Dogs will follow humans everywhere. Its in the social contract they entered into when they stopped being Wolves.
Cats on the other hand will only go where they please to go. And without mice to eat there is no reason for them to go into space.
As a side note, think about how many cats you see riding in pick-ups with their masters with their heads around the cab or out the window 🙂
Boss? Boss? Something ain’t right here, boss. Help?
You’ve featured that dog video before but I can watch it over and over.
I think cats actually will adapt better. I once knew a guy that had a training regimen to calm his house cat down. The cat hated water so he put him in the toilet, closed the lid and spent the day flushing.
You could twist this cat into a pretzel, hold him up by one hand in the air and he would calmly stay that way until you put him down. In other respect he was a normal cat (that found out that making a pouncing attack on a small prickly pear cactus was a really bad idea.) Removing needles from the inside of his mouth was no fun for either party.
Cats litter stinks. Dogs will hold it until reaching the designate poop area with an amazing level of self control but they need a designated pooper scooper, not themselves, to finish the job.
Mice will find a way.
Allen Steele’s Orbital Decay had a number of cats on the GEO station. Originally brought up to combat the mice but quickly becoming pets of the “beam jacks”.
Anyway, I have to go back to giggling and wondering how those airmen didn’t lose an eye.
Was it in Heinlein’s “Waldo” that the parakeet did amazingly well in Zero G?
I wish there was longer footage of both the cats and dogs to see if they started to get the hang of it. I would think cats would eventually become quite adept at orientation, the rotating tail and all…
Kittens raised and frolicking in zero-g would be worth watching.
Kittens raised and frolicking in zero-g would be worth watching.
The link for Kennedy didn’t work can you repost it?
———–
Dogs have a master, cats have a staff.
Bennett,
Arthur Clarke’s Island in the Sky had a canary that did very well in the station.
Tom
LOL. That’s pure entertainment with the cats!
There’s an old Jerry Pournelle essay where he described a similar effort in the 1960’s in a *fighter*. I think the conclusion was that cats do not like freefall and think people are the objects to cling to….
Cats are explorers. Start them as a kitten on the I.S.S. and they would find every hidey-hole in the place. I think they would adapt well. I could be wrong. Terribly wrong. SF horror wrong.
Now I remember, Sigourney Weaver had a cat in the first Alien movie.
Ken, AND gravity.
Cats are explorers. Start them as a kitten on the I.S.S. and they would find every hidey-hole in the place. I think they would adapt well.
NASA has had enough trouble with zero gravity toilets for humans. I shudder to think of the difficulty and cost of making a zero gravity litter box.
I could be wrong. Terribly wrong. SF horror wrong.
Cats are vindictive and hold grudges. Never, ever forget that.
What’s needed for space is genetically modified cats. Circumferentially equally spaced legs, say. Or a tendency to gas and directional vanes located near the, um, exhaust nozzle.
That’s why space needs dogs, not cats.
Dogs will follow humans everywhere. Its in the social contract they entered into when they stopped being Wolves.
Cats on the other hand will only go where they please to go. And without mice to eat there is no reason for them to go into space.
As a side note, think about how many cats you see riding in pick-ups with their masters with their heads around the cab or out the window 🙂
Boss? Boss? Something ain’t right here, boss. Help?
You’ve featured that dog video before but I can watch it over and over.
I think cats actually will adapt better. I once knew a guy that had a training regimen to calm his house cat down. The cat hated water so he put him in the toilet, closed the lid and spent the day flushing.
You could twist this cat into a pretzel, hold him up by one hand in the air and he would calmly stay that way until you put him down. In other respect he was a normal cat (that found out that making a pouncing attack on a small prickly pear cactus was a really bad idea.) Removing needles from the inside of his mouth was no fun for either party.
Cats litter stinks. Dogs will hold it until reaching the designate poop area with an amazing level of self control but they need a designated pooper scooper, not themselves, to finish the job.
Mice will find a way.
Allen Steele’s Orbital Decay had a number of cats on the GEO station. Originally brought up to combat the mice but quickly becoming pets of the “beam jacks”.
Anyway, I have to go back to giggling and wondering how those airmen didn’t lose an eye.
Was it in Heinlein’s “Waldo” that the parakeet did amazingly well in Zero G?
I wish there was longer footage of both the cats and dogs to see if they started to get the hang of it. I would think cats would eventually become quite adept at orientation, the rotating tail and all…
Kittens raised and frolicking in zero-g would be worth watching.
Kittens raised and frolicking in zero-g would be worth watching.
That would be worth paying to watch.
OT: Rand I read your article at
http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/in-search-of-a-conservative-space-policy
The link for Kennedy didn’t work can you repost it?
———–
Dogs have a master, cats have a staff.
Bennett,
Arthur Clarke’s Island in the Sky had a canary that did very well in the station.
Tom
LOL. That’s pure entertainment with the cats!
There’s an old Jerry Pournelle essay where he described a similar effort in the 1960’s in a *fighter*. I think the conclusion was that cats do not like freefall and think people are the objects to cling to….
Cats are explorers. Start them as a kitten on the I.S.S. and they would find every hidey-hole in the place. I think they would adapt well. I could be wrong. Terribly wrong. SF horror wrong.
Now I remember, Sigourney Weaver had a cat in the first Alien movie.
Ken, AND gravity.
Cats are explorers. Start them as a kitten on the I.S.S. and they would find every hidey-hole in the place. I think they would adapt well.
NASA has had enough trouble with zero gravity toilets for humans. I shudder to think of the difficulty and cost of making a zero gravity litter box.
I could be wrong. Terribly wrong. SF horror wrong.
Cats are vindictive and hold grudges. Never, ever forget that.
What’s needed for space is genetically modified cats. Circumferentially equally spaced legs, say. Or a tendency to gas and directional vanes located near the, um, exhaust nozzle.
Cats will adapt to zero-g.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kzin
Ken, AND gravity.
Only because Bigelow hadn’t put his green screen sound stage in orbit yet.
Cat’s do amazing things in gravity. I’ve seen feral cats run across a ceiling.
Put a laser pointer at the opposite end of a habitat and you’ll see cats jump the whole distance and hit the mark purrrfectly.
Can’t wait to see the first movie filmed entirely in orbit.
Kittens raised and frolicking in zero-g would be worth watching.
That would be worth paying to watch.
Hmm. Pay-per-view webcams. Could raise a lot of money that way. Might be a viable business model.
Paging Mr. Bigelow…
Don’t forget this highly evolved version of future cat…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cat_%28Red_Dwarf%29
Other animals? Birds of course (what a mess! and the screeching!) Ferrets? They would seem to have the right body design for ballistic motion.
A lungfish? Would that be interesting to see float into view during a live telecast?
…and the poor turtle. Always floating and dependent on others to bring food close enough to reach.