what do you think of this article "do dogs think"

i found it interesting
http://slate.msn.com/id/2127419/?GT1=7125

 

EXCELLENT!

I particulalry liked these 2 paragraphs.
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"I don't believe that dogs act out of spite or that they can plot retribution, though countless dog owners swear otherwise. To punish or deceive requires the perpetrator to understand that his victim or object has a particular point of view and to consciously work to manipulate or thwart it. That requires mental processes dogs don't have.

The more I've moved away from interpreting my dogs' behavior as nearly human, the easier it is to train them, and the less guilt and anxiety I feel."
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If everyone fully understood the definition of anthroporphism it would save a lot of upset, frustration, anger for the owner and even save some dogs lives....

As my mentor told me many years ago...."if it looks like a dog, walks like a dog and barks like a dog....its probably not a human".

 

Good article! The only thing I didn't agree with was that he said dogs don't have a sense of time. Dogs learn very quickly at what time certain things happen. One of the cautions when training a new behavior is to always vary the time you make the dog wait for the reward (assuming you are training something that requires a duration). This is because if you always ask the dog to "stay" (for example) for exactly 2 minutes, the dog will think the exercise is over after two minutes, no matter what you really want. And I think they come to know by your preparations when you leave them about how long you will be gone. Such as, "when mommy takes that bag with her, she is gone until dinnertime" or "when daddy puts on those special shoes, he will be back sooner" or something like that.

 

My understanding of dogs not having a sense of time is that they cant tell the difference between being left alone for an or 3. Can they tell the difference between being left an hour or 8 then yes but not in the way that we think of time.
For example a dog can usually go for an hour or 3 without needing to eliminate, he may sleep during this time, probably does for the most part but after about 6 hours he may need to eliminate and wakes up, gets restless, doesnt mean that he is going to have an accident in the house but now hes awake and is used to someone being there 'at the time he needs to go'....so then some anxiety can result, some dogs will just go back to sleep others having been in a routine of having someone there to let him outside when he needs to go may become destructive.
There could also be outside stimuli, could be that the dog is used to hearing the neighbours come home from work at specific times during the day, as a rule the owner is home at that time....suddenly theres no one home when the neighbours car pulls up. Could be kids coming home from school, someone else walking their dog at set times....anything like this, its not the time of day that the dog recognizes though its the action that it responds to, even though we usually wouldnt notice it, dogs do so when you have a routine and suddenly it changes....anything could happen. Change in routine is the first thing we look for when someone complains that a dog has suddenly had a change in behaviour....we usually just look at our own routines though like a new baby in the house, moving house, visitors staying, a new puppy....we dont think about anything outside what effects us personally...like a neighbour pulling up in their driveway but that in itself could be the trigger for a dog suddenly left alone at that time of the day to alter its own behaviour.

My dog, Krissie, I spend most of the day in the office, at 6pm I watch a soap opera (weekdays), as soon as the music comes on Krissie starts pacing back and forth until I come into the living room, if the TV is on a different channel she doesnt, she has no concept of time as we think of it, she knows its close to dinner time, shes fed every 12 hours and her body has got used to that but thats her natural 'internal clock'.
Hubby thinks she can tell the time....she cant but the music is the stimulus (Pavlovs theory.....works every time).

just my opinion.

 

When Buffy hears our cash register z out at the end of the day she KNOWS its time to go home and she will start barking and making all kinds of noise so we dont forget her. Like I would EVER forget my pups!!

 

and every morning when Jake hears the ding of the microwave he runs to his spot where feed him, any other time he does not respon to the ding

Delauk I understand what you are trying to say about the routine vs time, but what about this example. my parents dog every day at exactly 4m begs for her treats is sense of time or routine.? sure its routine because she gets them every day, but at that same time? how does she know that?

 

I have seen some of what you are saying, DeLaUK. For instance, my dogs are more likely to be destructive if we leave them at a time when someone is usually home.

On the other hand, I actually try to NOT have a routine. Our family is very chaotic. I purposely do not feed the dogs at the exact same time every day, so that they don't come begging at that time.

I know Nala follows cues. If it is dark and the TV turns off, she is out of her chair in a flash and ready to go outside to pee and then go to bed. If the TV stays on but I say "Okay" in a certain way or say "I am going to bed" or some variation on that - same reaction.

I don't see Bonnie react as much to cues like that. She's more likely to just follow me around, but not anticipate where I am going if that makes sense.

 

I think what the article was attempting to explain is that dogs, like other animals, are not aware of the concept of time in the same way humans are.

All animals, humans included, have certain innate biological time sensitive functions. For example, humans, being most active during the day, experience a rise in blood pressure, as well as changes in blood sugar, heart rate, etc, during daylight hours. Our blood pressure is at it's lowest around 4 in the morning.

Dogs also go through certain biological changes at specific times of the day, and those changes have an effect on behavior. Some changes can be manipulated artificially. Like animals that are fed every day at a certain time will experience changes in blood sugar and blood pressure as that time approaches. And their behavior changes in accordance. If a dog recieves a treat every day at 4 pm, their body becomes conditioned to that, and as 4 pm approaches the body prepares to process the food it expects to recieve. The dog feels hunger, he starts to salivate, his pancreas prepares to produce the enzymes needed for digestion and the insulin needed for the body to process glucose. It's a conditioned response...remember Pavlov.

This is not the same as being aware of time as a concept. Just as dogs are not self aware...they don't recognize themselves in a mirror, don't contemplate the universe, the meaning of life, or their own mortality...they don't understand the concept of time or it's passage. That's a human concept.

 

intersting Shine, on animal planet had a show on this week-end called "can animals tell time" and went along with various animals and kind of like like what you said, its a learned behaviour and the body adapts to that in various ways.