Sunday, June 14, 2020

Tumblr Thread: Dog Figures Out How to Herd Lawn Roomba


Give a sheepdog something to herd and by god it will herd that thing. In this case it was a little lawn care robot. That is a smart dog. Under the right circumstances, pets find ways to do creepily intelligent things. And there's something about roombas that make them seem more than just a mindless robot. For example, here Tumblr explores human nature with the concept of a "knife roomba."

1.

Text - gallusrostromegalus So one of my neighbors has a lawn Roomba or whatever they're called, and this thing trundles around looking like a background robot in the background of the original trilogy, and ABSOLUTELY BAFFLING THE DOGS. They have concluded, I think, that it's some kind of prey animal because right after this video ended they decided to crouch down and stalk it, which means I'm 90% sure I'm going to have to stop Arwen from eating it at some point.

2.

Text - theodorepython Of course it's a prey animal it fucking eats GRASS gallusrostromegalus While I can't fault your reasoning on robot taxonomy, apparently we're both wrong: Arwen, as much as she is a high-prey-drive animal, is foremost, a herding dog, and has decided that the Lawn Roomba is a SHEEP.

3.

Text - What happened is the lawn roomba belongs to the guy that does most of the maintainence on the neighborhood park, and he had it out grazing on a different section of lawn when my parents came down for a walk and Arwen was siezed by 200 years worth fo Kelpie Instincts, rolled out of her Harness and proceded to herd the shit out of this tiny, oblivious robot. Everything was on display- mock-stalking, intimidating eye contact, barking, running in front of it to try to get it to balk, the scar

4.

Text - After about ten minutes they realized she wasn't biting it, and decided to let her play Sheep Simulator 5000 for a while. She eventually figured out that It doesn't respond to Yelling, Posturing or Aggressive Eye Contact It does respond to having it's wheels or bump hazards hit It would respond to its side being nosed or slapped by moving in a different direction

5.

Text - Conent that this was apparently some kind of blind, deaf and particularly stupid sheep, she could now manage the robot by smacking it if it got too close to the creek bed or fence for her liking, and was eventually content to sit on the highest point of the field and Supervise (TM) it. "Hey." Said Roger, owner of the robot. "Do you think if I put the ramp down she'll herd it into the back of my pickup?"

6.

Text - Arwen was mostly asleep in the afternoon sun as roger put the ramp down but woke right up when mom Whistled, then pointed at the truck. She immediately went after the robot and did something that wouldn't have occured to me, an allegedly more intelligent being: the robot is roughly triangular, and when it hits an obstacle, will change direction so that one of its other sides (rather than points) is now the 'front'. So to get it to move in a straight line in the direction she wanted, Arwen

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