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Lots of people think animals are dumb beasts. My neighbor threw a party with a bunch of people in his PhD program. Our dogs hang out and we left the gate open b

Lots of people think animals are dumb beasts. My neighbor threw a party with a bunch of people in his PhD program. Our dogs hang out and we left the gate open between our properties so the dogs could go back and forth. One of the PhD students was amazed that if you threw a ball over the fence the dog knew how to go around the fence and through the gate to get the ball.

technothrasher 2y ago
They can certainly learn things like using gates, however they don't seem to have a concept of object permanence. If they go to the other side of the fence and do not find the ball, they will tend to begin a spiraling search for it, rather than concentrate on where the ball logically should be if you tracked the trajectory of it and formed a concept of where it went even after it left your sight.
- KittenInABox 2y ago
  Dogs obviously have a concept of object permanence, since they know to go around the fence to look for a ball in the first place. They wouldn't look for it once it's left their sight around a fence otherwise. That they're confused if they cannot immediately find the ball only shows that they struggle to calculate arcs, which many humans also do.
  - AnotherGoodName 2y ago
    And for anyone with a particularly intelligent but ball obsessed breed of dog you can ask them to get the ball so you can play and they’ll go from the front of the house around the back to pick it up off the top shelf in the shed where you placed it (but forgot yourself, but they remembered) and bring it to you. I absolutely assure you: My border collie knows at all times where the ball is. There’s zero question of object permanance.
    - lesuorac 2y ago
      I swear people who talk about object permanence have never tested it. The Wikipedia article about babies even talks about it not starting until month 8 [1]! At least, under "Contradicting evidence" they talk about other studies that showed as early as 3 months ... I think people just want to feel special and just can't accept that other animals have the same abilities that we do. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object_permanence#Stages https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object_permanence#Stages
- abdullahkhalids 2y ago
  Likely because their brain is optimized to find live prey, which tends to move around and take evasive actions. Intuitively understanding parabolic motion physics is probably not that useful in the wild.
WalterBright 2y ago
A friend of mine had a dog (Rover) that was half dingo. Dang, was he smart. But if he was on a rope attached to a tree, and wound around the tree, he could not figure out that he needed to run the other direction to unwind the rope. When he went on vacation, he asked if I could walk Rover once a day, I said sure. Rover reveled in being the top dog in the neighborhood. One of his favorite methods to assert dominance was hilarious. We'd pass one yard that had a fence made from vertical planks butted against each other. The yard contained one of the beta dogs. Rover found a knothole at just the right height, put his butt against it, and emptied through the hole into the beta dog's territory. The beta dog went berserk. Rover literally pranced as we continued his walkies.
kcplate 2y ago
When our dog’s toy rolled under the couch he went and retrieved a flyswatter we keep in the cleaning closet and brought it to me. He had seen me use this only one other time when his toy rolled under there.

technothrasher 2y ago

They can certainly learn things like using gates, however they don't seem to have a concept of object permanence. If they go to the other side of the fence and do not find the ball, they will tend to begin a spiraling search for it, rather than concentrate on where the ball logically should be if you tracked the trajectory of it and formed a concept of where it went even after it left your sight.

KittenInABox 2y ago
Dogs obviously have a concept of object permanence, since they know to go around the fence to look for a ball in the first place. They wouldn't look for it once it's left their sight around a fence otherwise. That they're confused if they cannot immediately find the ball only shows that they struggle to calculate arcs, which many humans also do.
- AnotherGoodName 2y ago
  And for anyone with a particularly intelligent but ball obsessed breed of dog you can ask them to get the ball so you can play and they’ll go from the front of the house around the back to pick it up off the top shelf in the shed where you placed it (but forgot yourself, but they remembered) and bring it to you. I absolutely assure you: My border collie knows at all times where the ball is. There’s zero question of object permanance.
  - lesuorac 2y ago
    I swear people who talk about object permanence have never tested it. The Wikipedia article about babies even talks about it not starting until month 8 [1]! At least, under "Contradicting evidence" they talk about other studies that showed as early as 3 months ... I think people just want to feel special and just can't accept that other animals have the same abilities that we do. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object_permanence#Stages https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Object_permanence#Stages
abdullahkhalids 2y ago
Likely because their brain is optimized to find live prey, which tends to move around and take evasive actions. Intuitively understanding parabolic motion physics is probably not that useful in the wild.

WalterBright 2y ago

A friend of mine had a dog (Rover) that was half dingo. Dang, was he smart. But if he was on a rope attached to a tree, and wound around the tree, he could not figure out that he needed to run the other direction to unwind the rope. When he went on vacation, he asked if I could walk Rover once a day, I said sure. Rover reveled in being the top dog in the neighborhood. One of his favorite methods to assert dominance was hilarious. We'd pass one yard that had a fence made from vertical planks butted against each other. The yard contained one of the beta dogs. Rover found a knothole at just the right height, put his butt against it, and emptied through the hole into the beta dog's territory. The beta dog went berserk. Rover literally pranced as we continued his walkies.

kcplate 2y ago

When our dog’s toy rolled under the couch he went and retrieved a flyswatter we keep in the cleaning closet and brought it to me. He had seen me use this only one other time when his toy rolled under there.