Breeds do, but a mix is, by definition, not a breed.
What scientific studies exist that the majority of Retrievers retrieve a ball in the water, but few, very few, if any, pugs will do this?
There is a science that studies which breeds are likely to maim, kill or cause the most damage.
cite:
Actuarial science is the discipline that applies mathematical and statistical methods to assess risk in the insurance and finance industries. Actuarial science includes a number of interrelating subjects, including probability, mathematics, statistics, finance, economics, financial economics, and computer programming.
When an insurance agency refuses coverage for households with pit bulls, it is not because they were executing a “knee jerk reaction.” It is based on hard data, data that affects their bottom line. Most insurance agencies will not cover pit bulls, with or without a passing grade on the ATTS temperament test. Farmers Insurance, a long time pro-pit bull agency, announced months ago in a California press release that they joined the list.
cite:
"as a general rule, insurance companies tend to resist covering these 11 types of dogs — or any mix of these breeds — most often, says Einhorn.
Pit Bulls & Staffordshire Terriers
Doberman Pinschers
Rottweilers
German Shepherds
Chows
Great Danes
Presa Canarios
Akitas
Alaskan Malamutes
Siberian Huskies
Wolf-hybrids
(Note: Insurance companies tend to deny coverage for the first four breeds on this list most often, experts say.)"
I assure you, insurance actuary study is in fact a science. In fact the Univ of Texas is one of many colleges that offer a bachelors degree in Actuary Science, which requires Calculus 2 and 3, Probability & Statistics, Math Stats, Applied Regression Analysis, Risk Management, Finance, and Stochastic Processes.
We could pay heed to the advice of these Insurance mandates based on graduates with degrees in Actuary Sciences, or…or…
we could take the NCRC’s word on pit bulls.
Disclaimer:
the National Canine Research Council, LLC is owned by the same individual that owns Animal Farm Foundation whose mission statement is: “Securing equal treatment and opportunity for ‘Pit Bull’ dogs.”
Karen Delise, Licensed Vet Tech (LVT), whose book, “the Pit Bull Placebo” was dedicated to her own pit bull in the preface, founded the NCRC
The insurance agencies do not have a dog in this fight (so to speak)
Wait a moment while I calm myself from the excitement generated by the knowledge that cougar58 has answered a post of mine. It’s almost like magic.
Damn, are folks trying to ban pugs because they don’t retrieve?
And is retrieving a primal behavior?
Which is completely unnecessary, since common sense will tell you the answer: the ones that are large and powerful.
But you have not argued that pit bulls should be banned because they are likely to cause death or maiming when they attack, have you? Nope. You have argued that, alone among all other breeds of dog known to humankind, pit bulls, ***because they are pit bulls, ***will unpredictably turn aggressive towards humans. And on that (false, unproven, unfounded) basis you argue it is legitimate to ban the breed.
You have never even tried to demonstrate that there is something* fundamentally different about the brain function of pitbulls* that will cause this perverse behavior. You’ve just brought a billion anecdotes and numbers. Which proves nothing about the *fundamental nature *of pit bull dogs being anything different than any other dog.
Unlike retrieving or herding, aggression is a primal part of the canine package. ALL dogs have aggression wired in to the fundamental hardware.
ALL dogs are capable of being aggressive.
And NO dog that is sound of mind and body will be unpredictably aggressive towards a human being, no matter how many people insist that their dog was perfectly loving, sweet, friendly, and delightful and then suddenly “snapped” and went berserk. That is either a lie or a very frustrating example of ignorance in the extreme.
Pit bulls are frequently owned and bred by people who do things which will make those dogs more likely to be aggressive. Not unpredictably, very predictably. (When I was a little girl my family had a fantastic German Shepherd that my father stupidly kept tethered outside. Sure as shit, that dog was aggressive. Not because he was born that way, but because my father made him that way by making a stupid choice of how to treat him.) And even those dogs which have been pushed towards aggression will not, in an instant, go from sweet and friendly to vicious killers. They will send very definite signals that they are about to hurt someone. Those signals might be missed or ignored, but it doesn’t mean they aren’t sent.
There is no such thing as a canis familiaris, of any breed, that is sound of mind and body, unpredictably and without warning becoming aggressive. It simply does not exist.
Which is why I keep asking you to show that pit bulls are somehow different in this respect than all other dogs, because it is only if you can show scientific proof that pit bulls are different from other dogs at this primal level that any banning of the breed could be a valid strategy.
So your anecdotes and statistics only mean one thing: the people who tend to choose pits are frequently creating aggressive dogs. And we should definitely do something about that, but banning the breed isn’t it.
Yes, none of which are at the primary level of core canine behavior, which is essentially core mammalian behavior: aggression, sex, fear, play - all are hardwired primary behaviors that look exactly the same across breeds.
Well actually . . . herding and retrieving are both primal behaviors, they are hunting behaviors modified via genetic selection. There are other hunting behaviors similarly modified – tracking by scent and by sight, for example, and digging for prey. All of the these functions are innate and have been selected for specific uses for many centuries.
Aggression is of course also a primal behavior in dogs, which is modified by genetic selection in the same manner. Hence the “guardian” or “protection” breeds. Of which the pit bull is one, with a special area of dog-fighting selection added.
There are quite a few large powerful breeds that are typically very unaggressive and mild in temperament; their size was selected for a different reason than for guardian purposes. Newfoundlands, Bernese, Mastiffs, Irish Wolfhounds, to name a few.
This whole discussion I find very weird. Of course people recognize pit bulls and of course they do a lot more damage than most other breeds; this is as common knowledge as common knowledge can be. Actuarial science is pretty far from “the popular media”.
It is a familiar weirdness though. I just had lunch a couple days ago with a doggish friend of mine who recently completed the Karen Pryor Positive Training Method six month trainer certification course. She is a very experienced trainer, and an intelligent and dispassionate observer, and she told me that whenever a “negative” method worked a lot better than a purely positive one (example: telling the dog what to do in a firm voice is “negative”), a universal, passionate, and basically nutso outcry arose from her fellow trainers-to-be about how the dog had been emotionally damaged. The trainees’ dogs were confused and demoralized by the training method, and all in all it was a bust, in her view. But not one of the other trainees thought so. They had gone through the rites and were entering the inner sanctum.
Essentially, a behavioral-modification technique originally developed by marine mammal trainers who had no way to manipulate their animals except via pieces of mackerel, has now been elevated to a kind of moral philosophy impervious to facts.
See where I’m going with this? There are lots of people who have this animal religion. The “there is no pit bull problem it’s a people problem” sect is merely one branch of the thriving tree. It is always a belief vs facts argument, and you know how those go.
Lets see what the Dog Whisperer, Cesar Milan, says:
“Yeah, but this is a different breed…the power that comes behind the bull dog, pit bull, presa canario, the fighting breed – They have an extra boost, they can go into a zone, they don’t feel the pain anymore. … So if you are trying to create submission in a fighting breed, it’s not going to happen. They would rather die than surrender. If you add pain, it only infuriates them…to them pain is that adrenaline rush, they are looking forward to that, they are addicted to it… That’s why they are such great fighters.” He goes on to say: “Especially with fighting breeds, you’re going to have these explosions over and over because there’s no limits in their brain.”
Having had Cavalier King Charles spaniels, I can only chortle at such a claim.
They’re about as aggressive as a sloth on Xanax.
Yeah, aggression looks the same across breeds when it happens. In many breeds you’ll never see it happen. Also, many breeds even when they show aggression are easily persuaded to give it up. You can scare them off. Then there are the breeds selected to not scare.
First, this still does not say anything about unpredictable aggression towards humans.
Second, Cesar Milan it’s not a scientist, and he’s not referring to studies showing differences in pit bull brains.
http://www.athenshealth.org/blank.cfm?print=yes&id=311&action=detail&ref=33575
Scientists who discovered a gene mutation that causes a fatal neurodegenerative disease in American Staffordshire (Pit Bull) terriers say the same gene may also be linked to a similar, rare fatal brain disease in humans.
The discovery of the gene associated with a variant of neuronal ceroid lipofuscinoses (NCLs) – a family of diseases that lead to mental and motor deterioration and death – may lead to improved screening and diagnosis of the disease in dogs. It may also be an early first step in developing a cure for NCLs in both dogs and humans, according to the multinational team of researchers.
In American Staffordshire terriers, also known as American Pit Bull Terriers, the disease causes mental and motor deterioration leading to death. Adult-onset NCL affects one of every 400 registered American Staffordshire terriers, according to research team member Dr. Natasha Olby, an associate professor of neurology at North Carolina State University.
“The disease became so prevalent because it was a recessive disease with late onset. Carriers of a single copy of the mutated gene never develop symptoms, and dogs with two copies of the gene might not show symptoms until five or six years of age, so the mutation was able to take hold in the breeding population,” she explained in a university news release.
Genetic analysis revealed the location of the specific gene and an entirely new mutation that has not been reported in people.
So, cougar, you found a wall of text that discusses a mutation that will cause a Staffy to die. There is nothing in that link that even mentions hostile behavior.
And Cesar Milan remains a nice guy with an ability to work with dogs who has no training in canine neuroscience who is spouting off a belief he may hold, but not one that is supported by evidence.
Thanks for your well written post
I am no fan of Cesars, altho pit bull deniers cite him often.
Federal law prohibits the sale of firearms and ammunition to individuals with a history of mental illness. Why do you suppose that is?
NCLs are a family of diseases that lead to mental deterioration in pit bulls, eventually killing them.
The mutation discussion is a thread hijack, but I would like to point out that AKC registered Staffies are not your generic pit bull, they are a small, specific, inbred population of dogs. That studbook has been closed since 1936 (no new genetic material since then). Like many if not most closed-studbook dog breeds, they have over time developed unique inherited disorders. Has nothing to do with their temperament. Most pits have no connection to the AKC.
you’re welcome!
In general, if a dog breed is not papered or otherwise has no connection to a pedigree-record agency, then they are not “a dog breed”, they are “mutts”.
If you want to say “mutts who share some phenotypical traits with Staffordshire terriers and other bully breeds are potentially more dangerous”, I’d probably agree with you and a push for stricter regulation of canine breeding/sale rather than restrictions on ownership that hit both well-bred papered Pit Bulls and some mutt with a big head bred to look tough and with whatever snuck into the kennel.
And yet, you tried to cite him as an authority on the mental qualities of dog breeds.
Which has nothing to do with breed traits or temperament, making your claim silly.
You seem to be willing to post anything to make your point, then ignore or deny your own claims when they work against you.
You are misinformed. Dog registries are a late 19th century invention. Until the (British) KC and the AKC got into the dog registry business, there were many breeds but no registries. There are still plenty of breeds that exist outside registries. Landrace breeds such as, in the US, Catahoula Cow Hog Dogs, Blackmouth Curs, Blue Laceys, McNabs, Carolina Dogs, English Shepherds, and others, continue to exist without registry recognition (some of the above are recognized by other than AKC registries but most are not registered anyway). The idea that only papered dogs are considered real breeds is a marketing device promoted by the AKC which took hold in the American consciousness and is now a kind of creed. But it is simply not true.
There might be more of a veracity issue with unregistered breeds, but generally those who breed such dogs are at least as careful as any other breeder. Normally they are rural people with rural needs in a dog, and a dog which does not measure up to the work it is bred for does not get bred on.
Pit bulls originated in just this way, and most of the breeders are outside the AKC. That doesn’t automatically make their non-registry dogs mutts.
“Common knowledge” includes such false ideas as: that the black population in the U.S. makes up the majority of welfare recipients; crime is rising in the U.S., Iraq had lots of WMDs in March of 2003, the Bernoulli principle causes airplane wings to be pushed up into the air; “survival of the fittest” means that the strongest creature has an evolutionary advantage; cats are aloof; the safest place in the house in a tornado is the southwest corner of the basement; and, (until their debunking became the target of intense media campaigns) forest fires must all be suppressed; butter is a good thing to put on burns; and vaccinations can lead to autism.
“Common knowledge” is pretty much as poor an indicator of truth as eyewitness accounts.
A major point of this discussion has been that the general public, (including hysterical members of city councils), has no idea regarding which dogs are or are not “pit bulls” and that a very large number of dog attacks are attributed to Pit Bulls when they were carried out by mixed breeds or other breeds, only to erroneously show up inflating reports of “Pit Bull” attacks.
This is totally bizarre. The AKC suggests that chihuahuas originated as dogs for upper-class Aztec citizens. If you’re correct, then AKC is incorrect, because chihuahuas weren’t a breed at that point. They had no connection to a pedigree-record agency. Despite the differences between poodles and chihuahuas in the sixteenth century, it’s not fair to call them distinct breeds: lacking pedigree-record agency, the only thing you can call them is “mutts.”
Is that really what you believe? Because I’ve seen some prescriptivist nonsense in my day, but that really takes the cake.