12 ms·
Cats are (almost) liquid
- justinlloyd 2y agoWhen a cat can go between two openings that are too small for the cat to pass through and the cat isn't being observed is what's interesting though and nobody has yet explained that.
- wormlord 2y agoBefore I had cats, I used to think of them in terms of other animals. What I mean is that a dog or a horse is very defined by its skeletal structure. They are like popsicle stick armatures with some flesh thrown on. Now I think of cats more like amorphous blobs with some hard bits stuck on. I think anyone who owns a cat will know what I mean by this.
- bl4ckneon 2y agoMy cat often lays down twisted 180 degrees or more. Just doing whatever they want, defying laws of nature.
- 9dev 2y agoWell, dogs also do this—I present to you my majestically twisted creature: https://imgur.com/a/5WcYzSw https://imgur.com/a/5WcYzSw I have no clue how that is even possible.
- bayindirh 2y agoI almost sprayed all my tea to my monitor and keyboard. Wish both of you a happy and derpy life together.
- debo_ 2y agoYour dog is the inverse of the Firefox.
- lisper 2y agoClearly your dog has been possessed by a demon.
- squarefoot 2y agoBrought memories of one of my cats (now silent meow) who also added the Italian equivalent of a middle finger. https://imgur.com/a/GFukfFP https://imgur.com/a/GFukfFP
- hugocast 2y agoDog Yoga
- austinjp 2y agoDoga.
- voidmain0001 2y agoI'm also stupefied by a human doing it. https://imgur.com/a/W7bcLZo https://imgur.com/a/W7bcLZo Taken from: https://www.gq.com/story/aleksei-goloborodko-real-life-diet https://www.gq.com/story/aleksei-goloborodko-real-life-diet
- johnnyanmac 2y agoYeah, nope. If I get like that, I'm never coming back. Probably have to bury me in that pose. Is this really just a matter of stretching? I read the article and he sums it down to he needs to stretch every day (he said himself thst his diet doesn't matter too much) He was also in the circus since 4, but this doesn't seems like something I could do in a lifetime of practice.
- Volundr 2y agoYou probably couldn't. There are lots of forms of hyper mobility, and extreme versions come with health risks. With practice and training you can probably do a lot more than you imagine, but for most of us the whole "fold yourself in half backwards" thing is beyond the limits of our spine, and it's for the best.
- hnbad 2y agoNo, it's not just down to stretching although I remember being told that as a kid when asking about "snake ladies" in circuses. Yes, the stretching and training is necessary but all the stretching and training in the world won't help you bend like this. Some people simply have hypermobilities (often from connective tissue disorders) and these can allow them to bend themselves into a pretzel. The stretching and training is as much for learning how to take it to such extremes as it is for learning how to do it (relatively) safely. Of course these conditions can still often lead to complications and often have other negative impacts like chronic pain, frequent bruising, slower healing and a tendency to dislocate various joints.
- kylecazar 2y agomajestic indeed!
- spike021 2y agoMy Shiba Inu does all kinds of similar things. He also doesn't hesitate at all when trying narrow spaces. He only hesitates once he's all the way in and realize he can't go any further nor turn around so he has to back up completely back out.
- quanthdhdh 2y ago$ meme init meme template initiated
- fullstop 2y agoMine managed to fit into this tiny basket, all by himself: https://i.imgur.com/htIw6ZV.jpeg https://i.imgur.com/htIw6ZV.jpeg
- bayindirh 2y agoI, for one, know, understand and welcome our almost liquid feline overlords.
- wiredfool 2y agoPurring bags of mostly water.
- nonameiguess 2y agoFor what it's worth, their hips and shoulders are actually limited in range of motion compared to humans, due to the very high muscle attachment points that are also what make them so amazingly strong and explosive for their small size. But an extremely flexible spine combined with the ability to dislocate key joints means they can still fit into very small, narrow spaces, presumably an adaptation allowing them to hunt small rodents that burrow and hide out in underground dens. Which I assume is why they have the instinct to immediately jump into and check out any box or cabinet or other enclosed space you open. You never know if there might be some voles in there.
- psunavy03 2y agoThey actually prefer to jump in a box because to them, it's a safe space to hide and watch. Cats look for spaces like that because their wild ancestors (and feral cats now) are small enough that they are both predators and prey.
- refulgentis 2y ago[flagged]
- fluoridation 2y agoYup. Same reason why they like to climb to high places. They can feel safe and survey the surroundings. Additionally, cats will hide in confined spaces when ill or in pain; a sudden desire to hide for prolonged periods is a sign that it needs to see a vet.
- jeffbee 2y agoHorse is practically all air. That's their secret. They are blimps with legs.
- js8 2y agoAre you sure you're not talking about birds?
- hackeraccount 2y agoI only went ridding a couple of times when I was a kind but the thing I remember is you'd start off on a ride ... then stop, tighten the saddle, start again and continue on the ride. Though I think maybe we'd do that twice. The other thing I remember is that brushing down horses was kind of fun - though I'll be honest at the end of the day I never really trusted those animals; they were just too damn big for my tastes.
- alamortsubite 2y agoWhen I pick up my cat and he's relaxed, it feels like I'm picking up a tube sock full of pudding.
- hnbad 2y agoWe joke that our small cat (she's old but small framed and lightweight) can put her entire body weight into every individual paw at the same time when she wants. You can pick her up and she'll weigh next to nothing and she can run over you like a feather but she can also simultaneously have four lead columns for legs if she wants to. I'm convinced cats are four dimensional or something.
- mesaverde 2y agoMy 3 cats are all completely different in this regard. Cat 1: Fairly timid, very cautious cat, is remarkably light-footed. If she jumps on my bed and starts wandering along my back while I'm trying to sleep you barely notice she's there... that is until she has started hitting me in the face with her paw. Cat 2: Smaller more hardy cat is a bit more heavy footed, slightly less cautious, but she seems to make some attempt to be light footed. Cat 3: By far our biggest cat - and also the offspring of Cat #2. Does not try to be light footed at all. He just stomps around. If he climbs on to me, will put all his weight on his front 2 paws, and causes immense discomfort, as he stands there figuring out what he wants to do. I love them all the same
- habinero 2y agoI'm convinced cats violate energy conservation, because they can shed an infinite amount of fur.
- toss1 2y agoA stray cat I adopted as we could not find his owner was named "Beanbag" (transitioning to "Mr Bean", no reference to the comedian)for exactly this quality. After a few days of recovery and starting to get comfortable, he started to snooze and literally poured off the couch, like a bag of beans... and he loved to stretch in my lap while I coded, putting up with all the typing & mousing... Truly liquid, indeed! Wonderful little guy, I still miss him.
- dominicrose 2y agoMy cat can sleep with its head upside-down event if there's no apparent reason for it to do that. I have another cat tough, which is tough, heavy but small, and resisting any external force, also keeping his claws open.
- keeganpoppen 2y agoyes i think this model of cats is exactly right. kind of like how our fingertips would just be lumpy sacs without fingernails, cats seem to have structure and flexibility in the way that like a tent does.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- joshuamcginnis 2y ago[flagged]
- loloquwowndueo 2y agoThe early networks that evolved into the modern Internet were mostly paid for with public funds, and they’re used nowadays mostly to watch cat videos. I don’t see anyone complaining about that /)
- joshuamcginnis 2y agoComparing the advent of the internet with a study on the flexibility and agility of cats in tight spaces isn't exactly apples to apples.
- exe34 2y agono, it might lead to better surgery robots, search and rescue robots, and countless things that I'm not even capable of imagining. you are the one comparing apples to oranges - the internet has been around for 50 years and has shown its value - this one has just been published!
- joshuamcginnis 2y agoWhat I'm trying to call out is that not all studies are equally valuable nor should they all be publicly funded. Would you at least agree me on that?
- fluoridation 2y agoBut how can you know ahead of time which studies are valuable and which are less so? What about metastudies? How do you quantify their worth?
- joshuamcginnis 2y ago
- pmahoney 2y agoCalvin vindicated https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/1993/04/20 https://www.gocomics.com/calvinandhobbes/1993/04/20
- accrual 2y agoI love C&H and am blown away there was something so applicable. Felt like an XKCD moment!
- cosmojg 2y agoC&H moments are the original XKCD moments!
- dhosek 2y agoBill Watterson was absolutely brilliant at depicting the weird positions that cats will lie in.
- banditelol 2y agoLol I automatically read C&H as Cyanide and Happiness
- joshuamcginnis 2y ago[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- add-sub-mul-div 2y ago[flagged]
- debo_ 2y ago[flagged]
- t-3 2y ago"Almost" is a bit vague and probably too strong, but they are mostly water, just like other mammals.
- krapp 2y agoTherefore they are more properly classified as soups.
- maxbond 2y agoNoted ontologist Pirate Software would argue that cats are a Wellington, not a soup. https://youtube.com/shorts/MnAegCmJ7Xk https://youtube.com/shorts/MnAegCmJ7Xk
- krapp 2y agoI can't refute his logic.
- orangeartist 2y ago[flagged]
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- pvg 2y agoMissing a cite to some pioneering work on this in the 30s by A.S.J. Tessimond [1] Cats no less liquid than their shadows Offer no angles to the wind. They slip, diminished, neat through loopholes Less than themselves; will not be pinned [1]https://www.blueridgejournal.com/poems/asjt-cats.htm https://www.blueridgejournal.com/poems/asjt-cats.htm
- evilotto 2y agoNot to mention Fardin, 2014.
- jmspring 2y agoHaving 7 cats, they are all different. My oldest mail holds himself rigid. The youngest male - still a kitten - is a noodle of murder and destruction.
- zafka 2y agoNice Description. A black noodle just joined our other 5 cats.
- jmspring 2y agoBlack cats are the best. She is one of two sisters (oldest cats at 9 at this point). 17 pounds of chunk loving. Annoying as all get out, but will literally roll around on the arm of the couch and “accidentally” drop into my lap. My wife and I go between two locations, today will be the first time 4 of the cats meet the murder noodle.
- fullstop 2y agoWe had two cats, and my wife wanted more. I was happy with two, so we compromised and now we have four of them. The feeding logistics of four, one with a special diet, are difficult. I can't imagine having seven of them long-term, especially the litter boxes. I've fostered kittens before, so I had nine cats in the house and it felt like all I did for those weeks was feed cats and scoop poop.
- 0x1ceb00da 2y agoWe need a documentary.
- damontal 2y agoThis sounds like something Karl Pilkington would come up with.
- cph123 2y agoMaybe an extension of monkey news, it could be cat news
- tencentshill 2y agoI wonder if the same experiment could be done with big cats - Would an opening that touches the mane of a lion have the same results?
- wildylion 2y agoThe cat will just get annoyed - it's a shaggy tangly thing that always gets in the way. Speaking from personal experience >:3
- stef25 2y agoThere's no mention of their whiskers, I was under the impression that this is what they use to become aware of their body size in tight spaces.
- dist-epoch 2y agoWiskers are mentioned, but using the scientific name - vibrissae
- move-on-by 2y ago> While dogs slowed down and hesitated before they attempted to use an uncomfortably small opening, in the case of cats, we did not detect this change in their behavior before their attempt to go through even the narrowest openings. However, remarkably, cats showed hesitation both before they attempted to penetrate the shortest openings, and while they moved through it. I just skimmed, but I didn’t see any mention whiskers. It’s seems to me that cats can make highly precise measurements of width just by sticking their heads in a space, but height judgments requires additional consideration.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- melvyn2 2y ago> Cats are also aided by their large and sensitive vibrissae, which are positioned on such locations of their head that the cat can detect nearby obstacles in closer encounters. Vibrissal sensation can compensate for the somewhat weaker vision in cats from closer distances or in poorly illuminated environments. Therefore, it is possible that cats approached the narrow openings in our experiment without differential hesitation, and they could use their vibrissae to assess the suitability of the apertures before penetrating them.
- move-on-by 2y agoOh thank you! I’m just a lowly cat owner and did not know what vibrissae are.
- diggan 2y agoFrom skimming the HN comments: > Wiskers are mentioned, but using the scientific name - vibrissae https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41870897 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41870897
- ChrisMarshallNY 2y agoIf you have ever put a cone on a cat (which lasts about five minutes), you see they get crazy. They hug the walls. Their whiskers are a major factor in their perception. I think they can also dislocate their spine. My cat likes to sit in what we call his "Buddha" position, with his back bent about 90 degrees, and his paws in front. This seems to be a common position. He'll sit like that for an hour.
- dekhn 2y agoSee also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4z30eLocTnU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4z30eLocTnU
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- pugworthy 2y agoThe overhead view of figure 3 in particular is noteworthy to me. The 3 human subjects are represented as abstract ovals, and the cat drawn as a cat who is staring up as if to look through the fourth ceiling at the reader. The reader becomes, in a sense, a greeble. This paper would have been a fun project for a scientific illustrator.
- pugworthy 2y agoFor reference, in the cat realm a greeble is what cats are looking at when they stare up at the ceiling or wall and there is nothing there. At least that you can see. So instead of the real cat staring at the imaginary greeble, we the reader are the real greeble staring at the imaginary cat. Who is staring back because it can see us.
- runxel 2y agoOh but that is old news! "On the Rheology of Cats": https://www.drgoulu.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Rheology-of-cats.pdf https://www.drgoulu.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Rheology-...
- ChoHag 2y agoNow that is what a dry academic paper about cats is supposed to look like. Cat pictures on every page.
- anonu 2y agoHere's the podcast: https://notebooklm.google.com/notebook/52350e74-f4b0-42d9-a166-152550436c2b/audio https://notebooklm.google.com/notebook/52350e74-f4b0-42d9-a1...
- sandebert 2y agoThis seems relevant: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lastquarterstudios.catsareliquidabp https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lastquarte...
- carabiner 2y agoThis is why they flow out of our grasp.
- tirant 2y agoThese are old news for those of us that grew bonsai kittens in the late 90s. https://web.archive.org/web/20050203111131/http://bonsaikitten.com:80/ https://web.archive.org/web/20050203111131/http://bonsaikitt... Obviously it was a hoax, probably one of the first ones reaching the first generation of internet users. But lots of people fell for it.
- ookdatnog 2y agoI mean, if you compare with what unspeakable things dog breeders have done to dogs over time, bonsai kittens don't seem that much of a stretch.
- Dilettante_ 2y agoThey're more of a squash, if anything
- mytailorisrich 2y agoAnecdotally my cat is always very cautious before going through cat flags, which are not particularly narrow but very short, but never hesitate to run into narrow but deep stuff...
- penguin_booze 2y agoObligatory Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/catsareliquid/ https://www.reddit.com/r/catsareliquid/.
- kator 2y agoInteresting because I have recently been trying to catch a stray cat for a capture-release process and the cat will not walk into a typical trap-door type wire mesh trap. Watching him on video the roof of the trap seems to freak him out. It seems a better trap would have a narrow gap with high door that lets them confidently walk into the trap and trigger would just block the slot perhaps with some sort of sliding door blocking the exit.
- theginger 2y agoThis science paper could have been a cat meme video. Never thought I would be saying that and meaning it literally.
- colechristensen 2y agoI mean I’ve seen the cat challenge meme video done a dozen times. https://youtu.be/O7PkYkXdKwc?si=-8BTPVvAK19WVEF https://youtu.be/O7PkYkXdKwc?si=-8BTPVvAK19WVEF This is like “hey what if this cat video was a research paper”
- metalman 2y agoI watched as a cat dove through a narrow opening (stair baulsters)only to wedge its aft end,stop dead,do a totaly ignoble face plant,and then sort of oooze through to land gracelessly. So in this case there was no hesitation,and cats regularly missjudge and get run over by cars,so at best the data is just that...data.
- _yb2s 2y ago> If the opportunity was given to them, dogs opted for a detour in the case of uncomfortably small apertures Except in the case of one very sweet but not exactly brilliant large dog I know that legitimately believes his entire body is just the tip of his nose that he can see. I’ve seen him walk straight through a 2” hole in a screen door, and he will repeatedly try to sit on e.g. a chair armrest and not understand why it doesn’t work.
- anotherevan 2y ago> their free-floating, diminutive collarbones allow them to squeeze themselves through very narrow gaps. Detached collarbones is one of the many interesting things I know about cats because of my cat obsessed kid!
- anotherevan 2y agoMy cat woke up, did a big stretch, and yawned. Then she hiccoughed, turned into a small dragon, and coughed up a fireball. "!!!" I said. "What?" She shrugged back into cat form. "You're a shape shifter?" "All cats are. There's just never any reason to not be a cat." /src https://mastodon.art/@MicroSFF/112928631782738642 https://mastodon.art/@MicroSFF/112928631782738642
- xarope 2y agoI'm more amazed that the authors could cite 52 references of similar studies!
- mstep 2y agorelated (german) https://noe.orf.at/stories/3272194/ https://noe.orf.at/stories/3272194/
- carstenhag 2y agoIt's a pretty common recommendation to not leave the windows open like that :/. Poor thing.
- Wuzado 2y agoFeels like a candidate for the Ig Nobel prize - and this is high praise!
- tropdrop 2y agoIn addition to the vibrissae explanation, I also wonder if their eyes (vertical pupils) just see better when it comes to height and not width, necessitating greater hesitation when it comes to judging things at their height and not high in the air. I am thinking they might need to move their head or eyes a bit side to side, though it may still be too fast to be readily apparent to the researcher. Relevant article [1]: "If you have a vertical slit, you're very likely to be an ambush predator," says Banks. That's the kind of animal who lies in wait and then leaps out to kill. He says these predators need to accurately judge the distance to their prey, and the vertical slit has optical features that make it ideal for that. But that rule only holds if the animal is short, so its eyes aren't too high off the ground, Sprague says." Ergo, cats have vertical pupils but tigers have round pupils. The tiger can probably judge horizontal distances better than the cat. 1 - https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/08/07/430149677/eye-shapes-of-the-animal-world-hint-at-differences-in-our-lifestyles https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2015/08/07/4301496...
- plondon514 2y agoI accidentally closed a very heavy door on my childhood cat and thought I killed it but it just bounced back and was perfectly fine.
- rosmax_1337 2y agoThe title made me click, and the content was enjoyable. But I still don't think clickbait like this should be present in scientific papers. It's something about how scientific papers are not "for pleasure", they're informational tools. An easter egg in a game is cool right, but an easter egg in a graphics driver? That's the distinction I'm making here.
- Kydlaw 2y agoI am so puzzled by this attitude. People are free to make any distinction they want, the way they want, but the representation you have of a scientific literature is erroneous. Scientific articles are informational tools that report results of experiments and nothing more. If the results are interesting to the peers, they are published. By they are not world's laws made paper unless sufficient replications are made. This means that each article need to be read with the context of the literature in mind and with a critical eye. Each are a single point of evidence to a phenomena. Hence, there are subjective informational tools, written toward a specific audience (the experts of the domains) to inform of a specific result in a specific case. On top of that, their are specific journal/issues where these types submissions are allowed. Don't read these submissions if you are looking for serious "information tools" Scientific literature must be handled the same way as legal literature. If you are not a law expert, you ask a lawyer. If you think you are a legal expert when you are not, surprising consequences may arise. In universities, they are classes dedicated to handling the scientific literature. They are provided for a reason. So please, don't use cat's physic for liquid simulation in game engine... or please do?
- rosmax_1337 2y agoLet's imagine someone interested in the biology of cats and felines at large. A specialized biologist. They might choose to personally catalog all publications which have use for them, like this article surely might. But in their catalog of articles, one will have the title: Cats are (almost) liquid And this is cute, slightly funny, but not correct. From an informational standpoint, this is not related to whether or not cats are liquid. From a material standpoint they consist of both solid, liquid and even gaseous substances. (to the extent we can consider co2 a part of their bodily function) In a newspaper or such, this would not be a problem, you read it, enjoy it, and move on. But not for serious science. A dry and purely objective title is better in that case, just like how a function should be named based on what it does, not based on some meme regarding what it does. The paper could be named: Awareness of body flexibility among cats. A function should be named get_employee(), not get_luser(). And the reason why this is true, is because the fad of naming a function get_luser() will become "not worth it" the day someone who didn't understand the meme comes across it, and has to ask you about it. Again especially if you're making a driver/library, something to be used by many, not by just yourself or a few others. And also, the "funny" aspect of it will present a mental hurdle. Instead of simply calling get_employee() in your new context, you will be calling get_luser(), and laughing for a bit and thinking about the bofh comics. Train of thought is lost. The human mind is limited, and attempting to "capture" it attention leads to an attention arms race. And this arms race leads to tiktok. Which is why we use dry naming for serious pursuits.
- lenerdenator 2y agoCats cannot be defined as liquid, as liquid is a scientific classification based in the laws of physics, and cats are widely known for not particularly caring about obeying the laws of physics.
- bschne 2y agoI wish they did this experiment with two slits to see if cats behaved (almost) like particles and/or (almost) like waves
- stronglikedan 2y agoI think it would be impossible to herd enough cats to pull that off. A sort of proof by contradiction if you will.
- ISL 2y agoThose would need to be very low-energy cats. You wouldn't be able to look at them for a very, very long time. If my quick math is correct, for the de Broglie wavelength of a cat to be comparable to its width, it would need to be travelling no faster than about 10^-33 m/s.
- Log_out_ 2y agoIt went through one, then it came back through the other playing catch with its own tail..
- alsetmusic 2y agoNo, it just ran into the room, spun around, and ran back out. There was no evident reason to do so.
- thomasjudge 2y agohttps://x.com/alex_wohlrab/status/1512750950330642432 https://x.com/alex_wohlrab/status/1512750950330642432
- rurban 2y agoMuch easier: A cat only knows about the size of its head. If the head fits through, the body will do also. That's extremely easy to guess for a cat, no body awareness, just head radius awareness