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I would venture to guess it varies by species, right? I mean I would be willing to bet that a g. rosea could go alot longer without water than say an h. lividum.
Intelligent water usage?
- Thread starter Ungweliante
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An adult tarantula can survive without access to water for a few months. Juveniles greater than an inch or so seem to be at least nearly as hardy as adults in regards to any sane watering schedule. Where constant access to moisture is important is with the tiny 1/8" - 1/2" slings. While something like Brachypelma will tolerate some periods of dryness, something like Nhandu drop dead way too easily if you don't keep keep things slightly moist.
i dont think that skiner would agree with u . ok i am not an expert but i konw some thing and inprinting behaveour by definition need some levels that can not be supported but the nervous sistem of T. but cause my english is bad , i can not go to the discution sorry.
but one thing, extrapolation is common with explaning the behaveor of animals that r lower in sofitication. one can explane the roach behaveour with out saing that that was inprinting by definition. and nocking of T when she is hungry can be explaned by nominal reflex.
but if ther r experiments that confirm those clames ok i was wrong than .
as i sad i am no expert
and one thing that i have learn is , that if someone wants to explane a thing (like Skinner)within his/here theory he/here will do so, convicted that he is right. and i am not here to hold his side
but one thing, extrapolation is common with explaning the behaveor of animals that r lower in sofitication. one can explane the roach behaveour with out saing that that was inprinting by definition. and nocking of T when she is hungry can be explaned by nominal reflex.
but if ther r experiments that confirm those clames ok i was wrong than .
as i sad i am no expert
and one thing that i have learn is , that if someone wants to explane a thing (like Skinner)within his/here theory he/here will do so, convicted that he is right. and i am not here to hold his side
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You realise that Skinner is considered to be a flint axe next to a argon laser in animal behavior today, don't you? The flint axe is probably being generous.
You're right, you aren't an expert, and you're completely wrong. When you've taken modern courses in insect and invertebrate behavior (and even taught a couple of graduate lectures in such), get back to me.
EDIT (so I don't sound like a complete ass) - A concrete, peer reviewed example of why you are mistaken: There are two morphs of the wolf spider Schizocosa uetzi. In one, the males have tufts of dark hairs on their forelegs, the other morph has bald, cream coloured forelegs. Although the two populations are separated by geography throughout most of their range, there is no biological barier to their interbreeding. However, imprinting serves to help keep them separate even where populations are nearby one another because whatever kind of adult male an immature female sees alters her preference for what kind of male she will accept when she does become mature. Let a daughter of the hairy legged male population look at those sleek, sexy baldy leg men when she's a teen, and that's what she'll grow up to let inseminate her. Let a daughter of the baldy legged male population look at those manly hairy leg men when she's a teen, and that's what she'll grow up to let inseminate her.
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/full/100/23/13390
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With regards to the question of "How long can a T go without water?", a few years ago the town I was living in was hit by a huge forest fire during a long, hot summer, the whole town was evacuated. I was out of town at the time and my roommates, while kind enough to grab a few of my possessions, weren't able to take my first & only T at the time, adult female G. rosea. She sat in my house for four weeks, no food, no water refills, no attention of any kind, average temp the whole time was near 38-40 Celsius, not to mention the air quality was horrid from the smoke of the fire and the rotting food in the refrigerator. Needless to say I was sure she was dead. When I finally got back into my house, I couldn't believe it, she was totally fine. I damn near cried. She's still with me today, and I love her to pieces for surviving.
She's still with me today, and I love her to pieces for surviving. u r making me use a dictionery.
sorry but i dont know if i miss used
the words but classic inprinting u
need to rekognise two cinds of stimulus.
the T does not hava a cappasity for that
cause of structure and nature of its nervous
sistem. weather or not the skiner exp. is old as
stoun hange or piramids he is a pionir and genius
so dont disprage cause that is not the way of relating
to pepople and scientisc . only option is that my term
and yours do not meen the same thing. about classink
inprintin have probalby more knowledg that u can dream
of but i was just makeing the paralel to a fild that i
dont know very well(behaveour of arachnoids).but the main
principls have to hold. class. inpr. is more comples in
humans that in any other animal so please...dont eaven
go there with me.
i used Skinners exp. cause some pepole have hear of him.
uf uf uf
about your example ,u would fail every class with exebition
of total lack of knowledge of inprinting. Classical
inprinting does not have a thing with inprinting the
instinkt trough generations. U r way of ... the point that
i wanted to make. mabu T has a instinktiv inprint of finding
watter ,and make a connection with filling the poth with watter
but taht is not classical inprinting.those r classical association. the first lesson in ethiology is about Lojds Morgan Cannon of Effectivety - do not explane behaveour of animal with complex terms if u can explane it with less complex processec (free translation)u go back to net and find classicla inprinting ,go over it and that come back to me
so wrong example
u can be Melani Klein or M West or Stiwe Irving
but the things u saied, they r wrrong. ther is
a possibility that class. inprinting can be done
but how things r going on no one have make any
progres or succes.
your examples r bad missleading and wrong, they
dont eaven have all elements for the things that
i have clamed can not be done.i ma not strickt about
that clame cause i dont work in that fild an if something
changes i will accept it. .
about low blows, i have finshed my lectiors and
studies long time ago. psychology, human behaveour
and ethiology , and Jung psychoanalis
( about 12 psychiatric schools and practice with poations),
so pleas dont tell me about coming back to you . when u
r ready u can come and its 20E for u. form 9 to 18h
final word.
i will give a chanse and tought that i have not been
understud for leck of my english.
i will not say a thing about this any more cause
yor alterego is so big that maby it will swallow
youself. give yor self a rest.u will not hurt anyone with things
u sad but dont count on makeing your name
on untruth clames, and internet rewrited knowledge. i
dont know u and dont care, but if u r wrong somethimes its eaiser
to say maby i was wrong (or maby its like that ) or u r maby right.
u just showed me how imature and no professional
u r -not letting someoneto be right.
arrogance is a double edge sword.
sorry but i dont know if i miss used
the words but classic inprinting u
need to rekognise two cinds of stimulus.
the T does not hava a cappasity for that
cause of structure and nature of its nervous
sistem. weather or not the skiner exp. is old as
stoun hange or piramids he is a pionir and genius
so dont disprage cause that is not the way of relating
to pepople and scientisc . only option is that my term
and yours do not meen the same thing. about classink
inprintin have probalby more knowledg that u can dream
of but i was just makeing the paralel to a fild that i
dont know very well(behaveour of arachnoids).but the main
principls have to hold. class. inpr. is more comples in
humans that in any other animal so please...dont eaven
go there with me.
i used Skinners exp. cause some pepole have hear of him.
uf uf uf
about your example ,u would fail every class with exebition
of total lack of knowledge of inprinting. Classical
inprinting does not have a thing with inprinting the
instinkt trough generations. U r way of ... the point that
i wanted to make. mabu T has a instinktiv inprint of finding
watter ,and make a connection with filling the poth with watter
but taht is not classical inprinting.those r classical association. the first lesson in ethiology is about Lojds Morgan Cannon of Effectivety - do not explane behaveour of animal with complex terms if u can explane it with less complex processec (free translation)u go back to net and find classicla inprinting ,go over it and that come back to me
so wrong example
u can be Melani Klein or M West or Stiwe Irving
but the things u saied, they r wrrong. ther is
a possibility that class. inprinting can be done
but how things r going on no one have make any
progres or succes.
your examples r bad missleading and wrong, they
dont eaven have all elements for the things that
i have clamed can not be done.i ma not strickt about
that clame cause i dont work in that fild an if something
changes i will accept it. .
about low blows, i have finshed my lectiors and
studies long time ago. psychology, human behaveour
and ethiology , and Jung psychoanalis
( about 12 psychiatric schools and practice with poations),
so pleas dont tell me about coming back to you . when u
r ready u can come and its 20E for u. form 9 to 18h
final word.
i will give a chanse and tought that i have not been
understud for leck of my english.
i will not say a thing about this any more cause
yor alterego is so big that maby it will swallow
youself. give yor self a rest.u will not hurt anyone with things
u sad but dont count on makeing your name
on untruth clames, and internet rewrited knowledge. i
dont know u and dont care, but if u r wrong somethimes its eaiser
to say maby i was wrong (or maby its like that ) or u r maby right.
u just showed me how imature and no professional
u r -not letting someoneto be right.
arrogance is a double edge sword.
- Joined
- Jul 22, 2002
- Messages
- 3,783
@Zarko
This has nothing to do with ego. I have my graduate degree in entomology. I am employed as an arachnological researcher. I have kept tarantulas for more than 20 years. I have read tens of thousands of hobbyist reports on animal behavior.
The bottom line is you are wrong.
Imprinting, associative, and habituative learning are all three possible with animals less complex than a tarantula. That is all there is to it. There is virtually no such thing so primitive that it is not capable of some learning. All you're doing is playing the "micro evolution" versus "macro evolution" game that Creationists attempt, nobody makes that distinction in animal behavior. Either something is a learned behavior or it's not. Nobody is claiming you can teach a tarantula to sit up and tap its legs ten times to get a cricket, but you'd have be daft to claim that they can't learn to associate given phenomena with the appearance of food, water, danger, etc. They've been around tens of millions of years, they've seen their climates change and alter multiple times, they've had complete turnovers of other species living nearby them, there is no way they can be 100% instinct (instinct, incidentally, is itself no longer considered to be all that real of a concept, behaviorists prefer to think of behaviors as stereotyped, with creatures who are more complex having less stereotyped behaviors than less complex ones).
In the Vernier example I mentioned above not only did one spider on its own learn that banging an empty water dish bring more water, some other spiders in the room began to copy the behavior and, in turn, learned that doing so brought more water. It was only when Darrin stopped refilling the water dishes promptly at their banging that the behavior stopped. Not only is that remarkable example of associative learning, it demonstrates they can learn under scenarios nobody would have thought possible even accepting modern knowledge of invertebrate learning.
Now, either the president of the ATS is a liar, or maybe you need to rethink your stance on this issue.
Also, Jung?, 'nuff said. He was a wild, speculative philosopher, not a scientist, not an ethologist, and certainly nobody who's name I'd drop in trying to convince someone I knew something about animal behavior. Your views are not only drawn from the wrong science, psychiatry, they are outdated and speckled with pseudoscience, not at all relevant to whether or not a tarantula can learn to associate given novel phenomena with simple phenomena related to their survival.
This has nothing to do with ego. I have my graduate degree in entomology. I am employed as an arachnological researcher. I have kept tarantulas for more than 20 years. I have read tens of thousands of hobbyist reports on animal behavior.
The bottom line is you are wrong.
Imprinting, associative, and habituative learning are all three possible with animals less complex than a tarantula. That is all there is to it. There is virtually no such thing so primitive that it is not capable of some learning. All you're doing is playing the "micro evolution" versus "macro evolution" game that Creationists attempt, nobody makes that distinction in animal behavior. Either something is a learned behavior or it's not. Nobody is claiming you can teach a tarantula to sit up and tap its legs ten times to get a cricket, but you'd have be daft to claim that they can't learn to associate given phenomena with the appearance of food, water, danger, etc. They've been around tens of millions of years, they've seen their climates change and alter multiple times, they've had complete turnovers of other species living nearby them, there is no way they can be 100% instinct (instinct, incidentally, is itself no longer considered to be all that real of a concept, behaviorists prefer to think of behaviors as stereotyped, with creatures who are more complex having less stereotyped behaviors than less complex ones).
In the Vernier example I mentioned above not only did one spider on its own learn that banging an empty water dish bring more water, some other spiders in the room began to copy the behavior and, in turn, learned that doing so brought more water. It was only when Darrin stopped refilling the water dishes promptly at their banging that the behavior stopped. Not only is that remarkable example of associative learning, it demonstrates they can learn under scenarios nobody would have thought possible even accepting modern knowledge of invertebrate learning.
Now, either the president of the ATS is a liar, or maybe you need to rethink your stance on this issue.
Also, Jung?, 'nuff said. He was a wild, speculative philosopher, not a scientist, not an ethologist, and certainly nobody who's name I'd drop in trying to convince someone I knew something about animal behavior. Your views are not only drawn from the wrong science, psychiatry, they are outdated and speckled with pseudoscience, not at all relevant to whether or not a tarantula can learn to associate given novel phenomena with simple phenomena related to their survival.
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Not that I am very anxious to jump into the deep water here and drown myself, but Skinner was noted for his experiments with operant conditioning, not classical conditioning. The Skinner Box, which anyone who has taken a college level psychology course has probably at least seen a picture of, demonstrates operant conditioning, or as Code Monkey referred to it, associative learning. It is response-reward conditioning, for example when a rat learns that if it presses the lever, a food pellet appears. The tarantula bangs on the dish, water appears. There is does not have to be an initial stimulus. The stimulus, in this case hunger or thirst, generally comes later after the rat has already learned the response-reward paradigm.
Classical or Pavlovian conditioning is what you were referring to here initially,where an animal is conditioned to exhibit a response to a stimulus which originally elicited no response: ie. the dog drools when given meat powder. A bell is rung before presenting the meat powder, then the dog will begin to drool upon hearing the bell. A tarantula sensed the cover opened on the enclosure, and heads for the vibration, knowing either food or water are about to appear.
Classical or Pavlovian conditioning is what you were referring to here initially,where an animal is conditioned to exhibit a response to a stimulus which originally elicited no response: ie. the dog drools when given meat powder. A bell is rung before presenting the meat powder, then the dog will begin to drool upon hearing the bell. A tarantula sensed the cover opened on the enclosure, and heads for the vibration, knowing either food or water are about to appear.
"Not only is that remarkable example of associative learning, it demonstrates they can learn under scenarios nobody would have thought possible even accepting modern knowledge of invertebrate learning."
yep it can be associative learning but not the classic inprinthing that i was thrying to say.(the same principle that Skinners showed on dogs) .u
said it your self it is ( and i agree) associative learning.
of cours where u can find consciounsness u can find learnig. i have written a papir on consciounsness in reptiles... and have some abouth T'z. it is in Serbian. associative learnig is simple and one dimensional and linear. it can be found in paramecium .... there is no intelegent arrange but it is still associative learning to react to a stimulus.
1)associative learning not equivalent to classic inprinting
2)tz can learn by association can not learn by classic inprin.
that is all i wannted to say
.
maby ATS president made a mastake and dosnt want to addmit that he missunderstud my point and was talking arogantly about stuff that i have more knowledge of. i had no plan to talk about those stuff case i am not here to educate about behaviour and teories that regard this subject but u tried to humiliae me
"You're right, you aren't an expert, and you're completely wrong. When you've taken modern courses in insect and invertebrate behavior (and even taught a couple of graduate lectures in such), get back to me.|"
that is not the way to tallk with pepole regardless of yor possition in ATS or this forum.u shold be more respectful
yep it can be associative learning but not the classic inprinthing that i was thrying to say.(the same principle that Skinners showed on dogs) .u
said it your self it is ( and i agree) associative learning.
of cours where u can find consciounsness u can find learnig. i have written a papir on consciounsness in reptiles... and have some abouth T'z. it is in Serbian. associative learnig is simple and one dimensional and linear. it can be found in paramecium .... there is no intelegent arrange but it is still associative learning to react to a stimulus.
1)associative learning not equivalent to classic inprinting
2)tz can learn by association can not learn by classic inprin.
that is all i wannted to say
.
maby ATS president made a mastake and dosnt want to addmit that he missunderstud my point and was talking arogantly about stuff that i have more knowledge of. i had no plan to talk about those stuff case i am not here to educate about behaviour and teories that regard this subject but u tried to humiliae me
"You're right, you aren't an expert, and you're completely wrong. When you've taken modern courses in insect and invertebrate behavior (and even taught a couple of graduate lectures in such), get back to me.|"
that is not the way to tallk with pepole regardless of yor possition in ATS or this forum.u shold be more respectful
- Joined
- Jul 22, 2002
- Messages
- 3,783
Right, but the big issue is whether Skinner is actually still part of any real curriculum, and he's not. His experiments are considered historical footnotes in animal behavior and most of his conclusions long rejected. Skinner was one of those who thought you could beat a dog to death and its screams and howls were just automated responses, not at all evidence of any underlying suffering psychological mind at work.
I made it through multiple courses in animal behavior and never once saw Skinner mentioned outside of the introductory chapter. Nor was it ever questioned whether inverts were capable of the sort of learning talked about in this thread (ok, most ethologists would raise an eyebrow at other spiders learning to bang their water dishes from some sort of observation of the first one, but that's an outlier for this discussion
).Where the problem comes in is with the sort of micro versus macro evolution schism. All a tarantula or other spider does is eat, drink, build a shelter, and mate. It has no other behavior modes under which to test its ability to learn. As a result, the studies that have been done fall under these categories, and then people like Zarko, "SEE, that's just instinct!" even though nothing could be farther from the truth. Instinct is why a digging wasp will continue to stock and seal off a larval chamber even if the sneaky scientist has removed the wasp larva or egg, because the behavior is sterotyped and once the egg is layed, the wasp is committed to the followup behaviors. There is no plasticity in these behaviors, they follow along exactly the same every single time. That is what we can call instinct.
On the other hand, when you take the larvae of certain lepidopterans and rear them on a plant, they will preferentially come back to that same species of plant to oviposit. It doesn't matter what plants their ancestors have been raised on for 10,000 generations, it doesn't even matter if the sneaky scientists moved the eggs to plants they don't even normally use. The larvae will imprint to the cues of the plant they grew up on and try and find that plant again if/when they make it to maturity. Evolution has cued them to a *type* of behavior, but evolution has not spelled out exactly how that behavior manifests itself, that part is modified by learning.
Enter the tarantula into the debate. It has to find water. How this is accomplished is different for every tarantula. Some will live down a slope where there are periodic rains that run right into their burrow. Some will live nearby a watering hole where they may have to travel a short distance at night to get water. Some will need to react to the sound of a rainstorm to go out and drink off the rocks and vegetation. And some will need to react to the disturbance of a large creature that is always followed by water being present in the small (perfectly round plastic) watering hole a few inches from their scrape.
This isn't some huge leap of ethology, it's basic selection for the ability to have behaviors plastic enough that they don't die of thirst because you haven't managed to mimic the structure of the yimyim tree which is where the spider's ancestors came to drink condensed dew at 6AM every morning.
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- Mar 8, 2006
- Messages
- 841
Skinner was still part of the curriculum when I was taking psych classes in the '80's, but yes, for the most part, he is a footnote, like Watson,or Pavlov.
He did teach pigeons to play ping-pong in the basement of one of the buildings at U of I though .
But back on track, imprinting is not limited to humans, take for example the ducklings who will imprint on a dog and follow it around. No creature, aside from perhaps plant life, is too primitive to learn.
He did teach pigeons to play ping-pong in the basement of one of the buildings at U of I though
.But back on track, imprinting is not limited to humans, take for example the ducklings who will imprint on a dog and follow it around. No creature, aside from perhaps plant life, is too primitive to learn.
I DID NOT SAY IN ANY POST THAT TZ R TOTALY INSTINCTIV ANIMALS....sorry
things u said r ok and they hold water. i agree with u.
u have changed the subject and thing u r talking about r all 100% allright with me .
why did u get skinner (hi is American he did bouth tipes of condicionig just i have mention him cause probably he is closer to u (amricans). there r a number of Europians who did this tipe of exsp. but u havent heard of them and they r not familiar names....explosion of those tipe of experimenst were done from 19th till pre war times (second world war) starting in Vunt's lab. the exsp. like those r not popular this days.
as u probably know hobbyst reports r not near anything scientific or experimental (ther is nuber of uncontroled variables)so u cant rely on those for example of conisoning of any tipe of behaveour.
ok lets talk about Pavlov. the same principle.and it is about valid teories not skinner or pavlov or anyone else.
plasticiti is effec of their ability to learn, but what tipe of learnig tarantulas can manifest is the question. i say they can not lear classic inprinting.
if they can it meens that after a couple of simultan stimulus of food and bell (for exsample) will define a reaction of salivation(in dogs). after couple of times , u just give a bell -stimulus and u'll get salivation again even thought there is no original sitmulus that should make salivation(i couldt explane it better ). u can not make T lear something like that.
but there r simpler behaviuors that Tz can learn ,and i hoppe, we agree on that.
things u said r ok and they hold water. i agree with u.
u have changed the subject and thing u r talking about r all 100% allright with me .
why did u get skinner (hi is American
he did bouth tipes of condicionig just i have mention him cause probably he is closer to u (amricans). there r a number of Europians who did this tipe of exsp. but u havent heard of them and they r not familiar names....explosion of those tipe of experimenst were done from 19th till pre war times (second world war) starting in Vunt's lab. the exsp. like those r not popular this days. as u probably know hobbyst reports r not near anything scientific or experimental (ther is nuber of uncontroled variables)so u cant rely on those for example of conisoning of any tipe of behaveour.
ok lets talk about Pavlov. the same principle.and it is about valid teories not skinner or pavlov or anyone else.
plasticiti is effec of their ability to learn, but what tipe of learnig tarantulas can manifest is the question. i say they can not lear classic inprinting.
if they can it meens that after a couple of simultan stimulus of food and bell (for exsample) will define a reaction of salivation(in dogs). after couple of times , u just give a bell -stimulus and u'll get salivation again even thought there is no original sitmulus that should make salivation(i couldt explane it better ). u can not make T lear something like that.
but there r simpler behaviuors that Tz can learn ,and i hoppe, we agree on that.
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- 841
Is what you call classical imprinting what we call classical conditioning here in the U.S? Pavlov and his dogs? It's simply a matter of swapping stimulii to elicit the same response, i.e the cat rubbing up against your legs when it hears the can opener. A tarantula could be conditioned to check the water dish when you open the lid.
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i got lost after the first sentence:? :? :? and now i have a headache
and now i have a headache 
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Hey Codemonkey,
You are being very rude in those posts of yours, especially if we take in consideration that you are a moderator and a scientist. I think that Zarko was just expressing his opinion and it seems to me that you are doing the same as you don't have any work on tarantula behavior to support your claims. If you have some, I would really love to read it as you two got me interested in this matter. I can't really take in consideration the observations of people who keep them as pets as they tend to be subjective...I have heard so many stories of people thinking that their dog was actually talking to them or similar stuff. Also, using the phrases like "get back to me when you learn something" or "do you want to say that the president of the society is a liar" sound quite manipulative, like they are spoken by a politician, not by a scientist.
So, I think you should both stick to some facts and to scientific work, arguments, normal dialogue and mutual respect…
Like I said, I would really love to hear and read more about this subject as it is very interesting, and the so far posted material wasn’t very convincing…
Peace…
Filip
Kind of ironic how he disses one of the pioneers of that which he studies and teaches...
tsk tsk its' not the first time i've seen him post something like this. i was searching for threads about pinkys and this turned up
http://www.arachnoboards.com/ab/showthread.php?t=14909&highlight=tarantula+pinky
basically him calling someone else stupid i was gonna post something to point out how disrespectful he was being but realized the post was from 5 years ago. i realize that you are very intelligent dark monkey or whatever your name is but really its not cool.