My four-year-old daughter asked me if her dog knows that it is a dog. Does her pet realise it is different from us or does it think that we鈥檙e just odd-shaped dogs or, indeed, that it is a particularly impressive human being?
The question calls to mind cyberneticist Stafford Beer, writing in a 1970s edition of New 杏吧原创 鈥淢an: 鈥楬ello, my boy. And what is your dog鈥檚 name?鈥� Boy: 鈥業 don鈥檛 know. We call him Rover.'鈥�
The boy鈥檚 reply reveals his belief that his dog has a mental image of itself (which he assumes to include a name), but at the same time confesses his inability to penetrate the dog鈥檚 psyche. And he鈥檚 right: the short but unsatisfying answer to the question above is that we don鈥檛 know what goes on in a dog鈥檚 mind.
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We can, though, make a reasonable stab at it. For a start, it鈥檚 clear that when individuals of different species interact, judgements of sameness or difference are simply not part of the story. That the tiny reed warbler heroically feeds the gigantic cuckoo nestling, despite the obvious (to humans) fact that it cannot possibly be a warbler, indicates that the bird isn鈥檛 operating according to any concept of warbler-ness or cuckoo-ness, but purely to one of this-thing-needs-to-be-fed-ness.
Dogs have specific responses to things-that-dogs-can-eat (such as rabbits) and things-that-can-eat-dogs (such as lions), and also to potential mates or rivals, and to offspring. Other than that, they resemble humans in viewing a variety of creatures of whatever sort as potential social companions or friends. Indeed, that is why you have a dog 鈥� and the dog tolerates you 鈥� in the first place. As with humans, the establishment and maintenance of social bonds is key to dogs鈥� way of life. I think your dog sees the questioner as her friend in much the same way that the questioner sees the dog as hers. Lucky dog, lucky you.
Angus Martin, Camberwell, Victoria, Australia
Canids in general start to develop social relationships when their eyes and ears open at about two weeks of age. During the critical period between two and 16 weeks, puppies learn the social rules that will shape their behaviour for the rest of their lives, including recognition of conspecifics and appropriate mates. The famous ethologist Konrad Lorenz, when studying greylag geese, found that sexually mature geese raised by a human 鈥渕other鈥� tended to direct their courtship behaviour toward humans rather than other geese.
鈥淏etween two and 16 weeks old, puppies learn the social rules that shape lifelong behaviour鈥�
In dogs, this same confusion can be seen in the way dogs direct social dominance and play behaviours toward humans 鈥� in effect, treating people as if they were dogs. Likewise, livestock-guarding dogs, such as those protecting sheep, are trained for their jobs by removing them from their mothers at just a few weeks of age and allowing them to grow up with sheep as their companions. The sheep are then forever recognised as family and are socialised with and protected as such.
After 16 weeks, this period of rapid learning and adaptation ends, and the social skills the dog has are pretty much set for life. This is why it is so important for puppies to have intimate contact with people from the time they are born. Traditionally, we adopt pet dogs when they are eight or nine weeks old, right in the middle of this period of social development, and proceed to lavish them with attention and experience through to the end of that 16-week period. The result is that the dog in the question above sees nothing at all odd about her tall, hairless pack-mates.
Julia Ecklar, Trafford, Pennsylvania, US