how do you know that?
how are you sure it's not just recall?

it's easy to show evidence for dogs having short and long term memory...but how can you show evidence for so-called "higher awareness"?

There is absolutely a way to connect the two. I'm going to venture a guess that it wasn't the first time you've ordered a pizza in front of them that they showed this behavior. They probably first linked you getting your wallet as you answer the door or the smell of pizza coming up the driveway to the idea of pizza. Then maybe they noticed your propensity to look out the window or a change in pheromone as your body anticipates pizza. Then they might have linked your phone use or change in tone or again another pheromone shift. Now we're 20 minutes out, but still have a link of stimuli that link action to pizza. Was it these exact triggers? Probably not. Was it something like this? Probably.

Try an experiment. Tell your dogs you are ordering pizza. Then go online to order it and sit at your computer until the pizza arrives doing your best to ignore the fact that a pizza man is on the way. See if they still sit looking at the door.

Dogs certainly have the ability to learn a lot of human language and to perform basic abstract thinking such as categorization.

http://www.newscientist....-biggest-vocabulary.html

It becomes a philosophical question whether this is an example of 'higher awareness' because we have not defined this term. I think this is also distinct from 'self-awareness' but it's really cool anyway.

I bet the dog knows some key words associated with pizza ordering. Pretty cool example.

That's amazing. Over 1000 words.

Just to make sure I'm articulating myself properly, I wouldn't even argue that SWIMfriend's dogs could know some language associated with pizza order. It's just that even if they did, recognizing those words and associating them with an event occurring in the upcoming future is still classical conditioning unless they learned the word in a context totally removed from someone actually showing up with pizza and then displayed the behavior SWIMfriend is talking about.



Benzyme, I'm still digesting this point. I think what comes into play is the frontal lobe's ability to abstract; many of the more complex emotions are simply abstractions of more basic primal ones. This doesn't answer the issue entirely, but from my perspective abstract thinking is what drives our use of language and accounts for many of the cognitive advantages we have.

from what I've observed, dogs recognize certain combinations of vowel sounds; i've often tricked dogs, using similar sounding words, to elicit a response.

the prefrontal cortex allows for premeditated decision making...planning...as well as some emotions and behaviors. like I said, only humans have this brain region.

although, some animals display remarkable learned behaviors that seem intuitive, like crows dropping nuts on the street for cars to run over then picking up the remains when cars have passed.

Yeah, I've noticed that as well. Even with the dog's name this works.

If I were be contrary I would say that predetermination is an aspect of abstraction.

Animals show amazing observance and cognitive ability sometimes. I loved the segments on the doc series Life that showed different groups of primates learning which rocks had to be used on which surfaces to crack a certain type of nut.

yea, primates are incredibly intelligent... but do they conspire, or feel regret or envy?
some of the wide range of emotions known to man can be observed in animals, but what is the underlying reason behind them? is there such thing as an insane bird or sociopathic macaque?
I suppose we'll never know since they can't communicate with us by language, but I'm guessing no.

many social animals observe an 'alpha', it's based on behavioral dominance; i still think this
is instinctual, and based on inherent animal behaviors, not 'higher consciousness'.

My dog recognizes himself in a mirror. I know this because he barks like crazy if he sees another dog on his turf – even if in a mirror. But he doesn’t bark at all when he sees himself.

They lie, I think you could call that conspiring. There's many examples of this behavior from Koko the guerrilla that learned sign language. There's an excellent podcast about an orangutan named Fu Manchu that certainly conspired.

And because Radiolab is so amazing that I pimp it everywhere I possibly can, they have an entire episode on Animal Minds as well as a podcast on a chimp named Lucy that will break your heart.

I think questions of emotion are actually different than questions of psychological stability (insanity, etc) or actual physical brain damage (like how low empathy region response is an indication of psychopathy). I remember a story of a macaque-esque bird (I forget the breed, it could talk if trained) that was left alone in a dark closet for years under a bad owner. This bird was totally gone. It looked terrible, frayed feathers and disease. It was extremely sensitive to all quick movement or loud noises. It was a wreak. I think this would qualify for some type of mental breakdown, but I don't think it requires using higher level cognitive functions for the bird to appreciate what's happening to it on some level. Thankfully the story had a happy ending and the bird was taken care of an returned mostly to "normal" bird behavior.

I think most animals experience the range of emotions that humans experience, they just don't have a frontal lobe that makes them appreciate it on the level that we do, and therefore don't have the level of complexity and nuance (and nonsense for that matter) that we do. Again I'll push my point of abstraction. A chimp may feel some form of anger or hatred towards a rival tribe member. He may even remember and recognize a member, making associations with past events. I don't think, however, that this chimp is back at his home camp coming up with plans on how to get this rival. He doesn't have the ability to bring into his mind what isn't in front of him. Maybe a "higher level" creature like a chimp could even recall images of his rival or play back events to a level that a dog or a mouse can't. What he can't do however, is hold in his head the idea of this rival in a situation that he's never seen before. He doesn't have abstraction.

Let me say first that I'm not trying to say anything except: dogs (and other animals) IMO sometimes show considerably more "intelligence" or "awareness" than is generally given credit for.

And I'll explain the phenomenon again: By the time my dogs were 2.5-3 years old (I had the male and female pick from a litter of dobermans produced by two "extreme prize-winning" German schutzhund dogs bought and imported to America by a very wealthy hobbyist who actually hired dog experts to travel to Germany and choose five or six of the ABSOLUTE best German schutzhund dobermans that could be bought for essentially ANY PRICE. The events I describe, btw, occurred around 1994. Both dogs have since passed away--but I now own two sons of the original male) they had learned--on their own--by their own observation, and not by any effort from me to "teach them"--that when they heard me order a pizza on the phone that in 20-30 minutes or so, a pizza man would come with the delivery. I noted they had LEARNED that because they started to show their ANTICIPATION of the driver coming, by going to the windows and looking out, pacing, etc. Pizza delivery times vary, of course--sometimes it would take 40 minutes--and they would CONTINUE their agitation UNTIL THE PIZZAMAN ARRIVED.

Did I signal the dogs? I have no doubt I did. I MADE NO EFFORT TO TEACH THEM, I only noticed, after awhile, that they were doing it. Probably, I myself would go to the window and check, etc., if the delivery was late (back in those days I wouldn't have been surprised if we ordered pizza a couple of times a week). After we NOTICED THEIR BEHAVIOR then we tried to decide if they were only cuing from us (my girlfriend at the time was a veterinary student whose father was in fact a quite well known animal behaviorist and professor of psychopharmacology. We were both quite interested in animal behavior--she used to do her own formal animal behavior experimentation).

So, we did some experiments and tests (fake phone calls, being very determined about not showing anticipation ourselves, etc.) and determined that it was clear and undeniable: they had LEARNED, ON THEIR OWN, to detect 1) The tone of voice, or character of call, that meant a pizza delivery, 2) That the call meant that there would be a DELAY of about 20 minutes before the pizza would arrive. Indeed, the male, who was extremely "high in drive" would sometimes rush to the window RIGHT AFTER THE CALL; but then he would appear to "realize/remember" that it would be awhile.

Another important thing to note was that these two dogs seemed to activate EACH OTHER. The effect was almost like they used their two weak minds to make ONE POWERFUL MIND, i.e., a thing that neither dog could figure out on its own could often be figured out by both dogs "working together." The female ultimately was much "smarter" (you could practically "watch her thinking" ), and the male was much more "aggressive" about things--the female would allow him to lead in "activity."

Since that time, I haven't had dogs who could learn that behavior on their own (i.e., had that level of intelligence AND drive). I also think the fact that they were a "male/female" team somehow contributed to their really extreme perceptual and learning abilities. Their "working together" was so obvious and deeply instinctual.

the distintion is not entirely exclusive; prefrontal cortex damage may result in both negative emotions AND so-called psychotic behaviors.

You're right. I should have said can be different. My own empathy example contradicts me. Oops.

100% true. And it sounds like you had awesome dogs.


I totally forgot to share this, but I have to mention the Radiolab podcast that questions Baboon instinct. A "reset" of males in a troop caused aggressive alpha male behavior to disappear and a culture where empathetic females ruled emerged. Absolutely crazy.

Here is the story of an orangutan who taught himself to pick locks--and hid his lock pick in his mouth so nobody would find it.