Monday, March 28, 2005

The Chester-test

I’ve been thinking about experimentation and “proofs” lately and I’m reminded about my Cairn terrier, Chester. Chester has a warped sense-of-humor, and he has a behavior that is 100% reliable and reproducible.



People approach Chester and say something like “What a cute doggie”, and Chester rolls-over on his back, begging to be picked-up. Right when you get him chest-high, Chester cuts-loose with a stream of urine and soaks you. For some reason, he enjoy's people's reaction to his trick.

This empirical experiment is 100% reproducible (Chester is great fun at cocktail parties), and he has never failed once. So, does this prove anything?

Can I conclude from by experiment that all Cairn terriers do this? No. Can I conclude anything at all? Yes.

I can derive the rule-of-thumb that “It may not be a good idea to pick-up a male dog, lying on his back”. This rule-of-thumb is not always true, of course, but it IS VALID, and it has kept me dry on many occasions.

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1 comment:

  1. David Aldridge12:16 PM

    It's the same thing with baby boys, I've found. With all three of mine, when you unwrapped them down below there's something about it that triggers a sudden release, leading to many an unexpected shirt changing/carpet mopping.

    Rule-of-thumb: when changing a baby boy, and finding that the diaper is dry after it's been on for more than four hours, DUCK!

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