16 ms·

I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

125 points by iechoz6H 2y ago

numerosix 2y ago
Thank you to bring this up.
johnea 2y ago
[flagged]
LeifCarrotson 2y ago
The post contains a pretty strong assertion that dogs cannot perform mental reflection: > In the authentic happiness Shadow finds in the most banal of activities, his commitment to life and action is one that we humans find so hard to emulate. This is because of something that happened to us: a great schism in consciousness that we know as reflection. We humans are the world heavyweight champions of thinking about ourselves, scrutinising and evaluating what we do and why we do it. > This schism breaks us in two. Henceforth we are all divided into one who thinks and one who is thought about; one who sees and one who is seen; one who reflects and one who is reflected upon. This bifurcation in our consciousness robs us of the possibility of a certain type of happiness, the happiness that accompanies being whole. Shadow is whole in a way that a human can never be. ... > Being undivided by reflection, being whole and entire, a dog has only one life to live, whereas we – in whom reflection’s canyon is deepest – have two. For us, there is both the life that we live and the life that we think about, scrutinise, evaluate and judge. It's one thing to assert that a philosophy of living in the moment may be good for people, something completely different to assert that dogs are incapable of living otherwise.
- pdonis 2y ago
  Is there any evidence that dogs can perform mental reflection?
  - IncreasePosts 2y ago
    What would dog mental reflection even look like? "I should have chosen a different route when chasing that rabbit?" I don't think there is any evidence for mental reflection at this moment, but the nature of reflection is that is entirely internal, and we don't really know in what manner dogs have cognition. But, the trend seems to be that we only learn more about the inner lives of animals as time goes on. 100 years ago it was accepted that non-human animals were essentially automatons that didn't feel feelings or have emotions, or engage in any kind of thought, which we know now is not true.
    - sorokod 2y ago
      "What would dog mental reflection even look like?" Maybe "I acted in a way that displeased my owner, next time I will not act that way".
      - pdonis 2y ago
        > "I acted in a way that displeased my owner, next time I will not act that way" This kind of conditioning can take place without any mental reflection--we know this because humans can be conditioned this way without even being consciously aware of it. This is not to say that the dog is unaware of having displeased their owner (which, as another poster pointed out, is in itself a form of mental reflection, although, as I responded, a very rudimentary one). It's just to say that the dog can be conditioned by this experience to not act that way next time, without being aware of it and without doing any mental reflection.
        sorokod 2y ago
        Yes, could. Doesn't mean it must. Your use of the word rudimentary implies some sort of spectrum, that makes sense to me.
        pdonis 2y ago
        > Your use of the word rudimentary implies some sort of spectrum Yes, it does. See my reply to abainbridge downthread.
- littlekey 2y ago
  Seems like a fair assertion to me, accepting the fact that we have no way (yet?) of proving it one way or the other. Just from observing any animal I think the default assumption is that we're the only ones who ruminate about our own selves the way we do.
INTPenis 2y ago
I like the author's positive outlook on life. Because when I see a dog act like that, especially in a family where a child has taken focus, I mostly see a prisoner longing for freedom. Me and my dog have been exclusive for almost a decade now. We have traveled across europe, always by my side. Off leash even, I have always wanted to give my dog the most freedom possible. To heck with human rules. I've mostly worked remotely during my dog's entire life, so I've always been there, and we've always been able to take a long walk outside. But at the end of the day we have to go home, and I have to fall asleep on the couch after dinner, and I have to work for hours and hours from home, or remote workspaces. So even with all the freedom my dog enjoys, I still feel like it would want more. We have lived in houses with yards, and my dog has lazily spent every single moment outside, in the sun, in the grass. But I still feel like it's insufficient. I have claimed this dog as mine, so it goes where I go, not where it wants to go. If my dog could decide it would have probably died a harsh death in the streets a long time ago. But the dog doesn't understand that. I believe a dog values freedom more than its immediate personal safety.
- pdonis 2y ago
  > I believe a dog values freedom more than its immediate personal safety. Why do you believe that? Bear in mind that our domesticated dogs of today are very different from their wild ancestors (or from wolves, their closest wild relatives).
  - yencabulator 2y ago
    Wolves value their pack too. The only lone wolves tend to be young males that were pushed out of their pack and are looking to find/start a new pack. Wolf pack is family, and stays together.
- onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
  > I believe a dog values freedom more than its immediate personal safety Think you're underestimating how much your dog probably likes you... Dogs have a different relationship to their owner than people do with their best friends or parents. It's like the best parts of each relationship wrapped into one for dogs.
ItCouldBeWorse 2y ago
Imagine you life for a pack, and to defend that pack, you have to bring the part that is most sensitive - your noose, towards the enemy and bite it. And its okay- you are living the rocket life anyway. Fast in, fast out, all for one, one for all.
bitwize 2y ago
Dogs derive much of their meaning and satisfaction in life from their humans. I know that when my wife and I leave ours in the house for too long, they start to become agitated; upon our return one of them, a Catahoula, has made a habit of complaining loudly, as is typical of her breed, as if to say "Where have you been? You belong here with us!" Oh, and a minute can count as "too long". Shadow gets excited upon hearing "do you want to come with?" because the repetitiveness of the outing doesn't matter. It's time spent with his human and that is more than enough. It's literally what he was made to do: in need of a faithful companion (other humans being too dodgy) we took one of nature's finest predators and engineered it over millennia, bending its will to need our companionship to the point of utter emotional dependency. Dogs, compared to wolves, even have extra muscles around their eyes whose sole purpose appears to be to enable them to emote to humans more effectively. Furthermore, dogs have the approximate intelligence of a human toddler... do any of you remember being three or four years old, and every single ride in the car was a new adventure to look forward to? I know that half of Hackernews considers it a biological impossibility to remember anything before about age seven, if that, but maybe when you have a toddler-level brain, things are still full of wonder that might be mundane or forgettable to adult humans.
nirmel 2y ago
I would just like to comment that if you love animals, you should hate pets. The amount of animal factory farming (killing of animals often more intelligent than your canine) required to nourish a domesticated animal over the course of their lives is gross in all senses of the word gross.
- kleiba 2y ago
  Alternatively, if you love animals, you should also love pets but not necessarily have one or support the concept.
- dbg31415 2y ago
  Mate, if ever there was someone who needed to spend an hour rolling around with a bunch of puppies, it's you. (= I hope you can at least understand that pets bring joy into the lives of their owners. It doesn't all have to make perfect sense. In the grand scheme of things, we're all just temporary cosmic dust, right? And dogs are a great daily reminder to focus on the small moments of happiness whenever you can find one.
  - causasui 2y ago
    This response to the point made by the person to whom you're responding is the philosophical equivalent of plugging your ears and going "la la la can't hear you". > In the grand scheme of things, we're all just temporary cosmic dust, right? What else would you be able to justify using this platitude?
    - DaoVeles 2y ago
      > What else would you be able to justify using this platitude? Have you been reading Earthly Ed's books? ;) Yeah, that justification taken to its extremes goes down a VERY dark path.
- 4ggr0 2y ago
  then buy a vegetarian/vegan pet :) rabbits, mice, hamsters etc.
standfest 2y ago
As a humorous reference I recommend to watch this rather old tv commercial: https://youtu.be/ExnWRuniooY?feature=shared https://youtu.be/ExnWRuniooY?feature=shared
tanepiper 2y ago
Looking forward to this - very in line with the philosophy my wife writes about https://busydoggie.com/home/blog/ https://busydoggie.com/home/blog/
Ygg2 2y ago
Talk about kinicism.
ttctciyf 2y ago
Somehow this piece manages to avoid mention of both Diogenes, famed admirer of dogs for whom his philosphical school, Cynicism[0], is named, and Kafka, whose Investigations of a Dog is an essential short fiction about a genius dog philosopher[2]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diogenes#Philosophy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diogenes#Philosophy : > asked why he was called a dog [Diogenes] replied, "I fawn on those who give me anything, I yelp at those who refuse, and I set my teeth in rascals." 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investigations_of_a_Dog https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investigations_of_a_Dog
AstroJetson 2y ago
I love this book: https://www.amazon.com/Be-More-Sausage-Lifelong-lessons/dp/0008405646/ https://www.amazon.com/Be-More-Sausage-Lifelong-lessons/dp/0... it's a great description of how sausage dogs can teach us life lessons. Highly recommended if you know a dachshund.
kennyloginz 2y ago
Reminds me of how much insight Philip K. Dick could pack in his short stories. In this example, Roog. https://philipdick.com/mirror/websites/pkdweb/short_stories/Roog.htm https://philipdick.com/mirror/websites/pkdweb/short_stories/...
Cousin-ITT 2y ago
Reminds me of when Mark Twain was asked if life was worth living, he responded "It depends on the liver."

125 points by iechoz6H 2y ago

numerosix 2y ago

Thank you to bring this up.

johnea 2y ago

[flagged]

LeifCarrotson 2y ago

The post contains a pretty strong assertion that dogs cannot perform mental reflection: > In the authentic happiness Shadow finds in the most banal of activities, his commitment to life and action is one that we humans find so hard to emulate. This is because of something that happened to us: a great schism in consciousness that we know as reflection. We humans are the world heavyweight champions of thinking about ourselves, scrutinising and evaluating what we do and why we do it. > This schism breaks us in two. Henceforth we are all divided into one who thinks and one who is thought about; one who sees and one who is seen; one who reflects and one who is reflected upon. This bifurcation in our consciousness robs us of the possibility of a certain type of happiness, the happiness that accompanies being whole. Shadow is whole in a way that a human can never be. ... > Being undivided by reflection, being whole and entire, a dog has only one life to live, whereas we – in whom reflection’s canyon is deepest – have two. For us, there is both the life that we live and the life that we think about, scrutinise, evaluate and judge. It's one thing to assert that a philosophy of living in the moment may be good for people, something completely different to assert that dogs are incapable of living otherwise.

pdonis 2y ago
Is there any evidence that dogs can perform mental reflection?
- IncreasePosts 2y ago
  What would dog mental reflection even look like? "I should have chosen a different route when chasing that rabbit?" I don't think there is any evidence for mental reflection at this moment, but the nature of reflection is that is entirely internal, and we don't really know in what manner dogs have cognition. But, the trend seems to be that we only learn more about the inner lives of animals as time goes on. 100 years ago it was accepted that non-human animals were essentially automatons that didn't feel feelings or have emotions, or engage in any kind of thought, which we know now is not true.
  - sorokod 2y ago
    "What would dog mental reflection even look like?" Maybe "I acted in a way that displeased my owner, next time I will not act that way".
    - pdonis 2y ago
      > "I acted in a way that displeased my owner, next time I will not act that way" This kind of conditioning can take place without any mental reflection--we know this because humans can be conditioned this way without even being consciously aware of it. This is not to say that the dog is unaware of having displeased their owner (which, as another poster pointed out, is in itself a form of mental reflection, although, as I responded, a very rudimentary one). It's just to say that the dog can be conditioned by this experience to not act that way next time, without being aware of it and without doing any mental reflection.
      - sorokod 2y ago
        Yes, could. Doesn't mean it must. Your use of the word rudimentary implies some sort of spectrum, that makes sense to me.
        pdonis 2y ago
        > Your use of the word rudimentary implies some sort of spectrum Yes, it does. See my reply to abainbridge downthread.
littlekey 2y ago
Seems like a fair assertion to me, accepting the fact that we have no way (yet?) of proving it one way or the other. Just from observing any animal I think the default assumption is that we're the only ones who ruminate about our own selves the way we do.

INTPenis 2y ago

I like the author's positive outlook on life. Because when I see a dog act like that, especially in a family where a child has taken focus, I mostly see a prisoner longing for freedom. Me and my dog have been exclusive for almost a decade now. We have traveled across europe, always by my side. Off leash even, I have always wanted to give my dog the most freedom possible. To heck with human rules. I've mostly worked remotely during my dog's entire life, so I've always been there, and we've always been able to take a long walk outside. But at the end of the day we have to go home, and I have to fall asleep on the couch after dinner, and I have to work for hours and hours from home, or remote workspaces. So even with all the freedom my dog enjoys, I still feel like it would want more. We have lived in houses with yards, and my dog has lazily spent every single moment outside, in the sun, in the grass. But I still feel like it's insufficient. I have claimed this dog as mine, so it goes where I go, not where it wants to go. If my dog could decide it would have probably died a harsh death in the streets a long time ago. But the dog doesn't understand that. I believe a dog values freedom more than its immediate personal safety.

pdonis 2y ago
> I believe a dog values freedom more than its immediate personal safety. Why do you believe that? Bear in mind that our domesticated dogs of today are very different from their wild ancestors (or from wolves, their closest wild relatives).
- yencabulator 2y ago
  Wolves value their pack too. The only lone wolves tend to be young males that were pushed out of their pack and are looking to find/start a new pack. Wolf pack is family, and stays together.
onlyrealcuzzo 2y ago
> I believe a dog values freedom more than its immediate personal safety Think you're underestimating how much your dog probably likes you... Dogs have a different relationship to their owner than people do with their best friends or parents. It's like the best parts of each relationship wrapped into one for dogs.

ItCouldBeWorse 2y ago

Imagine you life for a pack, and to defend that pack, you have to bring the part that is most sensitive - your noose, towards the enemy and bite it. And its okay- you are living the rocket life anyway. Fast in, fast out, all for one, one for all.

bitwize 2y ago

Dogs derive much of their meaning and satisfaction in life from their humans. I know that when my wife and I leave ours in the house for too long, they start to become agitated; upon our return one of them, a Catahoula, has made a habit of complaining loudly, as is typical of her breed, as if to say "Where have you been? You belong here with us!" Oh, and a minute can count as "too long". Shadow gets excited upon hearing "do you want to come with?" because the repetitiveness of the outing doesn't matter. It's time spent with his human and that is more than enough. It's literally what he was made to do: in need of a faithful companion (other humans being too dodgy) we took one of nature's finest predators and engineered it over millennia, bending its will to need our companionship to the point of utter emotional dependency. Dogs, compared to wolves, even have extra muscles around their eyes whose sole purpose appears to be to enable them to emote to humans more effectively. Furthermore, dogs have the approximate intelligence of a human toddler... do any of you remember being three or four years old, and every single ride in the car was a new adventure to look forward to? I know that half of Hackernews considers it a biological impossibility to remember anything before about age seven, if that, but maybe when you have a toddler-level brain, things are still full of wonder that might be mundane or forgettable to adult humans.

nirmel 2y ago

I would just like to comment that if you love animals, you should hate pets. The amount of animal factory farming (killing of animals often more intelligent than your canine) required to nourish a domesticated animal over the course of their lives is gross in all senses of the word gross.

kleiba 2y ago
Alternatively, if you love animals, you should also love pets but not necessarily have one or support the concept.
dbg31415 2y ago
Mate, if ever there was someone who needed to spend an hour rolling around with a bunch of puppies, it's you. (= I hope you can at least understand that pets bring joy into the lives of their owners. It doesn't all have to make perfect sense. In the grand scheme of things, we're all just temporary cosmic dust, right? And dogs are a great daily reminder to focus on the small moments of happiness whenever you can find one.
- causasui 2y ago
  This response to the point made by the person to whom you're responding is the philosophical equivalent of plugging your ears and going "la la la can't hear you". > In the grand scheme of things, we're all just temporary cosmic dust, right? What else would you be able to justify using this platitude?
  - DaoVeles 2y ago
    > What else would you be able to justify using this platitude? Have you been reading Earthly Ed's books? ;) Yeah, that justification taken to its extremes goes down a VERY dark path.
4ggr0 2y ago
then buy a vegetarian/vegan pet :) rabbits, mice, hamsters etc.

standfest 2y ago

As a humorous reference I recommend to watch this rather old tv commercial: https://youtu.be/ExnWRuniooY?feature=shared https://youtu.be/ExnWRuniooY?feature=shared

tanepiper 2y ago

Looking forward to this - very in line with the philosophy my wife writes about https://busydoggie.com/home/blog/ https://busydoggie.com/home/blog/

Ygg2 2y ago

Talk about kinicism.

ttctciyf 2y ago

Somehow this piece manages to avoid mention of both Diogenes, famed admirer of dogs for whom his philosphical school, Cynicism[0], is named, and Kafka, whose Investigations of a Dog is an essential short fiction about a genius dog philosopher[2]. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diogenes#Philosophy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diogenes#Philosophy : > asked why he was called a dog [Diogenes] replied, "I fawn on those who give me anything, I yelp at those who refuse, and I set my teeth in rascals." 2: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investigations_of_a_Dog https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Investigations_of_a_Dog

AstroJetson 2y ago

I love this book: https://www.amazon.com/Be-More-Sausage-Lifelong-lessons/dp/0008405646/ https://www.amazon.com/Be-More-Sausage-Lifelong-lessons/dp/0... it's a great description of how sausage dogs can teach us life lessons. Highly recommended if you know a dachshund.

kennyloginz 2y ago

Reminds me of how much insight Philip K. Dick could pack in his short stories. In this example, Roog. https://philipdick.com/mirror/websites/pkdweb/short_stories/Roog.htm https://philipdick.com/mirror/websites/pkdweb/short_stories/...

Cousin-ITT 2y ago

Reminds me of when Mark Twain was asked if life was worth living, he responded "It depends on the liver."