come and show me at home...

since you crashed crashy... ;)

Yeah, it was great. I wish I could get synchronized birds!

Twisthem488

Saw it? I sent it to all my non-juggling friends!

Of those who commented at all, most assume it's a trick. Well, yes, just like all the other tricks that you actually have to DO. (As I said on my card, "It's better than magic. I'm really doing it!")

Now that I think on it, the fish video reminds me of why I quit experimental psychology:
I was good at operant conditioning and progressive approximation conditioning of kids, rats, students, teachers, whatever. So like any kid with a new toy, I was boastful of my abilities and bet some other grad students that I could condition a rat to perform any single physically possible act on demand, within 24 hours. The best they could come up with was to make it masturbate on demand. It took two hours, I made a few bucks, and decided I really didn't want to be somebody who did that kind of thing. The rat didn't appear to be enjoying himself either.

(I don't mind being _able_ to do that kind of thing -- in the Marines I was trained to do much worse -- I simply choose not to.)

I have no idea what makes fish happy, so I wouldn't know where to begin to replicate this. The fish appear to be visually cued, but several other things could be at work. Assuming it's visual (finger and hand position), it's then a matter of reinforcing wanted sequences of behavior, one element at a time, and then creating new strings of behavior from established sequences. You also have to like fish (they'll know if you don't -- hell, plants know). With some animals you also have to establish respect, mutual respect, or a desire to please. The more cortex you have to work with, the more likely that the animal will at times expect to be able to reverse the process and get you to respond to it (housecats biting ankles for food, dogs bringing their leash, etc.), because they can learn the process as well as the wanted result, and see no reason why it shouldn't be reciprocal.

Among circus folk, progressive approximation conditioning is sometimes known as the "dukey" method (as in sharing your lunch, from the name of the box lunch supplied on short train or truck trips [a dukey run], which at some point came from a European seaside restaurant called Du Quay, that supplied such travel food to the local circus.)

As usual, more about penguins than anyone really wanted to know.

=Eric