Animals don’t get lost the same way Mitch Hedberg never got lost - build a house. Are you lost? Once, now I’m home.
Learning about the navigational feats of animals
71–80 of 93 posts
Re: Learning about the navigational feats of animals
#72I'm not quite convinced that "animals don't get lost". How many lost cats never return for every one that does? Did anyone ever make a real study? Also there are other questionable bits in the article for example "We now have geolocation devices light enough to be carried by monarch butterflies". Where are those devices described? For years I've been looking for a reliable GPS tracking for cats that don't require the…
Well, I've worked on one such geolocation device about the size of a grain of rice, and that was 30 years ago. It was a tracking device started by a former Israeli military intelligence officer after his family was scattered in a terrorist attack and it was days before everyone could be accounted. This tracking device was the size of a pack of cigarettes' when in development, and by the time I left the company (late…
We talkin’ basmati or sushi rice? And how was it powered?
Re: Learning about the navigational feats of animals
#73The idea that humans are the worst navigators ever is rather silly. Humans who actually explore the world without being spaced out by their smartphone can roam and find their way back perfectly well. But navigation is like a muscle, and most of us have allowed it to atrophy because it’s easy to just mindlessly follow what your GPS of choice tells you to do. I don’t think the “humans can’t navigate” premise of this ar…
Huh? The article devotes several paragraphs talking about how good humans have been at navigating and lists multiple feats as evidence.
Re: Learning about the navigational feats of animals
#74Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even in the desert where the landscape in always infux with sand dunes, people used to travel the desert and they still do in Africa and the middle east, they look up the into the sky for stars etc.Beduens still do it there, they unril recently-used to travel either walking or in camel convoys from Syria to Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. But when I got lost in the desert - car broke down- at dusk I had to wait walk, in the…
William Thesiger in his book recounts that the Bedouins he traveled with could also identify and navigate based on the shape of the dunes too, and they had memory and recognition of various dune landscapes from many, many places.
If I had to guess, I would suppose that they are not recognising specific dunes (which would be constantly changing), but patterns in the dunes caused by prevailing winds. I am sure there is something analogous to the Polynesian voyagers recognising patterns in the waves and currents of the ocean.
Re: Learning about the navigational feats of animals
#75The idea that humans are the worst navigators ever is rather silly. Humans who actually explore the world without being spaced out by their smartphone can roam and find their way back perfectly well. But navigation is like a muscle, and most of us have allowed it to atrophy because it’s easy to just mindlessly follow what your GPS of choice tells you to do. I don’t think the “humans can’t navigate” premise of this ar…
It's definitely a skill. I play minecraft infrequently with my brother in law and he can retrace his steps in the nether (and in the overworked) with complete ease. I in the other hand struggle.
Re: Learning about the navigational feats of animals
#76Animals do get lost.
As kids, we had a tortoise that wandered off one day only to be found by complete chance in a neighbours garden many months later. It disappeared again not long after never to be seen again. Either the tortoise really didn't like us or it just never found its way back?
Or killed by a cat / played with to death by a cat.
Re: Learning about the navigational feats of animals
#77When I lived in an apartment in New York City, I had an indoor cat. One day I was talking to my neighbor with the door open and the cat peeked her head out, sniffing around. She was a stereotypical fraidy cat, always scared of everything, so when she walked out the door, I knew she wouldn't go far, especially when she walked up the stairs outside my apartment. I few minutes later I hear her meowing like crazy. I went…
(Star Trek the Wrath of Khan) Spock: He is intelligent, but not experienced. His pattern indicates two-dimensional thinking.
Re: Learning about the navigational feats of animals
#78The idea that humans are the worst navigators ever is rather silly. Humans who actually explore the world without being spaced out by their smartphone can roam and find their way back perfectly well. But navigation is like a muscle, and most of us have allowed it to atrophy because it’s easy to just mindlessly follow what your GPS of choice tells you to do. I don’t think the “humans can’t navigate” premise of this ar…
Huh? The article devotes several paragraphs talking about how good humans have been at navigating and lists multiple feats as evidence.
Quote:
> The second is that the creatures with a credible claim to being the worst navigators on the planet have steadily reduced the odds of all the others getting where they need to go, by interfering with their trajectories, impairing their route-finding abilities, and despoiling their destinations. Those feckless creatures are us, of course.
Re: Learning about the navigational feats of animals
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
Male cats are usually the ones to go out and then come back in a few days, next time few weeks, then months... and then they disappear for good. I've never had a female cat go away like that.
Does that apply to neutered males?
Probably not, that would be my guess.
Re: Learning about the navigational feats of animals
#80There is a theory that migrating birds can see the magnetic fields using quantum mechanics.