[markfsanderson]

Do you think that dogs aren't so smart? Check this Time article out . . .

"Henry the schnoodle just did a remarkable thing. Understanding a pointed finger may seem easy, but consider this: while humans and canines can do it naturally, no other known species in the animal kingdom can. Consider too all the mental work that goes into figuring out what a pointed finger means: paying close attention to a person, recognizing that a gesture reflects a thought, that another animal can even have a thought."

Fascination stuff . . .
Mark, Jamie and The Poodle Gangsters!

 

[taxtell]

Someone else referred me to that article earlier, pretty amazing stuff.

Thanks for sharing it!

I also have an african grey, and have followed a lot of the work done by Dr. Irene Pepperberg, also extremely fascinating stuff:

http://www.alexfoundation.org/

RIP Alex.

 

[Aida-Christine]

That is pretty cool, though I'm not sure I agree that no other animal can recognize hand signals. I've trained a few of my cats over the years to preform certain actions based on hand signals and once they realized there was something in it for them they started obeying the signals so that suggests that they too could recognize signals.

 

[taxtell]

I agree w/ Aida.

My dogs, our clinic cat, my bird and my (deceased) horse knew hand signals for sure.

 

[markfsanderson]

We don't need no stink'n training!

That is pretty cool, though I'm not sure I agree that no other animal can recognize hand signals. I've trained a few of my cats over the years to preform certain actions based on hand signals and once they realized there was something in it for them they started obeying the signals so that suggests that they too could recognize signals.

Cool! The article states that dogs are born with it - they don't have to be trained. Small puppies exhibit the behavior, and they require to training! Great Apes and other animals can be trained, but only humans and dogs have this innate ability that the researchers have so far discovered. I bolded the pertinent text in my original post . . .

Sorry if it was a repeat post . . . thought it was kind of cool . . .

Regards,
Mark, Jamie and The Poodle Gangsters

 

[PonkiPoodles]

It's awesome! They had a show on National Geographic that said that dogs are actually smarter (in a sense) than chimps.

Read this article:

http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/03/animal-minds/virginia-morell-text/1

Betsy, the border collie on the front of the latest National Geographic Magazine, has a vocabulary of more than 300 words, knows 15 people by name, and can retrieve objects seen in photographs.

"Even our closest relatives, the great apes, can't do what Betsy can do—hear a word only once or twice and know that the acoustic pattern stands for something,"