[noz92]

Are dogs smarter than humans?

Let's assume that you buy a brand new puppy. Within a month (if you're good), you can have that puppy listening to and understanding simple commands, such as "sit" and "come here". But with a human child, who's aproximatly a year old, they still can't understand basic commands. If you tell him/her to walk over here (if they're able to walk yet), they just sit there and stare at you, while a dog would walk over there (usually, assuming you trained it right).

It's obvious that puppies are smarter than babies. But adults on the other hand, are (we think) smarter than adult dogs.

[iglak]

I went to preschool when i was 1.5yo....
usually kids won't listen to commands because they don't want to. when you train a dog you cram the word into it's head until it does whatever action when you say the word. if you do that to a baby i'm sure they'd follow commants as well, but nobody would ever want their children to do that, or to put them through that.

and notice that dogs live for about 1/4 of the time humans live, so they HAVE to learn basic things fast, humans don't. but humans learn more overall, and just a year later the human toddler would have learned a lot more than the dog.

[Lance]

Dogs develop (and die) faster. That doesn’t make them smarter.

[5614]

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Dogs develop (and die) faster. That doesn’t make them smarter.

i totaly agree, that was exactly my thoughts.

to expand, sure a dog can sit when its young, well done... when was the last time you saw dogs crating new mathematical equations and physical theories, creating vacinations or nuking each other?

they just arent that clever.

[Auburngirl05]

Dogs are also sexually mature by six months of age. You can't really compare developmental milestones between (unclosely related) species like that.

[5614]

thats because they live shorter lives.

if they had to wait until they were ~14 years old or whatever, they'd be dead before they could reproduce and you'd never even know they existed.

they HAVE become sexually mature younger, thats their life span - nothing to do with smartness, cleverness or IQ.

[Auburngirl05]

I totally agree with you that it's because they have shorter lives, I wasn't implying that sexuality and IQ are related, I was just using that as an example of how developmental timing is different.

On a slightly different train of thought, has anyone seen reports on that scientist that raised an ape infant (I think it was a chimp but I can't remember) that was the same age as his own child, and treated them as much the same as possible, and compared the developmental results? I can't remember his name, but it was a pretty interesting project.

[5614]

well that's an interesting post... here's what i came up with:

http://www.psy.fsu.e...ry/wnk/ape.html

it seems a pretty good site with loadsa interesting stuff.

[Sayonara³]

noz92 said:

Let's assume that you buy a brand new puppy. Within a month (if you're good), you can have that puppy listening to and understanding simple commands, such as "sit" and "come here". But with a human child, who's aproximatly a year old, they still can't understand basic commands. If you tell him/her to walk over here (if they're able to walk yet), they just sit there and stare at you, while a dog would walk over there (usually, assuming you trained it right).

If I have a car that can accelerate to 60mph in half the time it takes yours to reach the same speed, it doesn't necessarily follow that my car goes faster than yours.

[mossoi]

One species gets fed, housed and looked after by the other. That sounds like the smarter of the two. ;)

[Lance]

We do pick up its poop though.

[Mokele]

Yes, but which species uses it's own tongue as toilet paper? :-p

[john5746]

And which species destroys their ecosystem with their waste?

[Sayonara³]

mossoi said:

One species gets fed, housed and looked after by the other. That sounds like the smarter of the two. ;)

No, it sounds like the more dependent species.

Lance said:

We do pick up its poop though.

Because we are intelligent enough to have identified it as a risk to our persons.

john5746 said:

And which species destroys their ecosystem with their waste?

Have you any idea how much devastation 6.5 billion dogs would cause?

Imagine the smell :-(

[Kindria2000]

My dog Merlin runs smack first into walls... My dog Chewy drools all over herself...and My dog Darwin is a manic depressive (actually diagnosed!! I dont know how... things are just fooked up that way)

Now... I'm pretty sure that somewhere...right now... there is one dog planning to rule the world, but untill then, merkabah's (merlin's) head is getting nice nd flat... and I'm not joking.

[john5746]

Quote

Have you any idea how much devastation 6.5 billion dogs would cause?

Imagine the smell :-(

Good Point! I guess cats would have been a better candidate!

[noz92]

Sayonara³ said:

If I have a car that can accelerate to 60mph in half the time it takes yours to reach the same speed, it doesn't necessarily follow that my car goes faster than yours.

Okay, you're right, until a certain age, dogs learn and mature faster than us, making them more intelligent than us (until about 1, depending on the dog).

[5614]

ok, so dogs can learn basic commands like 'sit' quicker than humans can.

but as is obvious... dogs are not smarter than humans.

"One species gets fed, housed and looked after by the other. That sounds like the smarter of the two"

"to expand, sure a dog can sit when its young, well done... when was the last time you saw dogs creating new mathematical equations and physical theories, creating vacinations or nuking each other?
they just arent that clever."

[noz92]

noz92 said:

Okay, you're right, until a certain age, dogs learn and mature faster than us, making them more intelligent than us (until about 1, depending on the dog).

Intelligence and smartness (if that's even a word) arn't the same thing. Since dogs mature seven times faster than we do, then it's only natrual that at a certain time, the dog's IQ would be 7x what a baby of the same age has.

Obviously we surpass them eventually, but for that time, they are more intelligent than us.

(oh, and this thread goes for almost any animal, not just dogs)

[Auburngirl05]

Actually the "one dog year is seven human years" formula isn't accurate. I work for a vet, and according to her the first year of a dog's life is the equivalent of about 15 "human years", the second year is 10 "human years", and each additional years is about 3 "human years", although large breeds tend to age faster and die younger, so there is no absolute standard.