Seriously... I'm totally amazed. I've seen pigeons play ping pong (well more like real life pong). But this is amazing.
Check it out:
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Two neuroscience bloggers team up for one chimeric blog, and world domination of course.
Shelley Batts is a Neuroscience PhD candidate at the University of Michigan. She studies hair cell regeneration in the cochlea, and is trying to finish that quixotic quest called 'thesis.' She lies awake at night pondering how science intersects with politics, culture, policy, money, medicine, and religion in an attempt to be more than just a niche scientist sitting in the oh-so-lovely ivory tower. Follow me and my parrot, Pepper, on our quest to finish my PhD, land a post-doc, and stay sane.
The Omnibrain is a psychology graduate student at an online university. He hopes that the three weeks and $29.95 that he is spending on his Ph.D. will get him a job at a Tier 1 research university. Do online universities have postdocs? Ok...just kidding, he is really a Ph.D. Candidate in Psychology studying high level vision. You know... stuff like scene & object perception.
While not an official contributer to 'Of Two Minds,' Shelley's sidekick is an African Grey parrot named Pepper. His heros are Irene Pepperberg, Alex, and Rachel Carson. He spends his time learning Mandarin and writing the Great American novel.
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Category: Animals • Weird
Posted on: December 8, 2008 11:31 AM, by The Omnibrain
Seriously... I'm totally amazed. I've seen pigeons play ping pong (well more like real life pong). But this is amazing.
Check it out:
TrackBack URL for this entry: http://scienceblogs.com/mt/pings/87435
Comments
Could this mouse be following a scent trail?
Posted by: rpenner | December 8, 2008 12:47 PM
That's AWESOME. I need to train my guys to do this. Yuo can tell by the mouse pellets around on the table that the mouse has been training, probably following scent cues.
Posted by: scicurious | December 8, 2008 12:52 PM
Love it!
Posted by: Happy | December 8, 2008 2:39 PM
Yeah, but will it fetch a beer from the fridge?
pretty damn impressive even if no beer.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp, KoT, OM | December 8, 2008 2:39 PM
nah, using scent to accomplish that would be far more cumbersome than just basic training. that's a really long behavioral chain, and all the transitions had to be rehearsed many times, but still it looks very straightforward to me. i trained a chicken to do a shorter version of that as part of a skill-building seminar, as have many people. doable in a basic way, yes. impressive anyway, as it is a big investment of time? yup.
Posted by: quandrant_user | December 9, 2008 12:38 AM
I should of married this mouse , not my first husband ! What can I say, this mouse is smarter then ME!!!! ( is it a girl mouse? )
Posted by: susan | December 9, 2008 4:27 PM
Is anyone else bothered by the hand pushing it in the right direction at 1:51?
It also stops and looks around a lot, for no obvious reason. Maybe it's trying to find the scent again.
Posted by: blakyoshi7 | December 16, 2008 2:20 AM
I'd love to see some of the training. How long did it take? What did the mouse get as a reward as it learned?
Posted by: Phil | December 22, 2008 9:03 PM
Lovely! It reminds me of Microcosmos... but more so. But how did that Spongebob villain get in there?
Posted by: bramki obrotowe | January 5, 2009 6:57 AM
Lovely! It reminds me of Microcosmos... but more so. But how did that Spongebob villain get in there?
Posted by: sohbet siteleri | February 1, 2009 6:42 PM
really cute and impressive~ i wonder how the trainer made it!
Posted by: dreamfree | March 19, 2009 1:15 AM
we'll i am no scientist, physicist etc. I am a writer, a fantasy writer. I have studied different religions and i studied some facts about multiverse theory
Posted by: seslichat | July 7, 2009 3:09 PM