11 ms·

Rats Dream About the Places They Want to Explore

84 points by antimora 11y ago

interfixus 11y ago
For what it's worth, we kept pet rats for more than ten years, and I have seen the brightest of them perform mental feats I'm not expecting anyone to believe. Spatial modelling is clearly a rat speciality. One female, the smartest rat I ever saw, wanted to keep a large piece of bread for herself. The door into the cage had other rats loitering, so she went on a huge detour to the back of the cage, obviously with a theory that there might be a door in the corresponding position there. There wasn't, so she went back, picked up the bread where she had stored it, just of sight of the others, and forced her way through the main door. Watching it, we could have no doubt whatsoever this was a thought out, reasoned plan. The route to the back of the cage was long, complex, not obvious, and never before explored. On another occasion, she lied to us for quite a while, and was only caught out one night when I happened to see her at work. The food bowl was down to the least favourite bits, and she was systematically cleaning it out, burying the junkfood under floor litter. The moment the bowl was empty, she started banging and rustling to get our attention, look, the bowl is empty, I'm starving. I realised she'd had me fooled for several weeks where I hadn't seen any refused leftovers, and had mistakenly believed the battle of stubborn wills to be over.
- meowface 11y ago
  And yet most people have no issue with scientists torturing and mutilating them en masse to test theories. I understand the intentions are good, but I think it's a case where the ends don't justify the means.
  - SomeStupidPoint 11y ago
    Can you propose a means by which we can do many of those tests without rats? I'm actually all ears on this one, because I don't like it, but the slaughter of millions or billions of rats is making real progress on several research programs, spanning research in to disease, the function of organs, mechanisms of embryology, genetics, and epigenetics, etc. Stalling any of those programs has a real cost in human lives -- people die all the time because we haven't had 10 more years of research on what would've saved them done. Thousands of people. Millions of people. There is certainly some frivolous animal experiments, but I think at this point in time, they make up the minority, and that most of what you're objecting to has just been morbidly set against a higher goal to most people. So here's my real question: there's a cancer lab down the street for me; what animal should they intentionally give cancer to to progress their research?
    - interfixus 11y ago
      Reasonable questions, valid points, no clearcut answers. Every country wishing to known as civilized should have strict - and I do mean strict - legislation on all aniaml experimentation. We probably cannot get around it yet, but every single instance should be controlled, monitored, and damned hard to get permission for. My mechanisms for pain and suffering really aren't any different from those of a dog, a pig, a cat, or a rat. I don't remember offering myself up for even modestly unpleasant experimentation in cancer research, and may not have the rigtht to impose such unpleasentness on others. Of course, I am a hypocrite like everyone else, happily consuming whatever medication I may need, without asking awkward questions about its history and origins.
      - SoftwareMaven 11y ago
        My mechanisms for pain and suffering really aren't any different from those of a dog, a pig, a cat, or a rat. The mechanism is the same, but the effect is very different. Other animals do not exhibit the anxiety about expecting or experiencing pain that humans do. While that does not justify putting animals in unnecessary pain, it does mean we should be careful not to anthropomorphize our reactions to pain (or anything else, for that matter) onto animals.
        asciimo 11y ago
        > Other animals do not exhibit the anxiety about expecting or experiencing pain that humans do. How do you know this? I see more evidence against this statement than I see for it.
        meowface 11y ago
        >Other animals do not exhibit the anxiety about expecting or experiencing pain that humans do. What are you basing this on? If a mammal is exposed to pain, any stimulus similar to that initial cause of pain will cause anxiety and fear, just like in humans. They may not understand the cause-effect relationship of the stimulus as clearly as humans, but they certainly have the ability to expect and fear unpleasant stimuli.
      - 11y ago
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]
  - chockablock 11y ago
    For context, this particular study used a total of 4 rats. The rats used in an experiment like the linked one (done in the UK) would have undergone a surgery with full anesthesia and sterile technique, with prescription pain meds provided during recovery, and daily veterinary oversight throughout their lifespan. This procedure is of course not being done for the animal's benefit, but the level of medical care and oversight is quite similar to that provided a human who might need, for instance a deep-brain stimulator implanted. Before any animals could even be ordered, the specific protocols used, (and even the decision to use rats, and the number allowed to be used) would have gone through a number of committees at the university, under national-level oversight, and subject to laws and regulations designed to negotiate exactly the tradeoffs we are discussing. I guess I can see how a reasonable person could refer to this kind of treatment as torture. But every scientist I know who works with animals takes their responsibility to minimize harm to the animals they use very seriously. There's a legitimate discussion to be had on this subject; and it is already happening. The use of animals in research has changed a lot in the past hundred years, and it will certainly change a lot in the future. I think it's important for folks on both sides to avoid demonizing those who see the issue differently. Believing that some animal research is worth the costs is not the same as having "no issue with scientists torturing [animals] en masse"--by the way I disagree with the claim that most people feel that way. Some reasonable-seeming #s for the US in this blog post: http://speakingofresearch.com/facts/statistics/ http://speakingofresearch.com/facts/statistics/ . (Needless to say the # of animals used in research is dwarfed by, among other things, the # of animals eaten as food, killed on highways, or poisoned in the name of pest control.)
    - asciimo 11y ago
      ... and then they were killed. The more we learn about other animals, the more tragic this process becomes. In this case, the benefit is a vague possibility for "some insight into what happens in the human mind during sleep." Not worth it.
      - anon4 11y ago
        You could say they wouldn't have been born in the first place if not for this amount of research needing to be done.
- DrStalker 11y ago
  My sister used to keep rats and they erected a little barrier from cardboard in front of the food bowl because one of the dogs used to come over to watch them and they didn't like food that had dog breath all over it. Very intelligent for something so small and short-lived.
e12e 11y ago
I find it interesting that the article implies that money are to humans as cheese in a maze are to rats.
- adlpz 11y ago
  And I find it quite enlightening that I spend a sizeable part of my money on cheese. We animals are not so different.
  - e12e 11y ago
    In my minds eye, I just saw a remake of Creature Comforts[1,2], where the dialogue was not from real-life interview with people, but from hn. Tech Creatures. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creature_Comforts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creature_Comforts [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmNymPocKro https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmNymPocKro
chippy 11y ago
If humans also work this way - how would we design our computer systems? We should design websites to show some of the content behind the paywall. Or show the route paying users would take before asking for money.
- jdavis703 11y ago
  I think we already do this. The Wall Street Journal shows a brief purview of paywalled articles. And websites that have some conversion funnel constantly try to segment users into appropriate categories to better optimize the path towards payment.
- Revex 11y ago
  I think you are right on the money here, friend. Whenever I'm purchasing something online, I'm always curious how that transaction will take place... sometimes so much as just "test purchasing" the item to see what will occur if I actually decide to buy.
- chockablock 11y ago
  Note that Demis Hassabis of DeepMind/Google is a coauthor on the linked study, they are actively working on integrating insights from neuroscience into their AI systems.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
curiously 11y ago
man if a rat can dream, so can a Rhino who's fucking horn got cut off, so can a dog being butchered for meat.
- grossvogel 11y ago
  If we're going to get worked-up over meat, there's no reason to jump straight to dogs. Over 100 million hogs a year are slaughtered in the US [1], compared to about 25 million dogs worldwide [2]. 1] http://www.thefarmsite.com/reports/contents/liveanapril12.pdf http://www.thefarmsite.com/reports/contents/liveanapril12.pd... 2] https://litigation-essentials.lexisnexis.com/webcd/app?action=DocumentDisplay&crawlid=1&doctype=cite&docid=21+Animal+L.+29&srctype=smi&srcid=3B15&key=d9029f1ccf66735779b5e3defa01b270 https://litigation-essentials.lexisnexis.com/webcd/app?actio...
confiscate 11y ago
if the rat devotes 8% of its brain to imagining running around mazes in its sleep how many % of my brain stays awake at night imagining work-related and life-related issues when i sleep? ack no wonder i always lose sleep

84 points by antimora 11y ago

For what it's worth, we kept pet rats for more than ten years, and I have seen the brightest of them perform mental feats I'm not expecting anyone to believe. Spatial modelling is clearly a rat speciality. One female, the smartest rat I ever saw, wanted to keep a large piece of bread for herself. The door into the cage had other rats loitering, so she went on a huge detour to the back of the cage, obviously with a theory that there might be a door in the corresponding position there. There wasn't, so she went back, picked up the bread where she had stored it, just of sight of the others, and forced her way through the main door. Watching it, we could have no doubt whatsoever this was a thought out, reasoned plan. The route to the back of the cage was long, complex, not obvious, and never before explored. On another occasion, she lied to us for quite a while, and was only caught out one night when I happened to see her at work. The food bowl was down to the least favourite bits, and she was systematically cleaning it out, burying the junkfood under floor litter. The moment the bowl was empty, she started banging and rustling to get our attention, look, the bowl is empty, I'm starving. I realised she'd had me fooled for several weeks where I hadn't seen any refused leftovers, and had mistakenly believed the battle of stubborn wills to be over.

meowface 11y ago
And yet most people have no issue with scientists torturing and mutilating them en masse to test theories. I understand the intentions are good, but I think it's a case where the ends don't justify the means.
- SomeStupidPoint 11y ago
  Can you propose a means by which we can do many of those tests without rats? I'm actually all ears on this one, because I don't like it, but the slaughter of millions or billions of rats is making real progress on several research programs, spanning research in to disease, the function of organs, mechanisms of embryology, genetics, and epigenetics, etc. Stalling any of those programs has a real cost in human lives -- people die all the time because we haven't had 10 more years of research on what would've saved them done. Thousands of people. Millions of people. There is certainly some frivolous animal experiments, but I think at this point in time, they make up the minority, and that most of what you're objecting to has just been morbidly set against a higher goal to most people. So here's my real question: there's a cancer lab down the street for me; what animal should they intentionally give cancer to to progress their research?
  - interfixus 11y ago
    Reasonable questions, valid points, no clearcut answers. Every country wishing to known as civilized should have strict - and I do mean strict - legislation on all aniaml experimentation. We probably cannot get around it yet, but every single instance should be controlled, monitored, and damned hard to get permission for. My mechanisms for pain and suffering really aren't any different from those of a dog, a pig, a cat, or a rat. I don't remember offering myself up for even modestly unpleasant experimentation in cancer research, and may not have the rigtht to impose such unpleasentness on others. Of course, I am a hypocrite like everyone else, happily consuming whatever medication I may need, without asking awkward questions about its history and origins.
    - SoftwareMaven 11y ago
      My mechanisms for pain and suffering really aren't any different from those of a dog, a pig, a cat, or a rat. The mechanism is the same, but the effect is very different. Other animals do not exhibit the anxiety about expecting or experiencing pain that humans do. While that does not justify putting animals in unnecessary pain, it does mean we should be careful not to anthropomorphize our reactions to pain (or anything else, for that matter) onto animals.
      - asciimo 11y ago
        > Other animals do not exhibit the anxiety about expecting or experiencing pain that humans do. How do you know this? I see more evidence against this statement than I see for it.
      - meowface 11y ago
        >Other animals do not exhibit the anxiety about expecting or experiencing pain that humans do. What are you basing this on? If a mammal is exposed to pain, any stimulus similar to that initial cause of pain will cause anxiety and fear, just like in humans. They may not understand the cause-effect relationship of the stimulus as clearly as humans, but they certainly have the ability to expect and fear unpleasant stimuli.
    - 11y ago
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- chockablock 11y ago
  For context, this particular study used a total of 4 rats. The rats used in an experiment like the linked one (done in the UK) would have undergone a surgery with full anesthesia and sterile technique, with prescription pain meds provided during recovery, and daily veterinary oversight throughout their lifespan. This procedure is of course not being done for the animal's benefit, but the level of medical care and oversight is quite similar to that provided a human who might need, for instance a deep-brain stimulator implanted. Before any animals could even be ordered, the specific protocols used, (and even the decision to use rats, and the number allowed to be used) would have gone through a number of committees at the university, under national-level oversight, and subject to laws and regulations designed to negotiate exactly the tradeoffs we are discussing. I guess I can see how a reasonable person could refer to this kind of treatment as torture. But every scientist I know who works with animals takes their responsibility to minimize harm to the animals they use very seriously. There's a legitimate discussion to be had on this subject; and it is already happening. The use of animals in research has changed a lot in the past hundred years, and it will certainly change a lot in the future. I think it's important for folks on both sides to avoid demonizing those who see the issue differently. Believing that some animal research is worth the costs is not the same as having "no issue with scientists torturing [animals] en masse"--by the way I disagree with the claim that most people feel that way. Some reasonable-seeming #s for the US in this blog post: http://speakingofresearch.com/facts/statistics/ http://speakingofresearch.com/facts/statistics/ . (Needless to say the # of animals used in research is dwarfed by, among other things, the # of animals eaten as food, killed on highways, or poisoned in the name of pest control.)
  - asciimo 11y ago
    ... and then they were killed. The more we learn about other animals, the more tragic this process becomes. In this case, the benefit is a vague possibility for "some insight into what happens in the human mind during sleep." Not worth it.
    - anon4 11y ago
      You could say they wouldn't have been born in the first place if not for this amount of research needing to be done.
DrStalker 11y ago
My sister used to keep rats and they erected a little barrier from cardboard in front of the food bowl because one of the dogs used to come over to watch them and they didn't like food that had dog breath all over it. Very intelligent for something so small and short-lived.

e12e 11y ago

I find it interesting that the article implies that money are to humans as cheese in a maze are to rats.

adlpz 11y ago
And I find it quite enlightening that I spend a sizeable part of my money on cheese. We animals are not so different.
- e12e 11y ago
  In my minds eye, I just saw a remake of Creature Comforts[1,2], where the dialogue was not from real-life interview with people, but from hn. Tech Creatures. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creature_Comforts https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creature_Comforts [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmNymPocKro https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OmNymPocKro

chippy 11y ago

If humans also work this way - how would we design our computer systems? We should design websites to show some of the content behind the paywall. Or show the route paying users would take before asking for money.

jdavis703 11y ago
I think we already do this. The Wall Street Journal shows a brief purview of paywalled articles. And websites that have some conversion funnel constantly try to segment users into appropriate categories to better optimize the path towards payment.
Revex 11y ago
I think you are right on the money here, friend. Whenever I'm purchasing something online, I'm always curious how that transaction will take place... sometimes so much as just "test purchasing" the item to see what will occur if I actually decide to buy.
chockablock 11y ago
Note that Demis Hassabis of DeepMind/Google is a coauthor on the linked study, they are actively working on integrating insights from neuroscience into their AI systems.

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

curiously 11y ago

man if a rat can dream, so can a Rhino who's fucking horn got cut off, so can a dog being butchered for meat.

grossvogel 11y ago
If we're going to get worked-up over meat, there's no reason to jump straight to dogs. Over 100 million hogs a year are slaughtered in the US [1], compared to about 25 million dogs worldwide [2]. 1] http://www.thefarmsite.com/reports/contents/liveanapril12.pdf http://www.thefarmsite.com/reports/contents/liveanapril12.pd... 2] https://litigation-essentials.lexisnexis.com/webcd/app?action=DocumentDisplay&crawlid=1&doctype=cite&docid=21+Animal+L.+29&srctype=smi&srcid=3B15&key=d9029f1ccf66735779b5e3defa01b270 https://litigation-essentials.lexisnexis.com/webcd/app?actio...

confiscate 11y ago

if the rat devotes 8% of its brain to imagining running around mazes in its sleep how many % of my brain stays awake at night imagining work-related and life-related issues when i sleep? ack no wonder i always lose sleep