Chicken Hypnotism
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Chicken Hypnotism
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Re: Chicken Hypnotism
#2In this demonstration, the rooster doesn't even mind having its leg pulled and prodded. I wonder how much discomfort it will endure before snapping out of it.
Re: Chicken Hypnotism
#3Holy cow, it's real. I had chickens as a kid growing up and I was told this. I tried it; never succeeded. The only thing I learned was that chickens don't like having their heads grabbed. I just assumed it was some rural urban-legend.
Re: Chicken Hypnotism
#4This just moved "build henhouse" several steps up on my TODO list... Tempted to follow the spirit of this one: https://www.backyardchickens.com/articles/a-ufo-chicken-spac...
Re: Chicken Hypnotism
#5Are there neurological explanations about why this happens? Does this also happen to other animals?
Re: Chicken Hypnotism
#6Are there neurological explanations about why this happens? Does this also happen to other animals?
I believe there is a thing where sharks get turned over and stop moving.
Re: Chicken Hypnotism
#7Related: what’s the verdict on cat scruffing? Does it work? Should you do it to adult cats?
Re: Chicken Hypnotism
#8Are there neurological explanations about why this happens? Does this also happen to other animals?
I believe there is a thing where sharks get turned over and stop moving.
Orcas use this technique to turn sharks upside down, induce tonic immobility, and then eat out the liver and leave rest of the carcass...
Re: Chicken Hypnotism
#9Is this really a hypnosis or just some primal defense system that kicks in, like "snake ahead, freeze". I had a pet python and I know for a fact that snakes will only eat moving food, if you just leave a dead mouse snake will not touch it (same as frogs and many other lizards and amphibians). Pray needs to move to attract the interest. So if you don't want to get eaten by a snake the perfect defense is exactly this, don't move a muscle, stand very still. And many animals have "hard-wired" defense against snakes, for instance like cats get scared by cucumbers and other snake like shapes, although they never seen a snake in their life. Just a wild theory of course, but it might be that?
Re: Chicken Hypnotism
#10Are there neurological explanations about why this happens? Does this also happen to other animals?
As a kid, I kinda took hypnosis for granted largely on the basis of cartoons.
It wasn't until I was in my twenties and had read up a little on human cognition and evolutionary psychology that it occurred to me to ask, "Wait, is hypnosis really a thing?"
I found a Scientific American article around that time that gave a pretty good summary of the state of scientific inquiry into human hypnosis. One of the things it pointed out that I thought was interesting: apparently, in controlled studies, there's no strong correlation between a person's predicted susceptibility to hypnosis and their observed or actual susceptibility.
I find the idea that Bugs Bunny could take control of mind by swinging a pocket watch in front of my face a little unnerving so that finding worried me. I always thought my naturally skeptical predisposition would serve to protect me.
Based on my reading, I've come to understand hypnosis neurologically as a composite or intensification of other more mundane phenomena. As the Wikipedia article on hypnosis puts it, "Hypnosis is a human condition involving focused attention, reduced peripheral awareness, and an enhanced capacity to respond to suggestion."
I've never been hypnotized. Well, beyond the general everyday forms. (The SA article pointed out that reading a book could be regarded as a form of self-hypnosis.) I have talked to people who swear they've been entranced by stage hypnotists.
I'm still largely puzzled as to why it might have a naturally selected basis. A vestige of our origins as less cognitively and culturally complex social organisms perhaps?