神奇的汪星人能感知到的10件事(下)

er

5.癌症

A dog's highly sensitive nose can tell it a lot about the people it meets. Medical studies show that dogs can detect at least some kinds of cancer in humans.

狗狗高度靈敏的鼻子能夠分辨出許多和人類有關的東西。藥物研究顯示狗狗能偵測到幾種人類的癌症。

Properly trained dogs can detect lung cancer and breast cancer simply by sniffing a person's breath. Dogs have been documented being able to sniff a skin lesion and tell whether it's a skin cancer melanoma. The dogs are detecting changes in the skin chemistry where the lesions occur. With patients suffering lung and breast cancers, the dogs smell biochemical markers in their breath. Scientists explain that cancer cells give off different waste products than do other cells, and to a dog's keen nose, those products have a noticeable smell. At their 2014 annual meeting, members of the American Urological Association heard the results of a study that found that trained dogs are 98 percent accurate at detecting prostate cancer by smelling urine samples. Dogs also are being used to detect ovarian cancer by smelling "volatile organic compounds". Does this mean that the next time you go for a physical, your doctor is likely to have you screened by a dog? Probably not. But since early detection can be so crucial in surviving cancer, scientists continue to study dogs' ability to sniff out cancer. How does this gift work? How extensive is it? Can it be duplicated with medical instruments? Research in this area is ongoing.

受過適當訓練的狗狗僅僅通過嗅一個人的呼吸就可以檢測出他是否患有肺癌和乳腺癌。已經有文件記錄狗狗能夠通過嗅皮膚的損傷來判斷是否存在癌變的黑色素瘤。狗狗可以偵測到損傷處皮膚中化學物質的變化。患肺癌和乳腺癌的病人，狗狗可以聞得到他們呼吸中的生化標誌物。科學家解釋稱癌細胞會釋放與其他細胞不同的污染物質，而對狗狗靈敏的鼻子來說，這些物質有明顯的氣味。2014年的年度會議上，美國泌尿外科學會的成員瞭解到一項研究結果，經訓練的狗狗對尿液樣本的檢測準確率爲98％。狗狗也會通過嗅“揮發性有機化合物”，以檢測卵巢癌。這是不是意味着下次你去體檢的時候，你的醫生極有可能讓狗狗來對你做檢查？也許不會。由於早期偵測對癌症存活十分重要，科學家們會繼續研究狗狗嗅出癌症的能力。這個天賦是如何工作的?它的範圍有多廣?是否能夠被複制到醫療器械中?醫學上對這個領域的研究仍然在進行中。

ures

4.癲癇

Many people with epilepsy and other conditions rely on seizure-response dogs. Trained as service dogs, these dogs can alert parents when a child has a seizure. They might use a call button or special phone to call for help. They can guard a person having a seizure, protecting the person from injury and even removing objects that might cause harm. They might roll the person into a position in which he or she can breathe.

許多患有癲癇或是其他疾病的人們都很依賴防癲癇犬。防癲癇犬屬於服務犬的一種，可以在小孩癲癇發作時通知其父母。它們能通過通話按鈕或是特殊的電話裝置來進行呼救；也可以監護患有癲癇的病人，移除可能給病人造成傷害的物體，保護他們不受傷害，甚至還可以將病人調整成側躺姿勢，保持呼吸暢通。

Some dogs take dealing with seizures a big step further, by sensing when a seizure is about to occur and warning the person, as much as 10 or 20 minutes before the seizure. Estimates are that 10 to 15 per cent of trained dogs can sense when a seizure is about to happen. Sometimes, a dog becomes able to detect an oncoming seizure after having lived with a person as a seizure-response dog for several months. Scientists aren't sure what the dogs sense. One theory is that a person about to have a seizure has changes in blood or other body chemistry that a dog's highly sensitive nose can smell. A dog might sense a sudden spike in temperature that precedes a stroke. Another theory is that a dog's detail-oriented vision can detect small changes in the person's movements, changes that humans – even the person about to have the seizure – does not notice. However it works, the dog's warning can alert the person in time to get to a safe place, take medication and/or let others know that he or she might soon need help.

有些防癲癇犬能做的更好，它們能在主人發病前10至20分鐘對其做出警告。據估計，經過訓練後有10%至15%的狗狗可以覺察突發癲癇。在與主人生活幾個月後，防癲癇犬能預警主人癲癇發作。科學家們還不能確定這些狗狗是通過什麼預測到險情的。有人推測是病人即將發病時體內的血液或是其他的化學物質發生了某種改變，而狗狗靈敏的鼻子可以感覺到細微的變化。比如狗狗可能在主人中風前感知到了主人體表溫度的驟然上升來推斷出險情。另一種推測是狗狗對視線中的細節較爲敏感，可以感知病人發作前行爲的微小變化，而這些變化病人自己都注意不到。不過，狗狗的警告確實奏效了，它們總是能保護主人及時到達安全的地點，提醒他們服用藥物或是告知他人，患者需要救助。

n Fear

3.人類的恐懼

"Don't let the dog know you're afraid," most of us were warned as children. The idea was that if the dog knew we were afraid, it would take advantage of our fear by becoming more aggressive.

“千萬不要讓狗感覺到你的恐懼”——很多人小時候都被這樣告知過。意思是說如果狗感覺到了你的恐懼，它會利用你的恐懼心理，變得更加好鬥。

But is it true that dogs can sense fear? The answer is yes, if you don't get too literal. As far as anyone knows, dogs don't have eerie supernatural powers. There's a scientific explanation for most of the amazing things dogs can sense. Often, that explanation has to do with the dog's nose, its No. 1 way of understanding the world. Dogs have many more scent receptors in their noses than humans do, and their receptors are sensitive to more smells. Some estimates are that dogs' sense of smell is millions of times keener than ours. So, a dog may not read your mind and think fear, but it can smell what happens in your body when you're afraid. Humans sweat when we're stressed. And if we're frightened, our bodies release adrenaline. Our blood starts pumping faster, and we emit pheromones, or chemical molecules that float through the air. Dogs can smell all these fear-triggered human responses. Dogs' eyes are a secondary sense for them. Because they don't depend upon their eyes for their primary understanding of the world, they pay more attention to individual details than humans do, rather than processing an entire scene. That means that they detect small signals — facial expressions, tensing, varied gait — that tell them we are afraid. If you're afraid, a dog will know through smells and visual hints. Whether that means the dog will become aggressive depends upon the dog and the situation.

但是狗真的能感知到我們的恐懼嗎？如果你不過分追究字面意思的話，答案便是肯定的。我們都知道，狗沒有超能力。人們對於狗的靈敏感知能力給出了科學的解釋：一般來說，這與狗的鼻子有關，鼻子是狗感知世界的首要方式。和人類相比，狗的鼻子裏有很多嗅覺感受器，這些感受器對許多氣味都很敏感。據估計，狗的嗅覺能力比人類靈敏幾百萬倍。所以說，狗不會讀心術也不會體會到你的恐懼，但是它能夠通過鼻子覺察到你體內的物質變化。人在緊張時會出汗；恐慌時，體內會釋放腎上腺素，我們的心臟加速跳動時會釋放出費洛蒙激素或是化學微粒，它們會漂浮在空中。狗可嗅到所有人體因恐懼而生的物質。狗的眼睛是第二感知來源。因爲它們不將眼睛作爲基本的感知世界手段，所以相比於人類，它們更關注個體細節而不是全局狀況。這意味着它們能夠察覺到面部表情，肌肉緊縮，步態變化等能夠暗示我們恐懼心理的細節。如果你害怕了，狗會通過氣味與視覺感知到。這是否意味着狗會變得有侵略性則要看其類型和所處環境了。

n Sadness

2.人類的悲傷

Anyone who's had a canine best friend knows that dogs are attuned to human emotions. If you're sad, your dog will put its head on your knee or snuggle up. It might whine and give you a friendly lick.

愛狗人士都知道汪星人和人類心靈相通、感情相系。當你傷心的時候，狗狗會過來依偎在你身旁或者把頭放在你膝蓋上，給予你最溫暖的陪伴；亦或是傷心地哀鳴、友好地舔着你，似乎在舔舐你受傷的心靈。

Dogs also seem to sense emotions in people they don't know. Take a dog into a nursing home or children's hospital, and it will find those who need cheering up. Is there a biological explanation for dogs' ability to read human emotions, or is the empathy a natural result of how closely dogs and humans live these days? The answer is a combination of the two. The relatively new field of canine neuroscience investigates the workings of a dog's brain. In February 2014, the results of a study by a team of Hungarian researchers were published in the journal Current Biology and reported in popular news media. Using fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging), the scientists found that dogs' brains have a small part dedicated to detecting emotions in the voices of humans and other dogs. Humans have a similar brain part that enables them to sense emotions from human sounds, regardless of words. Their findings led the scientists to believe that dogs can tell by the sound of a voice when a person is sad. (There's a fascinating side story about how the scientists got 11 dogs to enter a scanner and stay still.) Is there more to the story than detecting the sounds of voices? Probably so. In 2004, a Harvard scientists said that his research showed that over the centuries of living closely with and depending upon humans, dogs have adapted genetically, developing a keen ability to read human emotions and intentions. Whatever the explanation, there's nothing like a sympathetic pooch to lift the spirits.

狗狗們似乎還能感受到連人們自己都沒意識到的情感。比如，把一隻狗帶進養老院或是兒童醫院，它會發現那些需要安慰的人們。汪星人能夠讀懂人類的情感，是生物學原因，還是因爲狗狗和人類長期親密地生活在一起所產生的自然共情結果呢？答案是兩者兼具。犬科動物神經科學的較新領域調查了狗腦的運作方式。2014年2月，《當代生物學》雜誌報道了匈牙利的一個研究小組的研究成果，各大知名媒體也報道了這則消息。科學家們利用功能性磁共振成像技術，發現狗的大腦裏有一小部分系統專門負責從人類和其他狗狗的聲音中感知情感。人類大腦裏也有一小部分類似的神經，儘管沒有話語的溝通，但其單憑人們的聲音便可感知到情感。根據這個發現，科學家們深信，狗狗是通過辨別人類的聲音來判斷他們是否傷心難過。（另外，想知道科學家們是如何把11只狗放進掃描儀，並讓它們保持不動的嗎？有一則有趣的花絮新聞專門報道了此事，在此就不贅述了。）汪星人除了通過人類聲音來感知人類情感，還有其他原因讓它們如此靈性。2004年，一位哈佛大學的科學家發現，狗狗和人類在幾個世紀的親密接觸中，已經對人類有依賴性。它們的基因潛移默化地發生了改變並開始適應人類，與此同時，它們也發展出了一種能讀懂人類情感和意圖的強大能力。不管是什麼原因讓汪星人有這樣的能力，當你傷心痛苦的時候，沒有什麼比一隻狗狗更能幫你療傷啦。

on the Way

1.寶寶即將出生

Can a dog sense when a woman is about to go into labor?

女性即將分娩時，狗狗是否能夠覺察到呢？

Without a doubt, dogs can tell when a woman is pregnant, partly because they can smell changes in the woman's body as her hormones shift. Later in pregnancy, a dog will sense changes in the way a woman moves, as well as changes in her emotions. If a dog is around when the woman's water breaks, it will be able to smell the amniotic fluid. If a dog is present when a woman is in labor, it will surely be aware of whatever she's doing and saying. Those are all fairly obvious. But will a dog know when labor is about to start, before it actually does? Many women say their dog could tell. Visit the comments section on websites for expectant moms, and you'll see plenty of testimonials about how Buster got protective or anxious hours before his mistress went into labor. The answer may simply be that because dogs live so closely with their humans, a dog can sense emotional changes when a woman's labor is about to start. Also, dogs, with their keen attention to visual clues, may sense subtle physical movements that the woman may not be aware of. Some people suspect that the anecdotes have more to do with a woman recalling what happened shortly before she went into labor, much as we recall where we were or what was happening when we learned dramatic news. But who knows? Some dogs can tell when a person with diabetes is about to have a serious drop in blood sugar, or when a person is about to have a seizure. Is it far-fetched to think there might be some small physical change in a woman hours before labor beings, something that humans can't detect but dogs can?

毫無疑問，汪星人之所以能夠判斷一個女人是否懷孕，有一部分原因是由於它們能夠嗅出女性體內隨着荷爾蒙分泌所發生的變化。汪星人也能夠感覺到懷孕後女性行爲和情緒上的變化。如果有狗狗在場，它不僅能夠嗅出女性羊膜破裂時流出來的羊水味道，而且也一定能夠料到女性分娩時會說什麼做什麼。以上那些都是相當明顯的事實。但是，當真正分娩到來之前，狗狗們是否也能感覺到呢？許多女性都稱，她們的狗狗能預料到寶寶即將出生。看看準媽媽們在網站上的評論，你就會發現有許多留言都是關於她們分娩前，家裏的那隻小傢伙是怎麼對女主人關切保護，又是怎麼焦慮地度過那幾個小時的。狗狗有這樣的能力，其原因可能是它們長期與主人生活在一起，當女主人即將分娩時，它們能夠感受到她們的情緒變化；不僅如此，狗狗利用其強大的視覺能力，也能夠察覺到女主人肢體行動上的細微變化，而這些變化也許連她們自己都沒意識到。但有人質疑道，發生這樣的趣聞軼事，大多是一個女人在其分娩前那段時間的遐思罷了，這非常像我們回想那些激動人心的消息時，總會想到那時候我們在哪裏，發生了什麼。但又有誰知道這些趣聞軼事不是真的呢？一些狗狗確實能夠預料到糖尿病患者血糖驟降，或者癲癇患者突發癲癇。那麼，狗狗能夠通過女性身體微變化而覺察其即將分娩（人類很難做到）的理論難道只是牽強附會？

審校：哎呀 編輯：JK 來源：前十網