By Pamela Powers Menomonie News Bureau
Mar 25, 2012
Hope College mathematics professor Tim Pennings tosses a tennis ball at UW-Stout Jarvis Hall to show how his Welsh corgi, Elvis, acts out the solution to a calculus problem. Hope College, Mich., math professor Tim Pennings and UW-Stout students watch as Penning’s Welsh corgi, Elvis, chases a tennis ball down a hallway in Jarvis Hall on the UW-Stout campus in Menomonie. Elvis takes the most efficient route to track down the ball, innately acting according to the laws of calculus.
MENOMONIE – Tim Pennings was playing a simple game of fetch with his dog Elvis in 2003 when it dawned on him: The Welsh corgi was acting out the solution to a calculus problem.
When Pennings, a math professor at Hope College in Holland, Mich., threw the ball at an angle into the surf at the beach, he noticed Elvis did not swim in a direct line to the ball.
Instead, because a dog can run faster than it can swim, Elvis ran along the beach for a certain distance before plunging into the water and swimming to the ball.
Using a calculus formula, Pennings determined the exact spot on the beach where Elvis should have jumped into the water to minimize the time it took him to retrieve the ball.
Elvis instinctively knew where that spot was, he said.
“When I saw this, it gave me goose bumps,” Pennings told a math class at UW-Stout during a recent presentation.
Calculus is a branch of math employed to calculate rates of change. The discipline was developed by Isaac Newton in the 17th century to better understand the motion of planets.
Following up on Elvis’ initial ball retrieval, Pennings returned to the beach and clocked the dog’s running and swimming times. He tossed the ball into the water 35 times and measured both the distance to the ball and the distance Elvis covered on the beach before jumping into the water.
Pennings plugged the measurements into a formula to determine where Elvis should have jumped into the water to minimize retrieval time.
“He jumped in within about a foot of the optimal point every time,” Pennings said. “I am 99 percent certain Elvis is just doing this by intuition. He is one of the many examples of nature finding the optimal solution to problems.”
Pennings also threw the ball while both he and Elvis were in the water. The dog still returned to the shore and ran part of the way before entering the water and swimming to the ball, taking the most efficient route to the object.
“That was the point Elvis got an honorary doctorate degree from Hope College,” Pennings said.
For his help in the research, Elvis has appeared on television programs across the U.S., and his innate calculus expertise has been documented in articles around the world.
Pennings and Elvis are crisscrossing the country, speaking with college students to teach them the importance of mathematics and a liberal arts education.
Brittany Brody, a junior majoring in vocational rehabilitation, attended Pennings’ presentation.
“I thought it was really interesting,” she said, noting how impressed she was at Elvis’ ability to instinctually determine the shortest route to a ball.
Powers can be reached at 715-556-9018 or pamela.powers@ecpc.com.
Powers, Pamela. “Elvis the Welsh corgi shows calculus is a breeze.” Leader-Telegram, March 25, 2012, https://www.leadertelegram.com/archives/elvis-the-welsh-corgi-shows-calculus-is-a-breeze/article_57907359-30f3-502f-8cf1-da770e2acb43.html.