The Origin of Dogs

nessdog writes "Your old friend in the back-yard can read you like an open book according to this article from the BBC. They report that your dog's power of reading your body language is better than a chimps. So next time you tell a lie, just remember who might be watching..."

Comments

The catch

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure they can read you like an open book. But dogs can't read books! Aha!

Does that mean....

[mattsucks]

So next time you tell a lie, just remember who might be watching...

Does this mean that instead of polygraphs, the police will soon begin using lab tests?

Officer: Sir, did you rob the bank?
You: Of course not.
Lab: woof woof *
Officer: Just as we thought, lying!

* I have to go out and pee on your tires.

Hmmmm

[FungiSpunk]

Any animal that sits down in front of your entire family on Xmas day, then cleans its own gentials with its tongue, is hardly screaming up the evolutionary ladder!

Re:Hmmmm

[diesel_jackass]

Oh come on, you know you'd do it too--if you could only reach.

My friend's dad (or my dad's friend depending on how you want to look at it) used to always ask us the rhetorical question:
"Do you know why a dog licks his balls?"
"No Fritz, why is that?" we'd say.
"Because he can," he would reply.
I think he's right too.

Re:Hmmmm

[FungiSpunk]

Damn! You already worked out one of my three wishes!

3 canine Eves

[Strange Ranger]

Given the small genetic sample that it seems 95% of dogs have originated from, I wonder if some careful breeding of wolves back into the dog gene pool would help with all the congenital problems that dog breeders have to be so vigilent about. Genetic diversity of course being a Good Thing.

I know dog/wolf hybrids aren't supposed to make good pets, can be dangerous, wild, etc. But careful breeding back into the most popular dog breeds would be worth preventing thousands of cases of hip dysplasia, eye problems, heart problems, skin problems, etc., etc.

A wolf/poodle cross might be a little disturbing though.

Re:3 canine Eves

[R.Caley]

I wonder if some careful breeding of wolves back into the dog gene pool would help with all the congenital problems that dog breeders have to be so vigilent about.

Dog breeders have problems not because of the genetic base of all dogs, but because they make money breeding dogs with their close relatives. The result is the doggy equivalent of banjo players and European royals.

Re:3 canine Eves

[young-earth]

Hip dysplasia actually became common in the US in the 1930's. Yet it was quite rare in Australia until the 1970's and 1980's. That's not evidence for a genetic issue, but it does correlate quite effectively with when commercial (cooked, processed, etc.) dog foods came on the scene.

If you feed your dog the BARF (Bones And Raw Food) diet, odds are they'll be a ton healthier. Research has shown that dogs from lines raised on the BARF diet tend to have near-zero incidence of dysplasia when their litters also use the BARF diet (see the books on the above site for details).

Many breeders are coming to realize this - the problem is primarily intake not primarily genetics. This has been quite effective for our giant-breed dog, a Great Pyrenees. He's over 11 years old and still quite spry, without a trace of dysplasia.

Re:3 canine Eves

[Strange Ranger]

A couple of points

You refer to dog breeders making money from "Pure breeds". Good breeders don't use close relatives to accomplish this. At least not what we think of as close relatives. 3rd cousin-in-law twice removed or some such thing is more like it. But together we both make the same point - Because of the lack of genetic diversity in dogs, especially purebreds, distant relatives can be genetically equivalent to fraternal twins (litters are made up of "fraternal twins"). Hence the need to inject some fresh DNA into the line.

My other point to the other poster: Mutts can make the best dogs, and usually have the potential to be healthier, but you never know until after you've owned the dog for half its life. If you want the perfect pet for your own needs the best way to do it is choose a pure breed that fits your needs and lifestyle and then spend a ton of time researching breeders and choosing the right line and puppy for you. This way you are far less likely to be surprised by what you get and be stuck with it for 12 or so years. Sure, there is a mutt out there somewhere who is exactly what you want in size, coat, brains, temperment, activity level, etc, and will live a bit longer than the perfectly chosen purebred, but your chances of finding him as a puppy and raising him as your own are almost exactly nil.

Re:3 canine Eves

[lommer]

Actually a friend of mine has a dog that is 1/4 wolf, and I can say that it is one of my favourite dogs in the world. It is not dangerous or really wild, and it is incredibly intelligent. It can pick up tricks or patterns much quicker than any of the other 3 dogs in the house. If I was going to get a dog, I would definitely want a part-wolf.

East Asian origins

[egeorge]

"His team found that, though most dogs shared a common gene pool, genetic diversity was highest in East Asia, suggesting that dogs have been domesticated there the longest."

I thought this was an interesting point considering the fact that east asia is a part of the world where some people eat dogs.

I wonder if there is any relationship between these facts.

joke

[Anonymous Coward]

Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.

-Groucho Marx

Re:Dogs smarter than chimps

[Stoutlimb]

I don't think dogs are smarter... They may be fairly good at interpreting social cues from humans, but that's from conditioning.

Personally I think dogs are better at finding food because of their superior sense of smell. I think this is another case of bad research, at least with comparing relative intelligence.

Re:Dogs smarter than chimps

[Austenite]

At least pretend to have read the article.

Puppies as young as nine weeks are as good as the adults, so it's not due to conditioning. Also, the experiment was designed so that the dogs could not use their sense of smell.

Oh wait.... I think I've just been trolled!