Huizenaas Jokes

(CIM) The Netherlands: Doctor Huizenaas of the Rotterdam Animal Research Institute has successfully trained a cat not to eat food. His research followed an unsuccessful attempt by Professor Egon Spuunrais to achieve this same goal.
Prof Spuunrais' failed experiment was based on the use of positive reinforcement. The cat was shown food, and if it refused to eat it, the animal was rewarded by a tasty tidbit. His conclusions were widely ridiculed, predominantly for the absence of a control.
Dr Huizenaas formulated a more rigorous test based on negative reinforcement, and including a control animal which did not receive the punishment.
In the Huizenaas experiment, whenever the test animal accepted food it was struck on the head by a small steel mallet. At first, the cat's behaviour was unaffected by this, but after some adjustments to the force of the blow, it was observed that the cat became progressively less interested in the food and indeed was often seen to shake its more...