.
Now how far is it to the nearest beach? …..
Must start practising …. wonder how long it would take me to build this:
In terms of the bond between dog and human, it doesn’t get much better than this!
Britain’s Got Talent is a British talent television show that started in June 2007 and has been running very successfully ever since. Originally broadcast by Thames Television it is now part of the ITV ‘stable’. Inevitably there is a website!
Anyway, Jean and I were browsing YouTube one evening looking for something to watch and came across this:
Ashleigh and Pudsey the dancing dog wow the judges with their flintstones dance act.
Britain searches for a new act to perform in front of the royal family at the royal variety performance.
Judged by Simon Cowell, Amanda Holden, Carmen Electra, Alesha Dixon and David Walliams.
Resist the urge to watch the semi-finals until you have watched the above; less than five minutes long.
Next Monday, the 21st September, is going to be the most important day this year. No! The most important day ever!
Because next Monday is the date of the People’s Climate March in New York. It is predicted to be the largest climate march in history. Well over 100,000 are expected to attend. I shall write more about this event during the coming week.
But also the 21st September will be International Day of Peace. That coincidence strikes me as highly significant. For a world at peace would cause the most massive reduction in our use of carbon-based fuels.
Thus without any embarrassment, I intend to republish in full [Ed: but see my comment] a recent item on the Permaculture News website: Seven Reasons Why World Peace is Possible.
Do I mention dogs? Read through to the end to find out! (Probably not difficult to guess the answer!)
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Seven Reasons Why World Peace is Possible
Introduction
The 21st of September will be International Day of Peace. It may seem a little premature to declare that world peace is due to break out by the end this month. I do not deny that the amount of killing and death and war and torture and death and coercion and abuse and death all over everywhere can be overwhelming. Nor do I deny that considering this, it is a natural assumption to believe people are sinners, destined for extinction. However, I do argue that compassion is as much a part of human nature as cruelty.
There is evidence that humankind did not always live violent lives. In fact, I assume most people reading this article are not habitually violent, and do not desire to watch someone suffer. All animals have the capacity to enrich the lives of others. We have the capacity to be both selfish and kind. What matters is which quality we chose to focus on; bringing that quality into focus within ourselves, the world, and our children.
Here I have collected an array of research demonstrating that there is a positive potential within each social group and person. I argue that humans can learn to build societies which are not founded on the expectation of organised violence. Here are seven reasons why world peace is possible. You won’t believe your own strength of belief: There is at least some hope.
The balance of this powerful and fascinating article may be read here.
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How many links did you follow? Most of them are wonderful links to organisations that many readers, including me, may not have come across before.
So to close.
I was about half-way through arranging today’s post when I realised that dogs have evolved without the need to have their own police forces or armies. It’s not as silly as it first sounds. Of course, dogs fight and some fights can be brutal and, occasionally, fatal to one or more of the participants. But they have a keen sense of their locality, of their tribal space; so to speak. Even as domestic animals, they are fiercely protective of what is their own place. Before dogs were domesticated, like the wolves from whence dogs evolved, the pack size was around fifty animals with just three animals having any form of status; something that has been mentioned many times before in this place.
The point is that dogs are creatures that have evolved to live in a local community and to live peacefully; by and large. My sense is that ancient man also evolved to be most complete within a community environment.
This is the end of the era of huge federal and national social constructions.
We must return to locally run and managed communities, which is the pathway to peace across this planet.
An incredible discovery about the motion of the sun, and the planets.
Serendipity
I have turned on my computer. It’s 15:30 on Sunday. My creative juices re Monday’s blog post are not flowing. Why? Because, together with a young helper who comes over most Sunday mornings, this morning we have shifted 100 bales of hay from outside the garage, taken them down to the hay-loft and stacked them floor to ceiling: all two and a half tons of them! To use an old English colloquial expression: I am fair knackered!
Then I am rescued!
Top of my email inbox is an email from Dan Gomez that is an item sent to him from his brother Chris. It’s a truly incredible discovery. One that requires us all to tear up what we understand about the Solar System and start again.
If you walk into any classroom today, and likely ever since you were a kid yourself , there is one model being taught regarding the structure of our Solar System. It’s the model that looks like this:
It’s the traditional orbiting model of the Solar System, or the Heliocentric Model, where our planets rotate around the sun.
While this isn’t entirely wrong, it’s omitting one very important fact. The sun isn’t stationary. The sun is actually travelling at extremely fast speeds, upward of 828,000 km/hr, or 514,000 miles an hour.
Our whole Solar System is orbiting the Milky Way Galaxy. In fact it takes 220-Million Years for the Sun to orbit our Galaxy.
Knowing this to be true, our visual model of the Solar System needs to change, and has been inaccurate this whole time. In fact, our planets are barreling through space with the sun, and literally creating a giant Cosmic DNA Helix, and a vortex similar to our Milky Way Galaxy.
Like this but in space, creating a never ending Sine Wave.
This entails that our Sun & the Planets of our Solar System are never in the same place. When we make one rotation around the sun, we have already traveled millions of miles through space, meaning these Cosmic Cycles are far grander than we might have previously imagined.
Here are two video examples of the Helical Model of our Solar System:
This is one by Physicist Nassim Haramein, which clarifies the difference:
Here is a beautiful digital representation of how our solar system is actually a vortex.
Thanks & Spread the Word! Let’s get this changed in Classrooms all around the World.
About the author: Amateo Ra is the co-founder of Creator Course, an Online School for Conscious Living which is currently being built. For the last 4-years, he has been training with Global leaders in Spirituality, Channeling & Conscious Business.
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Don’t know about you but reading this for the first time and watching the two videos really invigorated me. What an amazing universe it is out there!
I have been a follower of Alex Jones’ blog The Liberated Way for many months; possibly much longer. Frequently, I republish one of Alex’s posts here.
Nearly six months ago, I read a lovely essay of his and made a mental note to republish that in the next few days. Then the world overtook me and now April 30th, when Alex published this piece, has become September 8th!
Yet it hasn’t lost a heartbeat of meaning.
Read on and you will agree.
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The hidden gifts of nature.
The western education system ignores nature.
Nature is all around us with its gifts of philosophy, wisdom and creativity; qualities the West devalues at its loss.
The holidays are over in the UK, the students return to school, some to their exams. I reflect upon the sad treatment of creativity, wisdom, nature and natural philosophy in education, and in Western society as a whole, treated as worthless and unworthy of consideration.
On most days I walk past the former home of William Gilbert, some consider the father of electricity and magnetism. Born to a wealthy merchant family in my town of Colchester, Gilbert invested his personal wealth in an extensive study of magnetism with view to assisting the explorers of the Elizabethan age when Britain was building an empire in a period of great prosperity and confidence. Gilbert invented the term electricity. Gilbert wrote De Magnete, considered possibly the first work using the scientific method. In addition to being a scientist, a doctor to Elizabeth I, Gilbert was also a natural philosopher who used the empirical method of observation, demonstration and experience of nature to form his theories.
Each day I watch and interact with nature, like Gilbert I am a natural philosopher, and this forms the basis of my business ideas, my scientific understanding and my personal philosophies. Rather than a worthless study nature opens the door to the philosophy of the understanding of self, the world, and the relationship of self to the world. Wisdom is born of action and experience, the interactions with nature gives birth to wisdom. Nature encourages people to do new things in new ways, so rerouting electric signals in the brain causing new connections to form of creativity. The philosophy emerges from nature by causing the mind to question, observe and experiment, the basis of science and success in any discipline.
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Colchester, in the English county of Essex, goes way back to Roman times when the town was called Camulodunon (which was latinised as Camulodunum). That name is believed to date back to the Celtic fortress of “Camulodunon”, meaning Stronghold of Camulos. It served as the first capital of Roman Britain making a claim to be the oldest town in Britain.
It is where Alex Jones lives, the author of The Liberated Way, and where during the 1980’s I ran a business under the name of Dataview Ltd. In fact, the business was located in a very old, listed building known as The Portreeve’s House. It was at the bottom of town near Hythe Quay on the River Colne and the name “Portreeve” is old English for harbour master, i.e. it was originally the harbour master’s house.
The timber-framed building at 1–2 East Bay, Colchester, known as the Portreeve’s House is situated on the main eastern approach to the town centre. The building is on the junction of Brook Street and East Bay and is 375 metres east of the former position of East Gate and 150 metres west of East Bridge, the river Colne and East Mill. The building is believed to date back to the 16th Century.
I was doing a quick search through previous posts and, to my horror, found that I had published a post when the ‘web’ was twenty-years old. It was a post called Even more Tim Berners-Lee and was published on the 25th March, 2010; some four-and-a-half years ago. Ouch!
Now Tim’s at it again speaking about the ‘web’ being twenty-five years old.
Last March we launched this site, kicking off a year-long celebration of the Web’s 25th birthday, which will culminate in an Anniversary Symposium and gala dinner on 29 October in Santa Clara (USA), to focus on potential and challenges of the future Web.
Last March in Vancouver, Tim Berners-Lee gave a TED Talk: A Magna Carta for the web, that was just released by the TED conference. Enjoy!
Sir Tim Berners-Lee invented the World Wide Web 25 years ago. So it’s worth a listen when he warns us: There’s a battle ahead. Eroding net neutrality, filter bubbles and centralizing corporate control all threaten the web’s wide-open spaces. It’s up to users to fight for the right to access and openness. The question is, What kind of Internet do we want?
This talk was presented at an official TED conference, and was featured by our editors on the home page.
I will leave you with the conclusion of Tim’s talk (the emphasis is mine (Coralie’s) ):
What sort of web do you want? I want one which is not fragmented into lots of pieces, as some countries have been suggesting they should do in reaction to recent surveillance. I want a web which is, for example, a really good basis for democracy. I want a web where I can use healthcare with privacy and where there’s a lot of health data, clinical data is available to scientists to do research. I want a web where the other 60 percent get on board as fast as possible. I want a web which is such a powerful basis for innovation that when something nasty happens, some disaster strikes, that we can respond by building stuff to respond to it very quickly.
So this is just some of the things that I want, from a big list, obviously it’s longer. You have your list. I want us to use this 25th anniversary to think about what sort of a web we want. You can go to webat25.org and find some links. There are lots of sites where people have started to put together a Magna Carta, a bill of rights for the web. How about we do that? How about we decide, these are, in a way, becoming fundamental rights, the right to communicate with whom I want. What would be on your list for that Magna Carta? Let’s crowdsource a Magna Carta for the web. Let’s do that this year. Let’s use the energy from the 25th anniversary to crowdsource a Magna Carta to the web. (Applause)
Thank you. And do me a favor, will you? Fight for it for me. Okay? Thanks.
Get’s my vote. Just wish the last twenty-five years hadn’t gone by just so quickly 😦
I am referring to politicians; but you probably guessed that.
Just my way of a lead-in to a wonderful item seen recently over on ABC Eye Witness News.
Namely:
DOG ELECTED MAYOR IN CORMORANT, MINNESOTA
Duke, the mayor of Cormorant, Minnesota.
Tuesday, August 12, 2014
CORMORANT, Minnesota (WLS) — Duke, a 7-year-old dog, was elected mayor of Cormorant, Minnesota.
“He won by a landslide,” Tricia Maloney said of the Great Pyrenees. “He’s used to coming to the pub and getting some burgers and some fries or something.”
The 12 people who live in Cormorant all paid $1 to vote.
“Poor Richard Sherbrook that owns the Cormorant store, he didn’t even have half as many votes as Duke did,” Maloney said.
The farm dog is all bark, no bite. His term lasts one year.
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A quick web search found a longer version of the news item over on the CBS News website:
Duke The Dog Sworn In As Mayor Of Cormorant, Minn.
(credit: CBS)
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) – Every dog has his day and Saturday is it for Duke the dog.
Duke was elected mayor of the northwestern Minnesota community of Cormorant, and he was sworn in Saturday. Organizer Tammy Odegaard says Duke got gussied up Friday night, his second trip to the groomer since his election.
“He spends a lot of time at the dairy farm next door,” Odegaard said, who notes she’s now a member of Duke’s staff. “So, twice in, like, seven days for him is, like, it’s never happened. So I’m sure he’s wondering what’s going on with just that.”
His first grooming took five hours and came after the majority of the town’s 12 voters backed him in the balloting. The town pulled out all the stops for the 10 a.m. ceremony during Cormorant’s annual fair.
“We’ll have him put his little paw on the bible, going to have him have the little oath,” Odegaard said. “Of course, he’s not going to repeat it. It would be awesome if he would bark, but who knows? He’s a country dog, so he’s not used to performing on cue.”
During the two-minute inauguration ceremony, Steve Sorenson, chairman of Cormorant Township, greeted Duke and set forth his duties.
“You are about to em-bark upon a great time of service, tremendous personal and professional growth,” Sorenson said. “If you accept this challenge and these responsibilities, please bark or pant.”
Duke panted.
“I think that qualifies,” Sorenson said.
As for the mayor’s salary, a pet food store is donating a year’s supply of kibble to reward him for his service.
The village of Cormorant is located in northwestern Minnesota, near Pelican Rapids.
Duke is a seven-year-old, big, white, shaggy Great Pyrenees that loves to roll around in the dirt. Odegaard would not say if that activity qualifies Duke for a career in politics.
“You said it, not me,” Odegaard laughed.
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That inauguration ceremony was captured on video; see below. Warning, the first seven minutes are a little slow! But it is worth watching, trust me!
Learning from Dogs 