The four pigs came to win. If they played the game well, they received delicious dog food (they used to get M & Ms, but the humans decided they were too sugary). Time and time again, when researchers ask them to complete a video game task: guide a cursor with a joystick, a kind of rudimentary Pong“They did it with impressive skill.”
Researchers began puTting pigs in computerized tasks in the late 1990s, and although the results had occasional press coverage over the years, no peer-reviewed research has been conducted on the experiments. published until today, with a paper in the journal Frontiers in Psychology. Scientists found that despite visual and dexterous restrictions on animals, pigs were able to understand and achieve goals in simple computer games.
“What they were able to do is act far above the chances of achieving those goals,” Candace Croney, director of the Center for Animal Welfare Sciences at Purdue University and lead author of the paper, said in a phone call. “And beyond chance, it’s clear they had some conceptual understanding of what they were being asked to do.”
The published research is the expected fruit of some twenty years of work that began when Croney was at Purdue University, working with prolific pig researcher Stanley Curtis. The project followed the efforts of two Yorkshire pigs, Hamlet and Trout, and two micro pigs Panepinto, Ebony and Ivory, as they tried to move a cursor to an illuminated area of the computer screen.
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“They beg to play video games,” Curtis said he said the AP in 1997. “They beg to be the first to come out of their feathers and then step on the ramp to play.”
It was an uphill battle for the pigs. The joysticks were equipped for testing with primates, so hoofed pigs had to use their snouts and mouths to do the job. It was found that all four pigs were farsighted, so the screens had to be placed at an optimal distance for the pigs to see the targets. There were additional limitations to Yorkshire pigs. Raised to grow quickly, heavier pigs could not stand for too long.
“While there may be some physical limitations as to how the pigs could see the screen or manipulate the joystick, they clearly understood the connection between their own behavior, the joystick, and what was happening on the screen.” , Lori Marino, a neuroscientist not affiliated with the current document, said in an email. Marino, who directs the Whale Sanctuary Project, has long studied the cognition, intelligence, and self-knowledge of mammals, including pigs. “It’s really a testament to their flexibility and cognitive ingenuity that they were able to find ways to manipulate the joystick even though test setup often cost them physical participation.”
“What makes these findings even more important is that the pigs in this study are self-agents,” Marino added, “which is the ability to recognize that one’s own actions make a difference.”
Pigs were taught various orders to make their lives easier, as well as that of researchers. They learned instructions similar to those you would teach a dog (to sit, to come, to wait away from their feathers when they needed cleaning), as well as to look for their toys when they finished their job of playing video games.
“At one point, they were very good at getting their toys and they weren’t so good at cleaning up after themselves,” Croney said. “I practically became a pig nursery, I went around and ordered them. Then we started teaching them to put things back together. ”
When the investigation ended, the Yorkshire pigs were adopted by the owners of one bed and breakfast, where they lived their life on the farm. Ebony i Ivory he eventually retired to the children’s zoo. Croney said that even years after the experiments, he went to visit Hamlet, who heard his voice and “galloped” into the pasture to greet him.
Pigs may not have the right fingers of a primate or the bad looks of a puppy, but cognitively they are firmly in competition. Winston Churchill once said that “Dogs look at you, cats look at you. Give me a pig! He looks you in the eye and treats you like an equal ”. Gone are the days of giving pigs the respect they deserve.