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I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

theguardian.com

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Re: I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

#21

Post by ecshafer »

INTPenis wrote: post #5

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 r…

> Off leash even, I have always wanted to give my dog the most freedom possible. To heck with human rules.

Having dogs off of leashes is incredibly dangerous and irresponsible. The amount of children killed or injured by poorly restrained dogs is very high. A dog should be fenced in or on a leash if they are outside, full stop. Dog ownership should really have a license requirement.

Re: I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

#22

Post by sorokod »

IncreasePosts wrote: post #15
pdonis wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there any evidence that dogs can perform mental reflection?

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…

"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".

Re: I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

#23

Post by jjtheblunt »

gretch wrote: post #19
rootusrootus wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Off leash even, I have always wanted to give my dog the most freedom possible. To heck with human rules. I regularly meet people like that when I'm camping. I find it pretty frustrating. So many rules like that have basis in reality, they are not just meant to annoy.

As a dog owner, I agree with you. I KNOW that my dog would never hurt anyone. But I also know that no one else in the world has spent hundreds of hours with my dog, and to them he is a strange and large animal. Inevitably some of these ppl probably have some kind of childhood trauma related to dogs. So I always have him leashed where the rules are to have a leash.

My un-favorite is the people with dogs on the spring loaded extending leashes, who let their little crazy dog come running at my feral-parents dog from a distance, announcing "don't worry...my dog is friendly.".

The people _never_ ask if my dog on her 2 meter leash (the law in Arizona, btw) is friendly, dangerous, anything. They just announce that their dog isn't dangerous to us.

So often the small dog runs up to my dog's face full speed, centimeter from her nose, gets satan-barked at and driven away from us. she's sensibly trying to protect me and her from the little barely tethered full speed maniac.

The people ask if my dog was abused. Nope: had her since she was three months old, the feral mom and others were all adopted. They just don't seem to consider that _they_ were aggressive, in dog body language. And that's hopefully eye opening for them.

Re: I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

#24

Post by itishappy »

INTPenis wrote: post #5

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 r…

> Off leash even, I have always wanted to give my dog the most freedom possible.

> I believe a dog values freedom more than its immediate personal safety.

I'm sure you're convinced your dog would never hurt anyone, but are you really sure everyone else you encounter will feel the same? That's a huge amount of trust to put on both strangers and your dog, and I'd argue it has not been earned. I've never encountered an out of control dog, and I pray I don't have to, but I have friends who have. They broke ribs. Eyes would have been next. Please don't make me or anybody else hurt your dog.

Re: I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

#25

Post by zoklet-enjoyer »

INTPenis wrote: post #5

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 r…

My roommates' dog got attacked by the neighbor dog 2 days ago. The dog ran across the street into our yard to attack him. There's a reason for leashes.

Re: I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

#26

Post by jholman »

ecshafer wrote: post #21
INTPenis wrote: post #5

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 r…

> Off leash even, I have always wanted to give my dog the most freedom possible. To heck with human rules. Having dogs off of leashes is incredibly dangerous and irresponsible. The amount of children killed or injured by poorly restrained dogs is very high. A dog should be fenced in or on a leash if they are outside, full stop. Dog ownership should really have a license requirement.

> The amount of children killed or injured by poorly restrained dogs is very high.

This claim is interesting, if true. Can you back it up? I spent 15 minutes on research, and my preliminary findings, using US statistics (I'm not American but it's just easier to google American stuff) suggest that:

a) about 42 Americans die to dog attacks per year (about 0.13 per 100k population) (very high confidence)

b) it looks like about half of those are kids under 17, with ages 1-4 over-represented (very high confidence)

c) most of those kids-dying-to-dogs deaths are not due to unrestrained dogs in public, but rather infants in their family homes, dying to dogs owned by the child's parents (low to medium confidence)

For example, WP gathers media/journal reports on dog fatalities, and has 16 records for 2023 (so presumably about 1/3 of the fatalities for that year). 6 of those are children. Of those 6 children, 4 died to the family pet, the other 2 died to neighbours' dogs while in their own home. Extrapolating from that that suggests that the number of American children killed by poorly restrained dogs, other than their own family, is roughly 6. Out of around 10k child fatalities per year in the US.

That doesn't seem "very high" to me, but that's just a matter of opinion. Do you have data that shows a different pattern?

Re: I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

#27

Post by Fomite »

gretch wrote: post #19
rootusrootus wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Off leash even, I have always wanted to give my dog the most freedom possible. To heck with human rules. I regularly meet people like that when I'm camping. I find it pretty frustrating. So many rules like that have basis in reality, they are not just meant to annoy.

As a dog owner, I agree with you. I KNOW that my dog would never hurt anyone. But I also know that no one else in the world has spent hundreds of hours with my dog, and to them he is a strange and large animal. Inevitably some of these ppl probably have some kind of childhood trauma related to dogs. So I always have him leashed where the rules are to have a leash.

This. As a dog owner, my dog remains on a leash. I don't know you. I don't know your dog.

More than once, I've been put in the position where my dog is getting agitated because they're on leash, their dog can't be controlled because they're off leash, and we're rapidly approaching the "Swift kick or risk injury" stage.

"My dog is off leash because I want them to have freedom" is a profoundly selfish decision if you're in a place to encounter other dogs.

Re: I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

#28

Post by gretch »

Satam wrote: post #9
INTPenis wrote: post #5

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 r…

I think you're right that for a dog to live its best life it needs the ability to spend a lot of time outdoors with relative freedom. Our labrador had the chance to live like that in an excessively very large garden for his last 4 years. I'm glad he got that, I think it made his life much better. Looking back, when he stayed with us in an apartment he must've been depressed.

In the US, people tend to look at me weird when I tell them my dog lives outside. Some of them probably think I’m a heartless or uncaring dog owner.

When I first adopted him, I tried inside first, and he was unhappy and anxious, and so much of that went away when he was chillin outside.

I think humans often wrongly project their own preferences onto dogs.

Re: I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

#29

Post by pdonis »

sorokod wrote: post #22
IncreasePosts wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

"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".

> "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.

Re: I wag, therefore I am: the philosophy of dogs

#30

Post by sorokod »

pdonis wrote: post #29
sorokod wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"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".

> "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,…

Yes, could. Doesn't mean it must.

Your use of the word rudimentary implies some sort of spectrum, that makes sense to me.

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