Sniffer Dogs Led Astray By Their Handlers

It's a familiar site at any international Airport. Working dogs and their handlers busy about the place sniffing this and that in a constant search for prohibited substances. But a new study by researches at the University of California at Davis has found evidence that these dogs may be influenced by their handlers. When it comes to sniffing out the goods. The behavior of the handler, conscious or otherwise, may be having an effect on the dogs detection rates.

In this study. 18 dog/handler teams were studied under test conditions. Decoy scents were planted to test the influence of these distractions on the dogs. And the handlers were told that a paper marker would show the location of a target scent. There was no target scent present in the testing. So any alert on the part of the dog/handler team was a false positive.

What they found was that there were more alerts in the test scenarios where the handler was told of the location of a target scent. And that in fact the handler reported more alerts around the location indicated by the marker. So it was clear that the handlers expectation that a scent was present had an influence on the dog.

What I find interesting is the number of alerts in total. 225. This seems like an awful lot of false positives.
Also the tests were not recorded on video. So the effect of the handlers bias, leading them to incorrectly interpret the dogs actions as an alert, cannot be fully ruled out.

I would really like to see this experiment repeated with a larger sample size, closer scrutiny of the participants and the introduction of actual target scents. It would then be interesting to see if the handlers, or dogs, could be fooled into missing the target scents and giving a false alert. For example the handler may be told of the false location of the target scent and see if the dog can identify the correct location.

Though maybe that would be a bit hard on the poor subject team. Interesting tho.

Maori Elder "Sees" the Destruction of Wellington

Maori Elder, Keri Tia Toa, has used a speech this morning at the Waitangi treaty grounds to share his vision of the destruction of Wellington by devastating earthquake.

You can listen to his tale here. 

This is bizarre to say the least. I mean consider the context. A morning prayer session during what is a reflection on the singing of New Zealand's founding document. It's a time when we as kiwis are to remember how or nation came about.

And then we have an old crank stand up and declare that our capital will be destroyed. That our seat of government will be thrown down and that there will be soldiers and bodies in the streets. 

Amazing. 

Here are the possibilities as I see them: 

1) Keri Tia Toa is just a whack job. I mean it's entirely possible that he is simply loosing his marbles and decided to tell a fantastical story for what ever end he had in mind. 

2) He had a weird experience some time ago. A bad dream or something. And his obsessing over it combined with what ever influence his particular spirituality or belief system has had. Has twisted his memory of this experience into the strange "vision" that he now reports.  

3) He is just plain making shit up. This seems the most unlikely to my mind. Tho people have been known to do stranger things. 

As predictions go this is a rather lame one. I mean yes it is spectacular and would have enormous consequences for Wellington and the country as a whole. But it's so vague and rather a given.

This is what we skeptics refer to as the low hanging fruit. It's a prediction that is very likely to come true. There will be a large earthquake in Wellington some time in the future. That is a certainty. By not giving a specific date he leaves the possibility open that no matter when it happens it can still count as a successful prediction. Keri Tia Toa does say that it will be in the month of June. This is surprising because it cuts down his chances of being right to 1 in 12. Although if it's close to June or even in the middle of the year some time it will probably be considered a hit by some.     

I don't think I'll even bother why the idea of predicting the future is complete and total rubbish. suffice to say that in the entire history of our species there has never been any convincing evidence that humans are able to predict future events without using some form of inductive reasoning or theoretical  structure. No person has ever demonstrated the ability to have an accurate "vision" of events to come.   

I find this whole thing rather embarrassing really. A supposedly respected individual given a forum of national importance and he uses it to put forward an absurd vision of death and destruction. I mean come on. 

What do you think?        

Is This Brain Washing?

Here is "note able" creationist and general all around jackass Ken Ham indoctrinating a room full of kids.

  

This has a very cult like feel to it don't you think. The brain washing of young children in this way I find absolutely appalling and abhorrent. Filling their young minds with nonsense and denying them the chance to discover the truth is a form of abuse. 

I have real issue with the indoctrination of the young by religions of all stripes. But it seems all the more repugnant when it takes the form of anti-science, anti-reason, nonsense. These children will grow up and enter society with a warped and inaccurate knowledge of how the world works. This will surely hurt their prospects for higher learning and hold back their understanding of just how truly amazing things really are. 

Note to Mr Ham: I notice you're using a microphone. And a Projector. And you're in a Building. Probably in a modern city. No doubt you're wearing manufactured clothing. And you probably arrived at your brainwashing event in a car, train or bus. 

All of these things would not be possible without the science that you are so eager to deny (Science in general, not specifically evolution of course). Science works! The evidence is all around us in our lives. Evolution is a fact. The earth is older then 6000 years. Much Much older! Your holy book is an interesting piece of historical literature. It is not literal truth. 

O and also. 

You suck.

The above is not an argument in favor of my position. Merely something I felt like saying. Full and complete demolitions of the ridiculous Creationist/Intelligent Design ideas have been done to death by many, many people much smarter and more well informed than I. They can be found all over the interweb.

I really, really, really hate the indoctrination of the young and impressionable by the idiotic and the  foolish. Teach children to think critically and to reason for themselves. Then let them loose with the evidence and see what conclusions they reach. 

I suspect that if this were done right. Many more people in our society would have a more accurate and informed view of the world.