Tag: Science Daily

What’s in a name?

“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet”.

That very well-known quotation from Wm. Shakespeare was the obvious sub-title to today’s post.

You will be aware that I have written several times previously about Pit Bull dogs. But I would like to draw your attention to a post that was published here back in 2013. It was called In praise of Pit Bull dogs and featured a guest post from Noella Schink, in Portland, Maine, where she then lived and played with her 3-year-old pit bull mix, Addie, 8-year old shih-tzu, Brutus, and 2-year old hound, Lula. Apart from all of them being a little older I trust nothing else has changed.

That post in 2013 also included a picture of our gorgeous Casey, as follows.

Casey doing what dogs do so well – picking up a scent.
Casey doing what dogs do so well – picking up scents around his home.

Over on the Care2 petition site there was a compelling case being made for Pit Bulls to be given a different name. Read it and see if you are convinced of the need.

ooOOoo

How We Could Save More Dogs From Death Row by Changing One Thing

By: Jessica Ramos, March 29, 2016

About Jessica

3172603.large

Whether we like it or not, labels matter — even for dogs. New research from Arizona State University published in PLOS ONE, suggests labels could even lead to a potential death sentence, if you’re a pit bull.

Pit Bulls Wait 3 Times as Long to be Adopted

The pit bull went from America’s darling dog to one of the most feared (and misunderstood) dogs today. Their fall from grace is evident in stories like Olive’s. Olive the Pit Bull was brought in as a stray and stayed in the shelter for approximately 11 years. Olive was lucky enough to find her forever home, but so many dogs like her aren’t — and our arbitrary labels aren’t helping their cause.

According to Science Daily, researchers from Arizona State University wanted to know if breed identification influences adoption. The researchers found that dogs labeled as “pit bulls” could wait three times as long to be adopted from shelters into their forever homes compared to their lookalikes without the label or labelled as another breed.

Compared to other breeds, like Labradors, pits were perceived as less friendly and more aggressive. They also were considered less “attractive” than their lookalikes. Weird, right?

Even the researchers were surprised by how much the pit bull label influences perception and, ultimately, adoption. As researcher Lisa Gunter from Arizona State University explains, “We were surprised how very similar looking dogs sometimes get labelled ‘pit bull’ and other times as something completely different. These dogs may look and act the same, but the pit bull label damns them to a much longer wait to adoption,” reports Science Daily.

Ultimately, the researchers recommend losing the pit bull label to stop inadvertently penalizing these dogs in the shelter setting.

Heartbreaking Pit Bull Statistics

If you thought that Olive’s story was sad, she’s actually one of the lucky ones — not only for getting adopted, but for staying in the shelter system for the 11 years that she did.

According to Pit Bull Rescue Central (PBCR) 200 pit bulls are euthanized in Los Angeles County animal shelters every single day.

PBCR emphasizes that “for homeless pit bulls the death sentence is almost always automatic.”

Villalobos Rescue Center (made popular by the TV show Pit Bulls and Parolees) had this to say about the pit bull plight in Los Angeles: “The pit bull population has now risen to 40% of all the dogs in 12 shelters in Los Angeles. That means that almost half of the entire Los Angeles dog population is pits or pit mixes! Most are strays, tossed out like dirty laundry. It’s heartbreaking.”

Sadly, the plight of pit bulls is not limited to Los Angeles County. A 2013 Nat Geo Wild infographic reveals that:

  • 60 percent of the total dogs euthanized in U.S. shelters are pit bulls
  • 30 percent of the total dogs admitted to shelters are labeled pit bulls
  • 86.7 percent of pit bulls admitted to open admission shelters are euthanized

Do you know what the worst part of this sad situation is? There’s no such thing as a pit bull.

As Bark Post explains, the pit bull label is just “an umbrella term that most people use to refer to different types of dogs – the American Pit Bull Terrier, the American Staffordshire Terrier, the Staffordshire Bull Terrier, any mixes thereof, and any dog that vaguely resembles these dogs.”

The breed isn’t real, but the stigma has real consequences. And time and again pit bulls prove that they can be great dogs with the correct guidance and training when they get a second chance. Remember how Jericho the Pit Bull went from death row to being an amazing service dog?

Take Action!

Sign and share this petition urging animal rescuers to lose the stigmatizing pit bull label that unnecessarily penalizes innocent dogs. It’s a matter of life and death.

Photo Credit: Max Schneider

ooOOoo

I can’t better the comment to that Care2 item left by Sheri.

Sherri S.

Only idiots believe that pit bulls are bad! When are some morons going to finally wake up and realize bad owners are responsible for bad dogs! BSL should be banned everywhere. We must never stop fighting to end the senseless killing of this breed.

Say no more!

Dogs and wolves – fascinating research.

Something new to learn every day!

I have been saving this report for a few weeks.  Following yesterday’s great news about the latest concerning wolves in Oregon, today seemed a perfect follow-on with a report first published in online journal PLOS ONE. However, what follows is a full republication of the report as I read it on the Science Daily website.

ooOOoo

Teaching young wolves new tricks: Wolves are considerably better imitators than dogs

Date: January 31, 2014

Source: Veterinärmedizinische Universität Wien

Summary: Although wolves and dogs are closely related, they show some striking differences. Scientists have undertaken experiments that suggest that wolves observe one another more closely than dogs and so are better at learning from one another. The scientists believe that cooperation among wolves is the basis of the understanding between dogs and humans.

Wolves are considerably better imitators than dogs. Credit: Walter Vorbeck
Wolves are considerably better imitators than dogs.
Credit: Walter Vorbeck

Although wolves and dogs are closely related, they show some striking differences. Scientists from the Messerli Research Institute at the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna have undertaken experiments that suggest that wolves observe one another more closely than dogs and so are better at learning from one another. The scientists believe that cooperation among wolves is the basis of the understanding between dogs and humans.

Their findings have been published in the online journal PLOS ONE.

Wolves were domesticated more than 15,000 years ago and it is widely assumed that the ability of domestic dogs to form close relationships with humans stems from changes during the domestication process. But the effects of domestication on the interactions between the animals have not received much attention. The point has been addressed by Friederike Range and Zsófia Virányi, two members of the University of Veterinary Medicine, Vienna (Vetmeduni Vienna) who work at the Wolf Science Center (WSC) in Ernstbrunn, Niederösterreich.

Wolves copy other wolves solving problems

The scientists found that wolves are considerably better than dogs at opening a container, providing they have previously watched another animal do so. Their study involved 14 wolves and 15 mongrel dogs, all about six months old, hand-reared and kept in packs. Each animal was allowed to observe one of two situations in which a trained dog opened a wooden box, either with its mouth or with its paw, to gain access to a food reward. Surprisingly, all of the wolves managed to open the box after watching a dog solve the puzzle, while only four of the dogs managed to do so. Wolves more frequently opened the box using the method they had observed, whereas the dogs appeared to choose randomly whether to use their mouth or their paw.

Watch closely …

To exclude the possibility that six-month old dogs fail the experiment because of a delayed physical or cognitive development, the researchers repeated the test after nine months. The dogs proved no more adept at opening the box than they were at a younger age. Another possible explanation for the wolves’ apparent superiority at learning is that wolves might simply be better than dogs at solving such problems. To test this idea, the researchers examined the animals’ ability to open a box without prior demonstration by a dog. They found that the wolves were rarely successful. “Their problem-solving capability really seems to be based on the observation of a dog performing the task,” says Range. “The wolves watched the dog very closely and were able to apply their new knowledge to solve the problem. Their skill at copying probably relates to the fact that wolves are more dependent on cooperation with conspecifics than dogs are and therefore pay more attention to the actions of their partners.”

The researchers think that it is likely that the dog-human cooperation originated from cooperation between wolves. During the process of domestication, dogs have become able to accept humans as social partners and thus have adapted their social skills to include interactions with them, concomitantly losing the ability to learn by watching other dogs.

—-

Story Source: The above story is based on materials provided by Veterinärmedizinische Universität Wien. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

—-

Journal Reference:

  1. Friederike Range, Zsófia Virányi. Wolves Are Better Imitators of Conspecifics than Dogs. PLoS ONE, 2014; 9 (1): e86559 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0086559

ooOOoo

So if you, like me, are one of many people who believe that your dog knows what you are thinking, then we need to thank the wolf!

Snow leopards

Pure, simple wonderment!

To be honest, I had forgotten that I had this post stored in my ‘drafts’ folder.  But when browsing for something easy on the eye for a Sunday, I discovered this.

Despite the item going back to last July, it’s still wonderful and worth sharing.

Endangered snow leopards to be studied in Mongolia.
Endangered snow leopards to be studied in Mongolia.

First, the news release from the Science Daily website:

First Ever Videos of Snow Leopard Mother and Cubs in Dens Recorded in Mongolia

July 12, 2012 — For the first time, the den sites of two female snow leopards and their cubs have been located in Mongolia’s Tost Mountains, with the first known videos taken of a mother and cubs, located and recorded by scientists from Panthera, a wild cat conservation organization, and the Snow Leopard Trust (SLT).

Because of the snow leopard’s secretive and elusive nature, coupled with the extreme and treacherous landscape which they inhabit, dens have been extremely difficult to locate. This is a tremendous discovery and provides invaluable insight into the life story of the snow leopard.

Dr. Tom McCarthy, Executive Director of Panthera’s Snow Leopard Program stated, “We have spent years trying to determine when and where snow leopards give birth, the size of their litters, and the chances a cub has of surviving into adulthood. This is one of those exceptional moments in conservation where after years of effort, we get a rare glimpse into the life of an animal that needs our help in surviving in today’s world. These data will help ensure a future for these incredible animals.“

A short video of the female and her cub who were bedded down in a partially human-made den was recorded from a safe distance by Örjan Johansson, Panthera’s Snow Leopard Field Scientist and Ph.D. student, using a camera fixed to an extended pole.

Read more of the article here.

Now enjoy this!

Transit of Venus

This is a copy of a Post published on the 31st May to ensure that all who are interested get the details.

That Post was called, The noblest astronomy affords, all that follows is a copy of that Post.

Don’t miss the transit of Venus across the Sun.

Continue reading “Transit of Venus” →

The noblest astronomy affords

Don’t miss the transit of Venus across the Sun.

The full quotation is “This sight…is by far the noblest astronomy affords…” and was reputed to have been made by Sir Edmond Halley of Halley’s Comet fame, see here.  But today’s Post is about Venus.

Venus — Sister to Earth

From the NOAA Science on a Sphere website, we can read this about Venus,

Venus has been referred to as the sister or even twin to Earth by many because of its similar chemical composition, density and size. That, however, is where the similarities end. Venus is not only the hottest planet in the solar system, but also the brightest. Both of these characteristics are the result of the atmosphere that surrounds the planet, which is mainly composed of carbon dioxide and some sulfuric acid. This composition allows for the greenhouse effect to be astronomical causing the planet to have a constant temperature of 864°F. The planet is the brightest because the clouds, composed of sulfur dioxide and sulfuric acid, are highly reflective. The pressure of the atmosphere that surrounds Venus is 90 times that of the atmosphere around Earth, crushing any probes that land on Venus in a matter of hours.

Depending on where you live on Planet Earth you will see the transit on the 5th June, the 6th June or not at all!

Courtesy of Fred Espenak (NASA GSFC), who provides additional transit of Venus data from NASA.

(That additional data referred to above may be found here.)

That transit diagram plus mounds of other interesting stuff is on the Transit of Venus website and on that website this page has the details allowing you to work out what day and time the transit occurs depending on where you are.

To close let me be a little cheeky and reproduce, in full, what appeared on the Science Daily website on the 1st May.

Venus to Appear in Once-In-A-Lifetime Event

ScienceDaily (May 1, 2012) — On 5 and 6 June this year, millions of people around the world will be able to see Venus pass across the face of the Sun in what will be a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

It will take Venus about six hours to complete its transit, appearing as a small black dot on the Sun’s surface, in an event that will not happen again until 2117.

In this month’s Physics World, Jay M Pasachoff, an astronomer at Williams College, Massachusetts, explores the science behind Venus’s transit and gives an account of its fascinating history.

Transits of Venus occur only on the very rare occasions when Venus and Earth are in a line with the Sun. At other times Venus passes below or above the Sun because the two orbits are at a slight angle to each other. Transits occur in pairs separated by eight years, with the gap between pairs of transits alternating between 105.5 and 121.5 years — the last transit was in 2004.

Building on the original theories of Nicolaus Copernicus from 1543, scientists were able to predict and record the transits of both Mercury and Venus in the centuries that followed.

Johannes Kepler successfully predicted that both planets would transit the Sun in 1631, part of which was verified with Mercury’s transit of that year. But the first transit of Venus to actually be viewed was in 1639 — an event that had been predicted by the English astronomer Jeremiah Horrocks. He observed the transit in the village of Much Hoole in Lancashire — the only other person to see it being his correspondent, William Crabtree, in Manchester.

Later, in 1716, Edmond Halley proposed using a transit of Venus to predict the precise distance between Earth and the Sun, known as the astronomical unit. As a result, hundreds of expeditions were sent all over the world to observe the 1761 and 1769 transits. A young James Cook took the Endeavour to the island of Tahiti, where he successfully observed the transit at a site that is still called Point Venus.

Pasachoff expects the transit to confirm his team’s theory about the phenomenon called “the black-drop effect” — a strange, dark band linking Venus’s silhouette with the sky outside the Sun that appears for about a minute starting just as Venus first enters the solar disk.

Pasachoff and his colleagues will concentrate on observing Venus’s atmosphere as it appears when Venus is only half onto the solar disk. He also believes that observations of the transit will help astronomers who are looking for extrasolar planets orbiting stars other than the Sun.

“Doing so verifies that the techniques for studying events on and around other stars hold true in our own backyard.. In other words, by looking up close at transits in our solar system, we may be able to see subtle effects that can help exoplanet hunters explain what they are seeing when they view distant suns,” Pasachoff writes.

Not content with viewing this year’s transit from Earth, scientists in France will be using the Hubble Space Telescope to observe the effect of Venus’s transit very slightly darkening the Moon. Pasachoff and colleagues even hope to use Hubble to watch Venus passing in front of the Sun as seen from Jupiter — an event that will take place on 20 September this year — and will be using NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, which is orbiting Saturn, to see a transit of Venus from Saturn on 21 December.

“We are fortunate in that we are truly living in a golden period of planetary transits and it is one of which I hope astronomers can take full advantage,” he writes.

Editors note: Looking directly at the sun can cause severe and permanent eye damage. Do not look directly at Venus’ transit of the sun.

For more information see Wikipedia article.

Footnote:

I’m going to republish this in full on Monday, 4th June at the usual Learning from Dogs release time of 0700 UTC so to increase the odds of all my readers who would like to see the Transit having the information in good time!

Having the dog of a day!

Maybe there’s a new twist to that rather derogatory phrase!

For the life of me, I can’t remember how this story came to my ‘in-box’ but most likely it was from my Big Think subscription.  But I do know that the story has spread like wild-fire (poor choice of simile for Arizona!) and not without good reason.

Here’s how it was promoted on Science Daily,

Benefits of Taking Your Dog to Work May Not Be Far-Fetched

Man’s best friend may make a positive difference in the workplace by reducing stress and making the job more satisfying for other employees, according to a Virginia Commonwealth University study.

Stress is a major contributor to employee absenteeism, morale and burnout and results in significant loss of productivity and resources. But a preliminary study, published in the March issue of the International Journal of Workplace Health Management, found that dogs in the workplace may buffer the impact of stress during the workday for their owners and make the job more satisfying for those with whom they come into contact.

The VCU researchers compared employees who bring their dogs to work, employees who do not bring their dogs to work and employees without pets in the areas of stress, job satisfaction, organizational commitment and support.

Then over at the New York Daily News, it was presented thus,

Bring your dog to work to lower stress; Companies that allow pooches have happier workers

Amazon, Ben & Jerry’s and Zynga all have pup-friendly policies

A new study supports the stress-reducing benefits of bringing your pooch to work — to play with, look at, and pet while working.

According to a Virginia Commonwealth University study, having a dog at work not only reduces the owners’ stress level but also increased the level of job satisfaction for other employees as well. The study, announced Thursday, was published in the International Journal of Workplace Health Management.

“Dogs in the workplace can make a positive difference,” said head researcher Randolph T. Barker. “The differences in perceived stress between days the dog was present and absent were significant. The employees as a whole had higher job satisfaction than industry norms.”

Here’s a great example.  The photograph below,

One hand for the desk and one for the dog!

comes from the website of Interior Design Hound (seriously) where the by-line is Good Design with a Canine Twist! (No, I’m not making it up!)

Anyway, back to that NY Daily News item,

The study took place at Replacements Ltd, a service-manufacturing-retail company located in North Carolina, which employs approximately 550 people. The company has a dog friendly policy, similar to other  companies such as Amazon, Ben & Jerry’s and Zynga, according to CBS News, with around 20 to 30 dogs romping through the office every day. The study took place over a period of one work week, and subjects completing both surveys and saliva samples to measure stress levels.

According to The Humane Society of the United States, there are numerous benefits to having dogs at work, including improved staff morale, worker productivity, and camaraderie among employees.

Numerous studies have shown that having a pet is a good investment for your health. One study found that having a pet lowered your risk factors for heart disease, and another found that dogs encourage more consistent walking and exercise.

Seems pretty obvious to me.

Another tough day at the office!

Mind you, going back to the metaphorical ‘having a dog of a day‘ here’s one woman who probably wished she hadn’t got out of bed that morning,

Woman has a dog of a day in court

Sydney – If you have a phobia about dogs and hurt yourself running away from one, is it your own fault or should the owner of the dog pay compensation?

An Australian judge on Wednesday ruled against a woman who had put that case to him and ordered her to pay substantial legal costs.

Mileva Novakovic took her brother, Michael Stekovic, and his wife to the New South Wales Court of Appeal to try to overturn a lower court verdict that found they were not liable for injuries she sustained at his house in 2008.

Novakovic slipped and fell in a panic over finding a dog in their lounge room. She admitted to a fear of dogs and said she was compelled to run despite Cougar, a mastiff, showing no aggression towards her.

 

Very scary!

The power of a wagging tail!

We must never lose sight of the greater power of positive thoughts.

Indeed, who cannot look at a dog’s wagging tail and not feel better about life.  There is so much doom and gloom around that we need constantly to remind ourselves that there is a brighter future ahead, there always is.

And to understand how little it takes for a positive difference to sweep through, take a look at this article from Science Daily,

Scientists at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have found that when just 10 percent of the population holds an unshakable belief, their belief will always be adopted by the majority of the society.

The implications of this are profound. Be sure that we are living through a transition period, a period necessary to find a better future.  Find another nine people who agree with you, and there’s a hundred on their way!  Back to the article,

“When the number of committed opinion holders is below 10 percent, there is no visible progress in the spread of ideas. It would literally take the amount of time comparable to the age of the universe for this size group to reach the majority,” said SCNARC Director Boleslaw Szymanski, the Claire and Roland Schmitt Distinguished Professor at Rensselaer. “Once that number grows above 10 percent, the idea spreads like flame.”

Science supporting common-sense!

It almost goes on for ever.

The almost everlasting heavens above us.

There is so much information around us these days that it’s easy to forget how incredibly advantaged are those today that wish to learn about everything and anything.  It was just such a meander around the internet that brought me to a website called Science Daily, a wonderful daily digest of top science news items.

And a browse through that web site brought me to this piece on the creation of the very first stars in the universe.

June 1, 2007 — Astronomers removed light from closer and better known galaxies and stars from pictures taken with the Spitzer Space Telescope. The remaining images are believed to be the first objects in space, 13 billion light years away.

The first stars in our universe are long gone, but their light still shines, giving us a peek at what the universe looked like in its early years.

Astrophysicists believe they’ve spotted a faint glow from stars born at the beginning of time. Harvey Moseley, Ph.D., an astrophysicist at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, says, “The reason they’re faint is just because they’re very, very far away, they’re over at the far edge of the universe.”

I don’t know about you but I find this so deeply inspiring – a reminder of the instinctive nature of man to enquire and explore.  And it is this exploratory instinct that will pull us all through from the challenges that we all face today.

Anyway, I’m wandering off the subject!

Do read the piece in full here and then watch the following video from Avi Loeb.

Oh, want to know how far 13 billion light years is?  Brace yourself!

Light travels at 186,000 miles per second or more properly expressed 299,792.458 km/sec.  See here.  (Brilliant website by the way) That is 10 trillion kilometres a year.

So 13 billion light years is simply! 10 trillion multiplied by 13 billion kilometres.  Anyone got a larger calculator?

By Paul Handover