Sagan’s Baloney Detection Kit on NDT philosophy

Burl

What do you think is the validity of saying most of what creatures actually do - after securing safety and food - is to follow whatever seems interesting and fun - as I write this, this seems like SEEKING and PLAY

 

 

Yes. As a practical trainer, Panksepp allows us to make a list of needs for mammals to play based on neurological requireements. These are

1) Not Hungry

2) Not Threatened

3 Not Satiated

4) Social safety

So if we wish our dogs to play and be exicted and happy by it, we need to comply with the above. Panksepp covers this quite well i think, and so do a few others. Milkyway may have references off hand.

It is not a bad thing to train a dog in seeking mode. In fact it is easier to achieve . There is a question as to whether SEEKING and PLAY are inhibitory. BTW the prey drive that Kevin speaks of is a subset of SEEKING. (A very small one...)

 

 Thanks, PO, I wondered if I was on to something that really confirms my hunch that, as many have said before me, my dog's behavior is analogous to mine.  So when trying to say "dogs do X because...", the reasons given need to resemble the answer to this "people do X because..."

 I find this more natural than many of Kevin's answers to the first question, and I am often left with no answer from NDTers when I ask, "well if dogs do X because of Y, then do you also say people do too?" 

well you can't say that something is just interesting or fun. you have to ask why is something interesting or fun? why are sports (enjoyed by public) always competitions?

to answer your last question

I find this more natural than many of Kevin's answers to the first question, and I am often left with no answer from NDTers when I ask, "well if dogs do X because of Y, then do you also say people do too?"

ndt is pretty explicit in response.

dog's don't think. humans do think. what we both share however, is an emotional language/core that informs us how to behave. the difference is we reflect on our own behavior, which in turns creates new behavior.

 Poodle Owned: "Yes. As a practical trainer, Panksepp allows us to make a list of needs for mammals to play based on neurological requireements. These are 1) Not Hungry 2) Not Threatened 3 Not Satiated 4) Social safety. So if we wish our dogs to play and be exicted and happy by it, we need to comply with the above. Panksepp covers this quite well i think, and so do a few others. Milkyway may have references off hand. It is not a bad thing to train a dog in seeking mode. In fact it is easier to achieve . There is a question as to whether SEEKING and PLAY are inhibitory. BTW the prey drive that Kevin speaks of is a subset of SEEKING. (A very small one...)"

<<< I would argue that to the contrary, all of the above are actually subsets of the prey drive, not the other way around, which is why the hunting behavior of the wolf is the definitive characteristic that led to the domesticated dog, and is why something to do with hunting is the basis for the name of virtually every breed of dog.

A working dog of whatever breed, which means the hardiest temperaments, are not concerned with 1, 2, 3 or 4 when they are "in drive." It is also clear with working dogs that the drive-to-make-contact is stronger than the reproductive urge, and at any rate, sexuality is derived from the predator/prey modality. I also would argue that the existential states listed above of seeking, play, safety, satiation, are not elemental and can be articulated in terms of the brain-to-gut connection (implementing principle of emotional conductivity) which speaks to a deeper mechanism organizing these stereotypical responses. For example, if a dog has a spasmodic intestines, he feels "uneasy." Whereas if his highly emotive digestive system is rhythmic, he feels safe. This for example is the case for a police dog under gunfire that has been properly trained to associate gun play as prelude to the hunt, hence reliable down/stay in pounce mode until sent as directed by handler. Play is self-modified prey making because this increases the experience of "flow" and again, services the template that organizes the group for the purpose of the hunt. >>>

     Burl: "What do you think is the validity of saying most of what creatures actually do - after securing safety and food - is to follow whatever seems interesting and fun - as I write this, this seems like SEEKING and PLAY"

<<>>

well you can't say that something is just interesting or fun. you have to ask why is something interesting or fun? why are sports (enjoyed by public) always competitions?


But what is interesting and fun is quite fleeting, as one who is depressed (or merely tired or bored) well knows.

And ‘why’ something is interesting or fun is just about as close to asking ‘what is meaningful/ as you can get – and who do you know has an answer for that?


To answer your last question

I find this more natural than many of Kevin's answers to the first question, and I am often left with no answer from NDTers when I ask, "well if dogs do X because of Y, then do you also say people do too?"

ndt is pretty explicit in response.

dog's don't think. humans do think. what we both share however, is an emotional language/core that informs us how to behave. the difference is we reflect on our own behavior, which in turns creates new behavior.


This is your opinion only, asserted as fact.  DesCartes would agree with you (emotion and subconscious were all merely material aspects of body, and only man had the cogito – the rational mind).  What a damnable legacy this has left western civilization.  Fortunately, many bright thinkers of the last 300 yrs, as well as observant people not wedded to such a self-effacing, anthropocentric dogma believe otherwise.  The nature of animal cognition is being scrutinizedm and what we really understand is not supportive of No Dogs Think.


On Kevin’s assertion of the primacy of prey drive, I just don’t see it in all dogs, and don’t see it 24/7 in those that have a strong drive, sometimes you are in pursuit, and sometimes you chew a bone with eyes closed.   Same for us.  But if you cannot believe dogs' are able to temper their emotions and instincts with their higher cognitive function, you are probably left with the need to explain the variety of behaviors they exhibit some-other-howm and I guess prey drive does it for you.  But not me.

Hi Kevin

 

Kevin Behan

<<< I would argue that to the contrary, all of the above are actually subsets of the prey drive, not the other way around, which is why the hunting behavior of the wolf is the definitive characteristic that led to the domesticated dog, and is why something to do with hunting is the basis for the name of virtually every breed of dog.

 

The rebuttal of this may take some posts. We fortuntaley now have evidence behavourally, anatomically and fucntion wise that this isn't so. We can also look at logical evolutionary evidence in our own breeds that points to something a bit different.

What Panksepp and others suggest based on this anatomical and PET scan and neruochemical evidence is  that play is different than SEEKING. Some of what i am about to say is going to put me out on a limb dog world wise with a saw busy chopping myself off from this world

"Prey drive" is a big sloppy phrase that was coined in the late 1950's (Lorenz et Al ?)  and is far too broad a brush to define a very broad range of emotional states. We should refine it. To not refine it is to allow the kind of confusion that we have here. I think that Panksepp's idea of SEEKING is more encompassing, and to a fair extent allows sub behaviours of the prey sequence. I suggest that it is a good idea to look up this concept and check it out. Remember that this sub dividsion is based on how these circuits work in the brain, how we can trigger these circuits with various neuro chemicals, and the consisitency of these behaviours within a species or sub species.

SEEKING encompasses the normal desire of a mammal to look for prey or other food or to check it's environment out. It also includes the terminal behaviours which include "the bite" which is so over romanticesed. I need to repeat that several experiments suggest that this behaviour is not" adreanalised" and is a reflex behaviour. It is all there to check out,a number of experiments have been done, the chemistry examined, the anatomy discovered.

Now one of my "pet " annoyances is the insistence that only a type of behaviour or a type of play indicates drive, or that drive is some kind of fixed thing that comes at birth like a hot V8 engine in a good Aussie car... I keep on showing  that this isn't so over and over, just the same as i show over and over that it is more likely with the evidence of body langauge and behaviour that our dogs are in PLAY rather than SEEKING when we use this fluffy word called drive... Will continue this in the next post......

 

 

Burl

 Is my thinking just preposterous, or might creativity and interesting and fun be built-in to our creaturly DNA?

Maybe creativity is due to random neuronal firings. Or maybe it's due to subtle differences in perception due to the fact we are not machines. Or maybe it's just an early adaptive feature of our development.... or all or some of those and more.

corgidog

dog's don't think. humans do think. what we both share however, is an emotional language/core that informs us how to behave. the difference is we reflect on our own behavior, which in turns creates new behavior.

 

If we can't claim that dog's think, then the same must be said for humans.  Evolution demands continuity, biological and psychological.All the evidence to claim that humans can think can also be applied to the claim that dogs can think.  NDT claims to the contrary are contrary to reality.

As Elizabeth Knoll writes:  "if we cannot anthropomorphize the animals, we cannot anthropomorphize ourselves either." -- Dogs, Darwinism, and English Sensibilities

Kevin Behan

A working dog of whatever breed, which means the hardiest temperaments, are not concerned with 1, 2, 3 or 4 when they are "in drive." It is also clear with working dogs that the drive-to-make-contact is stronger than the reproductive urge, and at any rate, sexuality is derived from the predator/prey modality. I also would argue that the existential states listed above of seeking, play, safety, satiation, are not elemental and can be articulated in terms of the brain-to-gut connection (implementing principle of emotional conductivity) which speaks to a deeper mechanism organizing these stereotypical responses. For example, if a dog has a spasmodic intestines, he feels "uneasy." Whereas if his highly emotive digestive system is rhythmic, he feels safe. This for example is the case for a police dog under gunfire that has been properly trained to associate gun play as prelude to the hunt, hence reliable down/stay in pounce mode until sent as directed by handler. Play is self-modified prey making because this increases the experience of "flow" and again, services the template that organizes the group for the purpose of the hunt. >>>

It's delusional to think that a starving dog will no be interested food. Or that a dog facing a grizzly is not affected by the threat. Despite the ridiculous claims, there is a reason why working dog trials have rules about dogs in heat.  And Behan's fallacious claims won't change that fact.

It is also not "clear" - that's you making up stuff.  Like all the "therefore"s you like to use without antecedent arguments.

BTW, about 'associations? That sounds remarkably like conditioning.

TheMilkyWay

It's delusional to think that a starving dog will no be interested food. Or that a dog facing a grizzly is not affected by the threat. Despite the ridiculous claims, there is a reason why working dog trials have rules about dogs in heat.  And Behan's fallacious claims won't change that fact.

 

 

Yes, one of the pirmary reasons that one of Skinner's idea of "attraction" and "repulsion" is lacking in states and dimensions to adequately model behaviours.With a multi state model, we can look at how states may inhibit each other, or modify each other. (Probably talking like an EE, sorry about that!!)

 

 The dogs with true drive are not swayed by female in heat when they have chance to bite the sleeve. Easy to demonstrate this for yourself, no mystery. Trials are highly controlled events and all grounds for complaints have to be redressed. I've been to trials where dogs in heat went last, and the good dogs weren't bothered by the scent even though female was on the grounds for a warm up session. I've had client Rotty take on a bear on his porch, and the good police dogs loved the big felon for the fight, (ex pro-wrestler with a felony warrant) they saw him as a huge hunk of meat. All drives are subordinate to the master drive, emotion moving from predator to prey polarity. It's impossible to watch dogs in play and not see the flipping of these roles. It is the basis of dogs playing at a peak state of excitation.

All dogs have the signature of this in their makeup, but vary in its expression when stressed, and yet even so, under conducive conditions it can be recapitulated in any dog. For example, all wolves want to sink their teeth into the moose, but are "polarized" according to stress and so their personalities cause them to refract to varied approach to the quarry in a synchronized group manner. The lead wolf dies, another one moves into that emotional polarity. The notion of higher cognitive function as agency of this doesn't add up.

The question also isn't about the starving dog, but the well-fed dog that still chases prey, and note that on a hot day, such a dog can easily be driven to heat exhaustion before the prey drive tires. 

 I'm arguing that there is a group consciousness modifying individual behavior which is why every household of dogs emotionally polarize in a patterned way no matter how they are individually treated. I also believe that the belief in thinking as source of cognition in animals will always reduce to a mechanical model in the ultimate irony of how nature plays tricks on the human intellect.

One can always see the signature of strong drive 24/7 even though it may not be overtly expressed in every moment. For example, when two strange dogs meet, the emotionally stable dog with the stronger drive will defer to the dog with weaker drive in order to engage it in play. Of course you will see thinking in this but I'm just putting out an alternative explanation, because the stronger dog always defers to weaker dog, (allowing that both are emotionally stable/socialized) 

Kevin Behan

A working dog of whatever breed, which means the hardiest temperaments, are not concerned with 1, 2, 3 or 4 when they are "in drive." It is also clear with working dogs that the drive-to-make-contact is stronger than the reproductive urge, and at any rate, sexuality is derived from the predator/prey modality. I also would argue that the existential states listed above of seeking, play, safety, satiation, are not elemental and can be articulated in terms of the brain-to-gut connection (implementing principle of emotional conductivity) which speaks to a deeper mechanism organizing these stereotypical responses. For example, if a dog has a spasmodic intestines, he feels "uneasy." Whereas if his highly emotive digestive system is rhythmic, he feels safe. This for example is the case for a police dog under gunfire that has been properly trained to associate gun play as prelude to the hunt, hence reliable down/stay in pounce mode until sent as directed by handler. Play is self-modified prey making because this increases the experience of "flow" and again, services the template that organizes the group for the purpose of the hunt. >>>

 

 

I am not going to comment on your stuff about stomaches, flow and the rest  that is best rebuted by others. I am just going down this line of some anedoctal evidence that i have as a trainer, and some interesting and suprising results that i have had as trainer with my own dogs. 

I have said that SEEKING and PLAY seem in practice and in  developement to be quite seperate but also quite easy to confuse. My primary sport is tracking, and most dogs with training are driven so competely by the desire to finish the track that they will indeed ignore most things. A primary example is my older  poodle. She will ignore high temperatures, other dogs, bees, scee (gravel slopes) hot tarmac , long grass,cold wet grass for the chance to complete that track. She will ignore food and toys on the track. She is not a working dog, and every last scrap of that drive is manufactured goodness knows from where. She is not my first choice of tracking dog, but she does a dam good job. So i have to say that the reasons that she does is so well explained by Panksepp, it is the first reason that i actually read what he wrote. It is interesting to note the reward dynamic, and to note that she will ignore food... even though now size for size she would give some labs a bit of a shake in the greediness stakes. So what i have done is created a training environement that peaks her SEEKING, tha always has different unexpected things, goes weird places, is erratic in reward placement...

Now if you looked at videos of her playing tug with me, and blew it up and pretended that she was a GSD, you would think she had awesome drive. Every last once of that PLAY drive is hard fought for, difficult to develop and took rigid adherence to those rules. Now she would play tug with a piece of string, but she trusts me and the environment around me. I must say that i do sometimes look at my training partners who have harder gun dogs and working dogs who are full on as young puppies.... This is how it happened for my dog ... I have experienced her prey drive. It is fleeting vicous and quick with rats, mice and swallows.  Now this PLAY drive shows in ** i think "" a particular strut and focus that many dogs taught her way seem to develop in heeling. Gee we need to do some more research here... Note the play drive is finickety to get out , the SEEKING (conventional reward seeking)  on the surface and easy to develop but seems to have limits with some breeds.

I have taken my younger boy through the same process. He again if you threw away the preconceptions is a hard working dog. He playe hard and well... so what is this drive if i can train and build it to such heights? What are the answers here? Again, if we look at Panksepp, some of the  answers are pretty relevant.

On a personal note, why don't i get a "normal working dog?" Well i will, but they seem easy after my poodles and quite frankly not as much fun.:)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 My definition of prey drive accounts for phenomenon of altruism, cooperation, empathy and social structure. It is precise and yields a definition of "self" in the animal mind. The research on affective systems cannot do that because it presumes without evidence or correlation with observed behavior that a "self" is a self-contained faculty of one mind relative to another. This is an assumption, not evidence and it has skewed the interpretation of the experimental data.