Dog Life

Some people dismiss the idea that dogs can do the most rudimentary type of quantitative reasoning, such as determining which of two plates contains more kibble. Early researchers claimed that dogs couldn’t discriminate between a plate with three and another with eight kibbles. The studies demonstrating this, however, were flawed, since the dogs’ strategy turned out to be simply “Grab the food from the closest plate.” More careful studies have used pairs of panels, each of which had dots painted on it. Dogs were trained to always press the panel with the largest (or smallest) number of dots. The training was slow but the dogs did learn this task.

The history of animals as artistic subject matter goes as far back as the bison paintings in the Lascaux caves in Dordogne, France. Artist Wendy Grossman notes, “[Since] the dog has shared its life with humans, from prehistoric times to now, they have been depicted in carvings and paintings in early Egyptian, Greek, Mesopotamian and Roman art.”

Paris Hilton has undeniable star power, the paparazzi hound her every step, feeding the public's apparently insatiable appetite for even the smallest scrap of news or gossip about the leggy blonde heiress to the Hilton fortune. The Fox television network capitalized brilliantly on Paris's privileged socialite status in the reality show The Simple Life, which followed Paris and her best friend, Nicole Ritchie, as they temporarily exited their rarefied sphere of wealth to experience life with an ordinary farming family in small-town Arkansas.

Of the many gifts dogs bestow upon mankind, their ability to put smiles on our faces, even in the most difficult of times, is surely one of the greatest. Our dogs captivate and delight us with their quirks, their antics and their seemingly limitless capacity for joy. But as any dog owner knows, photographing those wonderful qualities and unique moments that make our canine companions so special is most often impossible. By the time we get the camera out, the moment is gone-and despite our best efforts to position, bribe and cajole, we are unable to recreate that spontaneous magic.

Ever since she catapulted to international stardom via Baywatch, Pamela Anderson has been one of the world's most watched and talked-about people. Plug her name into an internet search engine and you will come up with over two million sites discussing every available detail of Pam's life-and there have been plenty of details available. We've all heard the stories about her romantic entanglements, her plastic surgeries, and of course, those infamous home videos.

If you ever  call artist Matt Rinard at his home in New Orleans, be prepared for occasional interruptions from the Antichrist. "That's my Miniature Schnauzer, Lucy," Rinard explains, when an impossibly high, growling squeal breaks out in the background. "She's possessed by the Devil."

From the very beginning, Glenn Gould was different.  Separate, unique, a child prodigy unlike any other, he began piano lessons with his mother at age three, having already demonstrated perfect pitch. Signs of his musical faculties surfaced even earlier. "When Glenn was three days old his fingers never stopped moving," recalled his father, Bert. "His arms would be swinging back and forth, his fingers going ... and the doctor said, ‘That boy is going to be either a physician or a pianist.'"