We have a maze that is separated into two sections. We have a rat in each section. The rats are unaware of each other.

Each Rat is dependent on the actions of the other Rat for survival.

As each Rat moves about it unwittingly triggers the supply of food for the other Rat by setting of sensors at fixed positions. The rats are unaware they are providing a benefit for the other rat.

The Rats are the variables and the split maze is fixed.

Question:

How long before the Rats die?

Or

How long before they learn to intuitively support the existance of each other?

If one rat dies the other Rat looses it's supply of food so it to also dies.

If they survive over time then what would this prove?

If they survive over time then what would this prove?
it will prove that the rats like to set off sensors at fixed positions.

Originally posted by Quantum Quack
How long before they learn to intuitively support the existance of each other?


They will never 'intuitively' learn coz to the rats point of view, food is appearing spontaneously and randomly. Sometimes no food appears at all and a rat dies. This is of course only if the rats are seperated and cant see each other. They will learn if they see each others actions.

Although they wont 'learn', natural selection may favour those rats which always press on the sensors thereby increasing the lifetimes of the rats. That will only happen over a very long time tho!

I was talking to my son about a few hours ago and he thought that the rats may learn rather quickly that they have to keep moving to get their food. They may find the relationship between food and movement and manage to survive that way.

Does any one know if this type of experiment has been carried out?

if one rat just sat and the other just ran around then the first would get a picture that it has to sit down in order to get food, and then die of course. and if it started to run the other rat would be dead and no food from it, so...
I think your son is wrong

Actually my son is quite right in saying that they MAY find the relationship. It IS possible that they MAY survive.

My son and I are not suggesting a fact but only a possibility.
And by doing so allowing for the possibility that they MAY not survive either.

The rats would survive due to <a href=http://twm.co.nz/shel_morfields.htm>collective consciousness</a>

excerpt:

<i>In the meantime, the puzzles about memory have grown even stranger. This part of our story will take us to one of the most controversial frontiers of current science, although it actually starts back in 1920 when W. McDougall, a biologist at Harvard, began an experiment to see if animals (in this case white rats) could inherit learning. The procedure was to teach the rats a simple task (avoiding a lighted exit), record how fast they learned, breed another generation, teach them the same task, and see how their rate of learning compared with their elders. He carried the experiment through 34 generations and found that, indeed, each generation learned faster in flat contradiction to the usual Darwinian assumptions about heredity. Such a result naturally raised controversy, and similar experiments were run to prove or disprove the result. The last of these was done by W.E. Agar at Melbourne over a period of 20 years ending in 1954. Using the same general breed of rats, he found the same pattern of results that McDougall had but in addition he found that untrained rats used as a control group also learned faster in each new generation. (Curiously, he also found that his first generation of rats started at the same rate of learning as McDougall's last generation.) No one had a good explanation for why both trained and untrained should be learning faster, but since this result did not support the idea that learning was inherited, the biology community breathed a sigh of relief and considered the matter closed.


But the big implication of this approach is that memory is transpersonal. These mental morphogenetic fields are not locked in your brain, but are available throughout all space and all future time! From this perspective, the results of the McDougall- Agar experiments become easily understood. Each rat that learned the task gradually strengthened a morphogenetic field associated with the correct choice. Later rats of the same breed placed in the identical experimental setting could have a high degree of resonance with the earlier rats regardless of whether their immediate parents had been trained. Agar's rats started where McDougall's had left off because the field had not been diminished by space or time. Some readers will likely recognize this as an example of what is generally known as "the hundredth monkey" phenomenon, but these experiments and Sheldrake's interpretation are much more precise.

</i>

yes, I have heard of these experiments, and the results seem very interesting to me and make me wonder how is the experience of OUR previous generations affecting us

only in this case just 2 rats seem a little too little population, because they won't have the ability to learn from the experience of others or themselves, because one mistake and ... death

Actually Procop, I agree, I reckon the rats will learn to intuitively help each other basing this on the premise that the will to survive being a fundemental instinct.

Maybe they would not survive in all cases but I feel confident that they would in some.

Some would go on to think that the rats may form some sort of empathy even with out conscious awareness of this empathy and blindly work at their survival.

If I had the money and the time I would love to do this maze experiment.....It may prove surprising in it's results.

only in this case just 2 rats seem a little to little population

It probably wouldn't matter. The rats would develop a ritual (like religiin) (which would feel " right" (give them good feeling)). In this ritual would be included the touching of the sensor...

I doubt that collective consciousness explains this well. This is more of an example of conditioning.

Originally posted by ProCop
It probably wouldn't matter. The rats would develop a ritual (like religiin) (which would feel " right" (give them good feeling)). In this ritual would be included the touching of the sensor...

this assumption of yours seems to be a "little" too far fetched

The conditioning would only be intuitive as the sensors etc would be oblivious to the rats consciousness and only aware at an intuitive of "Gut" level ( if any).

Originally posted by Quantum Quack
Actually my son is quite right in saying that they MAY find the relationship. It IS possible that they MAY survive.
and it is possible that they MAY not, which leaves us to 50-50, which leaves us without any scientifically valid conclusions

K.G. Jung believed that personal experience is coded per person and stored (possibly outside) the person. By some mistake in the coding you can come <i>consciously</i> into the code-world of somebody else (eg. some people knew detailed info about medieval castles they had never visited). Unconsciously you are already connected. That's where urges come from. Rats would then get an urge to do something (without understanding the origin of this urge) and touch the sensor

Avatar, You are quite right. To remain true to the experiment we have to maintain an objective position and any statement that closes of either possibility is counter productive to the experiment. I mean no offense to any one with this comment.

but! if such an experiment hadn't been done before then the rats would get no unconsciouss trigger

btw- I like Jung

the experiment must be done with a reosanable quantity of rats simultaneously and then again with just 2 rats and then again with a large quantity

with this we would find if this consciousness is affected by a very small minority that is given only 1 chance (my assumption is that it won't)
and if it does then can the only two rats affect this subconsciouss experience field

which leaves us without any scientifically valid conclusions
which is why we can only speculate about possible outcomes.

The only way to know is to actually do the experiment.

As Procop is suggesting much research has been done and many results have been published that suggest and I repeat only suggest that the rats may find a way to survive intuitively.

AS yet though science is not satisfied by the evidence so far and rightly so ( to a point)

Interestingly, if we managed to get only one pair of rats surviving for say a period of time that suggests sustainablity ( say 3 years) then we have a couple of rats as living proof of empathic relationships. If we place 1000 kilometres between the rats and we achieved a sustainable pair of rats then we prove empathic relationships have no regard for distance. etc etc.

( assuming of course that the structure of the experiment is true to the question)

if this can be proven then the scientists need to find out why this is so and how does it work. ( sense of smell maybe)
also if we apply this to humans then we could explain why a person in London can have an empathic relationship with a person in Australia ( for example)

Originally posted by Quantum Quack
sense of smell maybe
don't make me laugh
smell :D
you suggest a smell traveling from australia to europe? :rolleyes:

if this is so, then it has to be brainwaves or smthing like that

actually it aint so ridiculous if you think about it.

Whales migrate for thousands of miles to the same breeding ground every year,

Sharks can smell food in the water from miles away.
Humans respond to subconscious smells.
Destiny is often referred to as a smell ( sniffing the breaze)
Dogs can find their way to their master with out any mamory aids or recognition ( over many miles)
Pidgeons can find their way home

Etc etc
Many examples of smell or some other sense that leads the animal to it's destination.

The rats I would assume would be quite smelly (ha) and distance for smell may be not an issue as proven by other animals ( speculated on )

dogs have good scent and thus they must know their master from distance? (and they know, I have a dog also)
I think that it is not so possible, especially because there are too many smells in a big city
no! I think that if there is this subconsciouss experience, transfer of information then it no way can be smell, because there are too many different obstacles. Brainwaves or smthing that we could regard as such seem to be much more possible
smell is simplification of this phenomen

p.s. don't forget that we are animals also
p.p.s. many animals have quite different smelling "talents" from a dog to a jelly fish, to a human, to a worm (many such experiments have been done with worms)

Ok, what kind of mazes (specifically) do you think may be most appropriate? And, how do you do sensors? I think this will be my small project for the winter vacation, muahaha.

well, you'll need more professional help from a person that "knows" rats and their habits.
as for the equipment I suggest you have brain activity scanners attached to rats

the design of the experiment would have to very well studied I would think.
Any possible accidental corruption would invalidate it.

The mazes would have to tbe different and complex enough to generate a reasonable probability that the rats would survive long enough to learn in the first instance.

As the rats survived ( the death result could be considered as obvious) you would need after a set time to enlarge the maze so as to allow the rats to show they can repeat the ability in a more complex environement.

One experiment could be held with rats that have lived together thus familiar to each others scent. Another experiment could be done with two rats that have never had close contact. For example a rat purchased in london and a rat in America always apart.
other versions could be done etc etc.

I would suggest the sensor would be placed in a blind alley in the mazes so that the rat would eventually have to make an effort to get to it ( unwittingly) If the sensor was placed on a artery in the maze it would be too easy to trip it. ( Randominity at play...the rat would still die eventually though)

What design would you use?

another point is that it would be a very cheap experiment I woudl think to do

The cash outlay would be very small.

Could even be done over the internet at as many locations you would care to consider
The design would have to rule out randominity so that in the long term sustainable pair are just not achieved by chance

Ok, Ill do some research and consult a few people. Promise a development within a week!

Originally posted by Avatar
dogs have good scent and thus they must know their master from distance? (and they know, I have a dog also)
I think that it is not so possible, especially because there are too many smells in a big city
no! I think that if there is this subconsciouss experience, transfer of information then it no way can be smell, because there are too many different obstacles. Brainwaves or smthing that we could regard as such seem to be much more possible
smell is simplification of this phenomen


What about dogs picking up scents from drugs, and chemicals, even a few molecules? I dont think the chemicals have brainwaves....

surely there is difference between a distance of few metres and few hundred kilometres (1oo monkey experiment)

and we are talking about information transfer (experience transfer) not a transfer of properties of some object (no matter how it is interpreted at the receiving end)
smell is a too primitive medium to do that imo

Originally posted by Avatar
surely there is difference between a distance of few metres and few hundred kilometres (1oo monkey experiment)

and we are talking about information transfer (experience transfer) not a transfer of properties of some object (no matter how it is interpreted at the receiving end)
smell is a too primitive medium to do that imo

I just read the post that prompted this whole smell sidetrack, and yes, THAT relationship is somewhat farfetched. Find the master over distances? Dogs noses can work with molecules, is it impossible for their to be a trail of uniqueness leading to you? Maybe your skin flakes go out the vent in your car, to show no relationship, hermetically seal a human who is in close relation toa dog and move him 20 miles away, and see if brainwaves help the dog find them.

I know what your talking about here, but making declaritive statements and assuming they are truth is a fallacy, a lot can be encoded in a molecule.

Though, reading the excert from ProCop, smell would be too primitive a medium for that type of transfer in my opinion as well. It would most likely be a medium with which we have no direct knowledge of as a species at this point in time.

To add to that, I was thinking about QQ's post, in relation to ProCop's post, and wouldnt the rats learning the relationship only be shown with succesive generations?

If you include that article in your speculations, it would seem that the rats wouldnt learn the relationship with each other, but that their off spring would get the relationship because their collective concious/unconcious both include the other rats findings.

If you include that article in your speculations, it would seem that the rats wouldnt learn the relationship with each other, but that their off spring would get the relationship because their collective concious/unconcious both include the other rats findings.

--

yes, that is my speculation
I have no means to do the experiments in order to validate or disprove my claims
that could easy be that also the same generation rats learn, but I quite doubt it, because gaining experience is a long process and animals generally lose their learning potential with age

When we talk of information transfer or ability to digest, store and respond to information I think we underestimate our capacities in this regard.

When you look at your computer screne the internet is brought to you by HTML the information is transfererred very quickly from computer to computer but even this is extremely slow to our sensory capacities.

When you walk in to a room that is full of people, with in milli seconds you have an entire appreciation of that room, with only the main points coming to your attention.

The amount of processing the brain is capable of is enormous by any comparison.

Smell is probably our most subtle sense most of what we smell is subconscious to us. But even I know that if you smell something you like it is amazing how it changes the way you feel. Like walking into a restuarant that cooks really nice food or the smell of another person especially the other sex. The information rate would be billions of bits per second in something more sophisticated than binary or digital languages.

The amount of information available to the rat is also enormous an not just from smell ( of course)

I think the rats would survive until one dies of something other than starvation. They’d not learn anything significantly new. They’d both search for food like rats normally do, and both would find food that the other triggered.

yeah, that is the most probable outcome

It may depend on how big and complex the mazes were.

Obviously a hungry Rat is going to go look for food therefore in doing so trip the sensor.

But if the maze was large enough the probability would reduce I would think.

The maze would have to be designed to reduce probability of survival by accident over time to Zero.

Originally posted by zanket
I think the rats would survive until one dies of something other than starvation. They’d not learn anything significantly new. They’d both search for food like rats normally do, and both would find food that the other triggered.

It could go as follows. Rat A touches the sensor Rat B eats and goes to sleep. Hungry A keeps searching B keeps eating. A gets egshosted and doesn't move around B goes to search touches the sensor A eats and goes to sleep. (If there is no (unconscious sharing of knowledge/learning)