I wish everyone could have heard Alexandra Horowitz’s talk that introduced the conference this morning. She gave an articulate and thought provoking speech about the “umwelt” of the dog. “Umwelt” is a term coined by Uexkull to mean the world of an organism, as it is sensed, perceived and interpreted. The point, which was well explained by Alexandra, is that each species sees the world differently, based on their perceptual abilities (ie, bees see colors we don’t, dogs smell things we don’t) and the parts of their environment that are relative to them. Some have said that because each species, literally, lives in different worlds, we can never really understand what it is like to be another animal. (This was famously addressed in philosopher’s Nagel’s oft-cited article, “What is it like to be a Bat?”)
Alexandra (and I) agree with that comment to some extent — how could we ever really know what it is like to have a nose like a dog’s? — , but not to the extent that we shouldn’t give it a good try. After all, we can’t really know what goes on in the mind of another person, but we can made inferences. We can use our knowledge about the sensory capabilities of an animal and how it interacts with its environment to know a tremendous amount about who it really is and what’s going on inside its mind.
Given what we know about dogs, as listed by Horowitz: The world, to them, is:
Incredibly smelly — imagine that a simple flower contains a history of the insects that have visited it, the people who picked it, the petal that is dying versus the petal that is just about to reach its peak.
Full of our Knees (go down to your dog’s height and look at the world from there.. boy is it different),
Running at a Different Rate — I love this concept of hers, that scents come and go at different rates than visual signals, disappearing, moving around, full of information about the past in a sensory world that make look the same to us but is constantly changing to a dog. She also reminded us that dogs see at a faster “flicker-fusion” rate than humans, such that their brains divide visual signals into smaller units than do ours. Could it be that they then are quicker to see movements when they begin than we? We do know that they are better at seeing movement than we are…
Full of Details — that may be irrelevant to us, like the scent on the carpet, the slime trail of slugs on a blade of grass.
Evaluated based on how a dog can relate to it: Can it fit in my mouth? Do I chew it or chase it? Just as we see a pencil and a mitten as 2 completely different things, dogs may categorize them as the same; as things that can be picked up and put in the mouth, (or slept on, or rolled in, etc etc).
All of this is not new, in a way, but then, of course, it is, because we all need reminding that our reality is just that, ‘our reality,’ and it is no more a reflection of truth than is a bee’s view of flowers with ultraviolet stripes pointing to the pollen, or a dog’s map of the scent of a hidden toy, carried along by the breeze.
In summary, her talk was a great introduction to tomorrow’s topic of Canine Cognition. The afternoon was great fun, with an inspiring session done by Victoria Stilwell, a great champion of positive training methods, as is Kyra Sundance, trick trainer extraordinaire. Given that I’m introducing the day tomorrow, I’d better close here and get back to working on my talk. [pardon any mis-spellings, etc…. I usually proof but need to finish up my talk!]
I am, I will admit, a tad tuckered. Many of us did a book signing and I signed books for one and three quarter hours. The process is incredibly reinforcing, I am so incredibly grateful to meet so many wonderful, gracious people, but I lost my voice by the end. But I did get an extra treat….after having our pictures taken who knows how many times, Victoria and I turned the tables and got a picture of us together. Great fun.
Kat says
Envious! Great timing though. I spent time this afternoon with a search bloodhound in my classroom of K-3rd graders trying to give them some insight into how the bloodhound perceives the world. The best we came up with was to tell them that she “sees” the world with her nose. I wish we’d thought to tell them that she can see into the past with her nose. We did talk about how in cartoons you sometimes see someone leave glowing footprints so that another character can follow them. As we described it to the kids, even though those footprints are invisible to us they show up to bloodhound’s nose just like those cartoon footprints do on the TV. It’s fascinating to consider and to try to imagine how dogs perceive the world.
I think that Ranger has concluded that people smell with their eyes. When I’m out with him and stop to photograph something he’ll often scent in the direction the camera is pointing (unless it’s at him) raising his nose up scenting the air when I’m photographing landscapes and putting his nose down to scent when a I’m taking macros of the dew on grass or something. I know I catch myself scanning the ground when he’s very intent on sniffing something hoping I’ll find a visual cue about what interests him.
Debby says
How interesting! I am actually in the middle of reading Alexandra’s book now, this is like a little review. I am so excited Victoria is at the conference, it shows her dedication to dog training, being next to you must have been an honor for her. I am always cheering for her, as opposed to the other popular TV “entertainer”. Keep us posted and enjoy!
Laurie says
Reading about umwelt online. Intriguing to say the least. I am inclined to extend this to different individuals within a species… though that may be stretching it. With my dogs, who are Aussies, I often note how they interact differently with their world than my friend’s Golden. Though they have the scent capacity I am sure, they seem much more sight and sound driven (one of them moreso than the other.). I work with people with disabilities, and am currently very involved in Behavior Modification and Management regulations in my state. We talk a lot about understanding the persons perspective of his or her world based on their disability and their capacities. Without this understanding, or functional assessment, how can we support people to live in the world we perceive? Is an individual organism’s umwelt based on individual capacity? I think Temple Grandin’s explanation of Autism and her capacity to understand the umwelt of other species. Hmmm…
Alexandra W says
I love Victoria Stillwell. Watching her show was full of a treasure trove of basic information for me in the first few weeks and months of owning a dog.
And the idea of the umwelt is fascinating! Do you have any book recs on that subject?
Pike says
Great picture! With a nice caption that Victoria had under it on her facebook entry:
“Had a great first day at the APDT conference in Atlanta today: gave one of the opening talks, had a fun booksigning session with great fellow trainers, and met one of my training idols for the first time in person: Patricia McConnell.”
Cheers to two of my training idols!
Carolyn in Belize says
Exactly as Debby says: I’m always cheering for Victoria also and when possible, recommend her program over “the other one.” Alexandra’s book is on my “wish list” — hope Santa is reading this!
Denise says
If I’m not mistaken, Alexandra’s book is out in paperback now. Borders may have it discounted although I’m not sure of that. I bought it when it was first published but never got around to reading it. Hmmmm. Must be time to correct that.
Tring to understand how my fearful dog views any particular situation really helped me cope with his behavior, especially in the beginning when there was a lot of coping going on…. There’s a big difference between, “this crazy dog is constantly going berserk over nothing and I can’t deal with it,” which tends to lead to frustration and punishment, and “he’s frightened by that kid/dog/older person who’s staring at him” which more logically leads to either moving him far enough away from the kid and working on counter conditioning, getting the person/other dog owner to correct his/her behavior (ha! maybe) or just removing the dog from the situation entirely for the time being. Much much much better outcome for everyone once I started to try seeing his perspective on his triggers.
Debra says
I’ve been thinking a lot about my dog’s nose this week, and his perception versus mine. He was “skunked” last week and the smell lingers despite every attempt to remove it. I can only imagine his misery having to “wear” that smell. When it first happened it hit my nose so intensely that my eyes were watering, and I wondered – is this what smells are like to him all the time? I’m not sure I would want to live in his world!
I love the picture by the way.
Pam says
What fascinating topics…I spend a lot of time pondering how my dogs perceive the world.
Great pic….I love Victoria..and have sent many an email to Animal Planet Canada to air her show rather than inundate us with repeats of ‘the Other’.
Heidi Meinzer says
So wished I could have been there! Facebook is on fire with wonderful comments about all of the great speakers this year!
Melanie S says
What a lovely photo of the two of you!
Alexandra’s book is on my wish list too…
Here is the link to an article I wrote and had published a couple of months ago…
http://www.elephantjournal.com/2010/09/connecting-and-smelling-with-the-nose-of-my-dog-melanie-sweeney/
I wrote it after a particularly blissful, serene late-winter’s morning experience with some of the members of my Clan. In it I ask myself, when observing my dog’s extraordinary nose, “What would it be like to enter his world and experience each breath as redolent with meaning?”