Under the umbrella of comparative cognition is an animal’s ability
to understand quantity or numerosity. In the late 1800s a German math teacher
successfully taught his horse Hans how to answer mathematical questions by
tapping his hoof on the ground. He could answer addition and subtraction
problems and could keep track of dates on the calendar. A psychologist, Oskar
Pfungst was very skeptical and observed Hans doing his tricks. He found that
Hans could not solve mathematical equations but instead was very good at
reading facial features of the questioner. If Hans was asked to tap out the
answer to 2 + 3, he would start tapping, the questioner would begin counting
and unconsciously dip their head or move some part of their body, this would
signal to Hans that many taps was the correct answer. In all of this, Hans was
portraying a precise form of stimulus discrimination, but it is impressive,
nonetheless. Similar to Hans clever acts is Maggie the Jack Russell who, in the
video, is up against 7-year-olds in a mathematical competition that is very
amusing to see.
Maggie is brilliant. I think that the obvious explanation to this experiment is that the trainer is doing the math and subtly signaling the dog when to stop tapping its paw. I would like to see the experiment repeated without the trainer being present.
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