Posted on 11/24/2016 9:28:45 AM PST by MtnClimber
Once again, science has confirmed the suspicions of dog-owners that their beloved pets know more than they are letting on. In this case, it has to do with memory, a favorite subject of researchers who study the mental abilities of other animals.
No one doubts that dogs can be trained to remember commands and names of objects. They also remember people and places. But Claudia Fugazza and her colleagues at the Family Dog Project at Eotvos Lorand University in Budapest set out to see whether dogs share a more complex kind of memory.
In people it is called episodic memory, and it involves a sense of self. In animals, its called episodic-like memory, because its difficult to try to plumb something as elusive as self without the aid of language.
All attempts to understand thinking and memory in nonverbal animals are difficult, and Dr. Fugazza, Adam Miklosi and Akos Pogany developed a technique that depends on something called Do-as-I-do training, which itself is pretty amazing.
In this training, dogs learn to imitate any action the trainer takes. First the trainer does something like touch an open umbrella with his hand. Then he says, Do it. Then the dog taps the umbrella with its paw assuming the training is going well.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
It makes you think about all the things we say...so glad our dogs cannot talk! Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours.
Sammie, Sherlock and Sophie said to say, "Blah blah blah, Gus. Blah blah."
lol
Dog Poetry
A Dogs Soul
Every dog must have a soul, somewhere deep inside
Where all his hurts and grievances are buried with his pride.
Where he decides the good and bad, the wrong way from the right,
And where his judgement carefully is hidden from our sight.
A dog must have a secret place, where every thought abides,
A sort of close acquaintance that he trusts in and confides.
And when accused unjustly for himself, He cannot speak,
Rebuked, He finds within his soul, the comfort he must seek.
He’ll love, tho’he is unloved, and he’ll serve tho’badly used,
And one kind word will wipe away the times when he’s abused.
Altho’ his heart may break in two, his love will still be whole,
Because God gave to every dog an understanding Soul!
Unknown
-And THAT is why I have too many dogs...
Anything involving deer or hunting I post the "Bummer of a birthmark, Hal", cartoon.
Anything involving cats I post the "Tricks dogs play on cats" cartoon.
Anything involving goldfish I post the "Whew, that was close. 'Course, now we're equally screwed cartoon".
And whenever Baraq Obama talks about jobs or working I post the "Why do we need jobs?" cartoon.
My dogs were smarter than me, and I’m not a liberal. LOL
“My dogs are smarter than liberals!”
They also have more principles than a significant percentage of humanity.
I was telling someone recently about something that happened to me when I was in probably second grade elementary school. My dog was pregnant, and my mom made a nice bed in the basement (a warm basement - decent environment) of our small house in a city neighborhood. I used to come home from school and enter from the door to the basement, and when I did, I saw a puppy, covered in the wetness of recent birth, on the floor next to the stairs leading up from the basement.
My father was home (he worked nights) and I told him that our dog had one of our puppies in the basement. He said, go look in your bedroom. When I did, my dog was on the bed, nursing 4 puppies, and there was a big stain on my bed from the birth. My father then took her to the basement and showed her the other puppy, that she licked, and then carried upstairs to my bedroom (she must have panicked when she had the first puppy, and ran upstairs to have the rest). That puppy was the runt of the litter initially, but became the most energetic of all with time. They all wound up in good homes, and I wound up with new bedding.
Yes they are thankful.Everytime our two dogs look at us,it’s with a soft loving,grateful stare.They were both rescues that would have died without intervention.
Thanks for posting that.
My female mini-dachshund is very smart and very commutative. She has a whole range of modulated barks, whimpers, snarls, whines, yips, facial and ear movements that she draws on when she is trying to get her point across. Her physical and facial reactions to you the human not quite “getting it!” are hilarious. It’s the look of, “Can these two legged creatures really be this dumb? “. As she has gotten older she has become the “Grand Duchess “ of the house. She has her “spot on the couch” and there is a protocol about her spot. She has to get on the couch first or she sits in front of you and “complains” using all her communication skills. I have to shoo the other dogs off. They’re oblivious to the protocol violation. She gets on then either myself & the other dogs. She doesn’t care about the order. She is the smallest dachshund we have ever had but by far the most “dachshund-any”. She also doesn’t like you to pick her up until she decides its “ok”! She is very friendly with kids, people ,etc but always on her terms.
LOL!!!:)
Did you have a border collie?
Well, duuuuh! Wasted time and money on something that's a plain as the nose on her face.
Yes. Have you ever taken in a stray or abused dog?
My old dog held herself and others above rude behavior and crassness.
Our older group of cats are very smart and can carry on the longest conversations. They are constantly coming in telling me about their great adventures or something. They understand us but we’re too dumb to understand them.
When they were first introduced to their collars, I told them they don’t belong to a family without collars. They have only lost one collar. Whenever they get one off, they pick up and carry to me or leave it where they know I’ll see it - on the bed, on my desk or in the living room. This last collar that was lost, a neighbor found it immediately and called so don’t know if he’d have brought it home if there was time.
Too bad they can’t seem to catch on that I don’t need to be shown their trophies. We walked in after coming in from Thanksgiving dinner a little while ago and they had a 2 foot long snake in the living room!
Our Boston is physic ...
Pavlov did the classic experiment years ago proving dogs have memories.
Spelling out W-A-L-K or P-A-R-K gets an instant response from the dog like she knows what we are talking about.
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