[2BNTV]

Article on CNN today about dogs intelligence.
Editor's note: Learn some surprising things about what your dog might be thinking on AC360's series "Animal Intelligence" tonight, 10pm ET

(CNN) -- Sit! Shake! Quit barking! Get off the couch! Go find your toy!

Ever wonder what your dog is thinking as it gazes at you while you are barking commands?

Duke University's Canine Cognition Center in Durham, North Carolina, is one of the few labs in the country focused on how dogs think.

"We're excited about describing the psychology of our dogs," says professor Brian Hare, the lab's director. "Different dogs solve different problems differently. And what we want to understand is: What is it that either makes dogs remarkable as a species or what is it that constrains the ability of dogs to solve problems?"

Center studies how dogs think.
Duke University
To test the dogs' ability, Hare and a team of graduate students put dogs through a variety of games similar to those you might play with young children.
"We don't want to look at cute pet tricks. What we want to know is, what does the dog understand about its world?" Hare said.
Hare has been analyzing our four-legged friends for about 15 years. He says dogs have figured out how to read human behavior and human gestures better than any other species has, even chimpanzees.
"The way they think about their world is that people are superimportant and they can solve almost any problem if they rely on people," says Hare.
Children start relying on adults' gestures when they're about a year old. That's about the same age that dogs start to recognize and rely on humans, too, Hare says.
When both I and Hare tried to direct Hare's dog Tazzie to a cup that had a treat in it, Tazzie took his master's cue and went toward the cup. I was a stranger to Tazzie, so the dog didn't rely on my information.
"He's grown up with me," says Hare. "We do lots of stuff together. He's never met you before, so he's saying, look, if they're both telling me where to go, I'm going to trust the guy who I'm with all the time."
According to Hare, this proves dogs are complex social animals who understand they have different relationships with different people.
"They really narrow in and pay attention to you and they want to know what it is about the world that you can help them with," he says.
Anderson Cooper meets bonobo chimps Researchers at Duke are studying dogs to better understand their limitations. If they can identify why dogs make mistakes, they believe they can help them improve. That could mean making dogs better at working with people with disabilities or better at working with the military.
"They are a very different species and they think about the world differently than we do. And we need to figure out what are the constraints on how they solve problems, how is it that they think differently from us. And I think that we're going to be able to have a much, even richer relationship with dogs than we already do if we figure all that out," says Hare.
The professor says even though domestication has made dogs smarter, they are not perfect. Still, they're so smart, he says, that they can understand the principle of connectivity.
"They know they're connected on a leash and [dogs reason] 'Well, now I have to listen, because if I don't do what you say you can stop me. Where if I'm ... not on a leash, well, yeah, I know the command but I don't have to listen to you now,'" explains Hare.
And just like children, dogs also understand that if you turn your back, they can misbehave, especially after their owners have told them not to do something.
"Your dog takes the food you just told it not to take, and you're really upset because your dog disobeyed you, and you think that your dog is not obedient. Well, no, no, no, your dog was obedient but it realized that it could get away with it," says Hare.
At the end of the day, dogs may rely on humans, but they also use their skills to manipulate their owners and the world they live in. And even though dog owners like to think they're in command, the professor says it may actually be Fido who is really in charge.

2BNTV - What do you think?

There is no question who is in charge at our house. Who is it the tapes his favorire shows just in case a certain someone needs to go outside to pee, poop, eat grass, look for lizards, or bark at some unseen threat. Who is it that has to always leave the door partly open so that a certain someone else can push it open with his nose. Who is it that gets up a few times in the middle of the night at times so that a certain someone can at times just stick his nose up in the air for some late night excitement.

Who is it that has to have someone drive to the nearest grocery store because he is out of his favorite treats and/or lunch meat?

[ceejay]

Originally Posted by 2BNTV

At the end of the day, dogs may rely on humans, but they also use their skills to manipulate their owners and the world they live in. And even though dog owners like to think they're in command, the professor says it may actually be Fido who is really in charge.

2BNTV - What do you think?

Wow...great reading! Thank you so much for posting this!

I had a lab-border collie mix (Oreo-God rest her soul) who knew how to manipulate me to no end...she was definitely the boss in my house.

When the phone rang, she would run into the kitchen waiting for me to answer it...she had this look of joy and anticipation, the tail was wagging like crazy and she could barely sit still. The minute I said "hello", she would start barking like crazy. She KNEW I would give her a "chewy thing" just to shut her up. The same thing would happen when the door bell rang!

At the end of the day, once I announced "sleepy time", she would gather up every single one of her toys that she played with that day. Sometimes she would pick up 6-8 things at once (she looked sooooo cute). She would walk around the house, making sure she didn't forget anything and then proceed upstairs where she would arrange them on her bed in a circle and sleep inside that circle.

Readers Digest had a "vocabulary" test for dogs years ago. Oreo scored as a "genius". No one believed it, but it was true. Her brothers (my sons) thought that I was out of my mind. I was...truly out of my mind with love for that dog! I miss her terribly and she will never be replaced

Thank you for letting me share my Oreo story.

[davimarti]

I too know that certain person...lol

[davimarti]

awe what a nice story,,,i know you will miss her for a long time, as I do mine

[K9-Lovers]

Thank you 2BNTV for sharing that wonderful article and telling us about the show tonight. I agree with everything the article has to say except for one statement:

"The professor says even though domestication has made dogs smarter, they are not perfect."

To me, dogs ARE perfect.

And, Taltarzac sounds like the perfect dog owner.

[lightworker888]

or is it on a dish? If it is on comcast then can anyone tell me what channel it is? Thanks

LW

[Pturner]

Originally Posted by K9-Lovers

Thank you 2BNTV for sharing that wonderful article and telling us about the show tonight. I agree with everything the article has to say except for one statement:

"The professor says even though domestication has made dogs smarter, they are not perfect."

To me, dogs ARE perfect.

And, Taltarzac sounds like the perfect dog owner.

That's funny K9, I picked out the same one statement, agreeing with all the rest. The statement that "domestication hasn't made dogs perfect," made me laugh out loud. Like domestication has made us perfect. Yeah, right!

[Pturner]

Another dog story. Our back door opens to a sun room that opens to the kitchen. When my late Norfolk Terrier, Chase, was a puppy, I installed a doggie gate between the kitchen and sun room, until I could train him not to bound out the back door whenever I opened it.

Well, I got him trained to stop at the gate without having to close the gate, my last step before removing the gate. At least I thought he was trained. I went out one morning to get the newspaper, and like a good little puppy, he stopped at the gate instead of following me out the door.

But when I was returning up the driveway, I saw him at the floor-to-ceiling window next to the outside door, watching me return to the house. I figured I would have to come in and correct him.

However, when I turned the door knob, I heard his feet scramble across the floor as fast as they would go. And when I got the door ajar, there was Chase, standing at the gate like he was supposed to, intently wagging his tail.

And all I could do was .