Posted on 09/03/2009 12:49:51 PM PDT by decimon
Wolves do better on some tests of logic than dogs, a new study found, revealing differences between the animals that scientists suspect result from dogs' domestication.
In experiments, dogs followed human cues to perform certain tasks despite evidence they could see suggesting a different strategy would be smarter, while wolves made the more logical choice based on their observations.
In fact, dogs' responses were similar to human infants, who also prioritize following the example of adult humans.
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
So when wolves go to socialism, they get dumber. Humans have the same results.
I believe AnAmericanMother had it last.
“The wolf is solving the “situational problem” at hand, while the dog is solving the “what does the Man want Me to do here?” problem.”
Yes, very well put.
There is no animal (chimps included) that outperforms dogs in understanding human gestures. I don’t think we actually bred this into dogs (fossils of wolves, wolf/dogs have been associated with humans for better than 100,000 years) but rather this is the result of a common natural process known as Mutualism that as you say rewards a species “with a long term survival edge”. IMO dogs are simply wolves occupying an ecological niche. The better they understand humans the better suited they are for the niche.
Or the Little Brown Lab.
I'm pretty sure HairOfTheDog passed it on to Joe 6-pack.
Retrievers are specifically BRED and TRAINED to follow human directions instead of their logic, in certain circumstances.
As a matter of fact, I was out today with our pro trainer and a couple of other retrieving club members doing what we call "De-Cheating Drills" which are designed to reinforce the dog's obedience to the handler in the face of what looks like an easier way.
We were working on water de-cheating today. Essentially, when you throw a bird or bumper across a small body of water, the dog looks at the situation and realizes that it's FASTER to run around the bank rather than swim through the water. But we want the retriever to take a straight line to and from the bird, even if it's slower.
So you throw a bumper down a long body of water and send the dog. The dog's natural inclination is to swim to the bank immediately and run back. If the dog goes to the bank, you stop him with a whistle, take him back to where he left the water, sit him, throw the bumper back to the straight line in the water, go back to the line, handle him with an "over" command back to the line, and whistle him on in.
Here's the kicker: we could not get either of my dogs to cheat, even when we threw the bumper 20 feet down the shoreline and only 3 feet from the bank. They KNOW that the water is where I want them. One of them is a show Lab that has had it trained into her, but the little one is from a high-up Field Trial line and she has NEVER cheated, always takes a straight line. It's bred into her.
Probably more information than you wanted, but I just got downstairs from washing off the pond slime.
I recall Joe having it but he passed it on.
I think I was confusing you with one of our other lovely Freeper ladies, USMCWife6869.
Maybe it was because your name was first on the ping list :)
Sometimes the “logical” thing is to do what the “boss” seems to want, even if your own observation is contradictory.
In this case the “boss” is the human.
The dog doesn’t want to be “fired”, and doing what the “boss” wants is almost always a better choice than doing what is correct based upon your own observations.
I had a golden retreiver that loved to splash into the water after a ball. When I decided it was time to leave the park and I wanted her to start drying off, I started throwing the ball NOT in the water. She would get the ball, look at me as if patiently teaching a child, then go to the water and lay down in it looking at me, then come give me the ball.
It was as if she was trying to train me “Throw the ball in the WATER!!!”.
They should have tested Border Collies...
I have an Australian Shepherd and a Border Collie. The Aussie is smart, but he wants to do exactly what I want him to do. The Border Collie is less obedient, but more goal oriented - he looks at the objective, then decides how he wants to achieve it.
In the Highlands, Border Collies are expected to get the job done while the shepherd may be out of sight, so independent reasoning is a good thing. In most American settings, the dogs are used in sight of the shepherd, so independent actions are considered bad.
That reminds me of when our little Blue Point Siamese mama cat toilet-trained her kittens by the lecture-demonstration method. Hilarious!
Now THAT is a good cat!
My dad worked with a guy in New Zealand whose family raised sheep with Australian Shepherds. The dogs were so well trained by instinct and the originally applied training that they didn't even train new pups or dogs; they did what the other dogs did - and that was to unlatch the gate and take the sheep out in the morning, keep them together, then take them back in at night and close the gate latch.
I wondered what the humans did other than feed the dogs and sheer the sheep. Didn't even have to be there to open the gate. That always impressed me.
Wolves are smarter than dogs? It’s about time they kill all the pitbulls.
my bad
Now, on the other hand, you have dogs that just don't GET the 'deference to the handler' idea. Flat-coat retrievers are the Henry David Thoreaus of the dog world -- they really do march to a different drummer although they are highly intelligent.
They are notorious water-cheaters/ bank runners. I was at a hunt test (AKC Junior test) and for some reason every Flat Coat owner for miles around showed up at that particular test. The Saturday water series was on this obnoxious little pond owned by a club member. It's shaped like a five or six-armed starfish, with the longest water distance along two arms maybe 50 yards max. Most convoluted shoreline you ever saw. The judges set up the two single marks from one of the little promontories or points between two of the starfish-arms, with the line of one just skirting the end of another point and on to the opposite shore - the line of the other from the starting point ('the line') straight up the middle of the water on another arm to the end.
There were maybe 12 Flat Coats entered in the test -- and EVERY SINGLE ONE ran the ENTIRE bank, all the way to the left around the ends of two channels, and then all the way to the right around the ends of three channels to the second mark. They're not supposed to flunk a Junior dog for bank running, but this just got ridiculous and by the end of the series even the Flat Coat owners had to laugh.
The judge remarked to one as she left the line a little crestfallen: "I don't know what you're complaining about. All your pain is self-inflicted."
Of course my little Chocolate Lab swam straight out, waded through the water over the second point, swam straight back, then swam up and back the channel. Her first goal is to please Her Human, not to follow that distant drum . . . . my little Black Lab had DQ'd that morning when she stepped in a hole and dropped her duck . . . . < sniff >
My Chocolate Lab likes to herd -- she was an agility dog before she was a hunt test dog, so she spent her formative years among Border Collies. She is diminutive for a Lab - only 20 3/4" tall at the shoulder - so she jumped in the 20" class or 22" class (depending on the association) with all the Border Collies. We retired her when she started running in Masters, because there's no way a Lab can make time when she's the only Lab in a class with 30 BCs! If you're running for your Excellent title you're allowed one time fault, and she always used it up. Never knocked a bar, never blew a contact - she was just too slow.
They all forget where their puppies came from.
Flame away.
My wolves are so smart that it is scarey at times.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
