Researchers designed music to appeal to cats

[Cheraphy]

To demonstrate that cats are capable of appreciating music, some researchers designed a few tracks that should appeal to them. I have three of those furry beasts co-inhabiting my home. So, one by one I tested one of their tracks with them. I took them to my room, held them against their will. They struggled to get away. But when I put on the second track embedded in this article all three of them stopped struggling and focused their ears towards my speakers. A few seconds after the song stopped, two of them continued struggling. The last one took longer, but did eventually want to get away.

Their ages are (in order tested) 11 years old, 3 years old, and 15 years old.

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/03/a-symphony-for-cats/386737/

If you too have cats, I'm interested to see how many will be able to reproduce the results I had.

[z05DSL3A]

I have four cats, three of them don't respond much to music. The fourth seems to like things like Emily Barker & The Red Clay Halo, KT Tunstall, and Kami Thompson. She did stop and look when I played the second track but soon went back to cleaning. The boys did nothing.

[htirwin]

I am skeptical that it's the music itself the cats are interested in and not the rodent like sounds in the background.

[Ispil]

I think the rodent-like sounds are specifically what the researchers were going for.

[firedraco]

My cat ignored it, but it could also just be tired because it was laying next to me trying to sleep when I played the music.

My other cat just ignored it.

[IWishIKnew]

Sounds like a complete waste of time. Wasting money and time trying to figure out whether cats can "appreciate" music is about as productive as stopping half-way through mowing your lawn to see if crickets give chicken shit about their cousins you just chopped up.

Besides, even if it were worth the time and money spent, this isn't even evidence: it's all circumstantial. So, even if it were a worthy cause -- and I'm not saying it is -- it niether proves nor disproves whether cats can "appreciate" music, and, by extension, is still a complete waste of money and time.

[Cheraphy]

This was only the first step, the following step is to run brain scans on the cats as they play the music and look to see if certain areas light up.

As for it being a complete waste of time and money, there is so much of science that will probably never have an application, either to it's own field or to daily life. But science isn't always about learning in hopes to apply. It's often learning for the sake of learning. To know all that can be known.

[Little Bobby Tables]

Sounds like a complete waste of time. Wasting money and time trying to figure out whether cats can "appreciate" music is about as productive as stopping half-way through mowing your lawn to see if crickets give chicken shit about their cousins you just chopped up.

so is writing a useless wrapper around boost.filesystem, but its still done anyways. also, as cheraphy said, its not circumstantial because there are ways you can test the brain to see what responds to it. its how we are able to determine what area of the brain is associated with memories

[IWishIKnew]

Little Bobby Tables said:

you can test the brain to see what responds to it. its how we are able to determine what area of the brain is associated with memories

Notice a key word there: "associated". That only means that it makes pretty colors flash on a cat-scan, but it doesn't necessarily mean it's connected in any way.

In any case, my wrapper is of little relevance to this topic, and I fail to see why you would even bring it up when I could say the same about ChessPlusPlus. I'm not even going to go into arguing why I needed my wrapper to begin with, because it wouldn't contribute anything to this thread except pedantic stupidity.

In any case, my origional point was that the knowledge that cats either can or can't "appreciate" music doesn't do anything to further our society. What on earth would such knowledge do for us? Create more food? Make construction faster? Provide "better" transportation? No, it does none of those things. It's a completely useless piece of knowledge.

[Cheraphy]

I reiterate. Science isn't always about learning in hopes to apply. It's often learning for the sake of learning. To know all that can be known.

[Little Bobby Tables]

Notice a key word there: "associated". That only means that it makes pretty colors flash on a cat-scan, but it doesn't necessarily mean it's connected in any way.

update your dictionary brah. associated does not mean "that it makes pretty colors flash on a cat-scan" (IWishIknew 1245). it in fact does mean is connected to. http://www.google.com/#q=defintion+of+associate
who the hell told you otherwise :D?

In any case, my wrapper is of little relevance to this topic

of course. i didnt say it about the topic. i said it as a rebuttal to:

Sounds like a complete waste of time

showing that we all do pointless things in the name of (computer) science.

and I fail to see why you would even bring it up

see above

when I could say the same about ChessPlusPlus.

ok... i mean a chess program isnt really the same thing as a wrapper, and i dont take part in it, but ok. thats a shitty comeback but ok.

I'm not even going to go into arguing why I needed my wrapper to begin with, because it wouldn't contribute anything to this thread except pedantic stupidity.

yes, because its not needed ;)

In any case, my origional point was that the knowledge that cats either can or can't "appreciate" music doesn't do anything to further our society. What on earth would such knowledge do for us? Create more food? Make construction faster? Provide "better" transportation? No, it does none of those things. It's a completely useless piece of knowledge.

air tight argument bro. i bet thats what the people who threw away crude oil said. since they cant see a use for it, there mustnt be one. amirite? i bet they feel stupid now.

It's often learning for the sake of learning. To know all that can be known.

true, just wanted to point out that that was a very HHGTTG 'ish statement :D. props