Keep in mind that the pointer breed is called that for a reason.
Pointers–the dogs–do the pointing, which if I understand you implies that they’re obviously hip to the whole idea of body position–somebody’s body position–relates to an activity. In it’s case freezing an aligning with nose as arrowhead.
They are less exquisitely attuned, or at least expected and trained, to respond instantly and accurately to hand gestures or sounds with such a degree of accuracy as retrievers. Rather, they are given a wider berth ahead of the hunter–a huge area, in fact–to do their seeking out thing. Yes, they are trained to respond and move to a certain general areas, but it’s quite a different job.
Of course, people want, and can get, a multi-purpose hunting dog skilled at many things.
Pointers don’t just look at the prospective prey, they lift one foot and stick their tail up straight out. All on instinct, untrained. It’s remarkable.
I had Rat Terrier who could do it. It morphed into her watching our eyes to find a hidden treat or toy. I swear to god and a stack of important books she showed me with her eyes where the remote or my glasses were. She was an exceptional dog in many respects.
RIP Gracie. Super dog!
Moderator Note
This thread was bumped by a spammer who has since been wished away to the cornfield.
Oops. I still liked posting about my dog:)
Reminds me of my mom’s old Pembroke Welsh Corgi, Corky. She definitely knew how to use her eyes to both catch our gaze and then look meaningfully towards the leashes when she wanted to go outside. She also knew how to say the word “go” in a kind of high-pitched gulping yelp which sounded like a human saying the word while hiccuping. Most dogs learn words well enough to get excited when they hear “treat” or “outside” or “go” but how many learn to speak any of them?
And we like reading about your dog!
Beck’s always good value.
Plus, I love this thread - absolutely fascinating. But I’m aching to know (per post 19) - how the hell did the dolphins stash their tokens?
Anybody?
j
In a mermaid’s purse, I expect.
Ba dum, chhh!
Very funny. 
j
I’ve actually been experimenting (casually, for fun, with pet) rabbits to see what their love for treats can reveal about their hidden talents. Occasionally they will understand that a treat happened in proximity but missed any cues to where it ended up exactly. I then sometimes see how lazy I can be while still helping them find it. I have lucked out rarely with general direction pointing, but I got the impression that what was happening from the bunnies point of view was less “a direction communication towards treat!” and more “arm movement! Check for treat! Maybe accidentally change position enough in excitement for nose compass to kick in!” It also understands if I point directly, as in, touching the area where the treat is. And sometimes if I rustle or jingle the toy it’s in, the noise alone will tell it where to look.
I tend to think most trainable animals can easily grasp the idea that pointing a finger means to search, but I think the understanding that it is communicating a specific direction would probably take a lot of effort to distinguish from the simpler interpretations which lead to sufficient equivalent behavior.
That said, bees do interpretive dance using twerking to give complex directions, so…
It is just a piece of the hunting behavior chain of wolves (part of prey stalking) which humans have isolated and amplified. As retrieving, scent tracking, and herding also are.
I vividly remember the day I wanted my daughter, in a backpack at the time, to look up to appreciate the big ceiling fan in a museum. I pointed up (looking at her, not the fan), and she looked up. I’d trained many dogs by that time but she was my first kid. I was amazed, because although you can fairly easily teach dogs to follow a pointing finger, you do have to teach them. You don’t have to teach children.
I’ve seen a cat or two that will look where I’m pointing (at the bird outside the window, or a missed treat on the floor), but those instances seem to be remarkable for a cat. Usually, a cat will just sniff the end of your pointed finger.
I ‘taught’ my Siamese cats to extend their paw to my finger tip. Kinda of a target game. BIG mistake. If my hand moves at all when they are sitting with paw extends. If I reach up to push my glasses up, paw extends. If I walk by and they are anywhere near the height of my hand, paw extends. Occasionally a razor sharp talon nicks me.
I swear they laugh when it happens.
Cats can look where you’re pointing… provided your finger’s equipped with a laser.
My most recent dog learned to do this with a little training. My Border Collie just figured it out on his own. But he figured out a lot on his own. Border Collies are crazy smart.
I had one cat who would follow a finger pointing gesture, but it involved whole arm movement, my looking where I was pointing and verbal clues I’m sure. She is also my only cat that would usually come to me when I called her. Most cats I suspect even if they did understand the pointed finger would never let us know they know it.
I recently read a book about this:
Genius of Dogs
The author traveled to Siberia to do behavior experiments on domesticated silver foxes. The foxes were selectively bred based on only one trait: how readily would they approach humans. The author wanted to know if domesticated fox kits would understand pointing with no training, the way most puppies do. They did, even though they’d had no prior contact with humans (other than feeding and cage maintenance, same as the control group). He also tested the “control” kits - fox kits who had not been bred to approach humans and were presumably identical to their wild ancestors. The wild foxes did not understand pointing. (The experiments had to be done carefully to ensure that the wild foxes would not be at a disadvantage due to their fear of humans - they were first conditioned to not be afraid of the experimental set-up.)
It would appear that breeding animals to be comfortable around humans (ie, domestication) introduces this ability.
The author also tested bonobos in Africa; I believe he found that bonobos are better than chimps at understanding pointing.
Also, not all human cultures point with a finger, and of those that do, not all point with an index finger. Nose pointing and elbow pointing and chin pointing also exist (and probably other I can’t remember), and if you are around people like that, they don’t look at where a finger is pointing to. People can be trained to look where a finger is pointing, but if you’ve ever tried to train a person to do something, you’ll know it can be very difficult.
IME Huskies can be taught to follow a pointing finger to a treat near your feet, but they won’t follow it to something far away. They will, however, pick up on the movement of your chin and the direction of your gaze. German shepherds (in my universe of two) will appear to follow the point, but close observation also reveals that the pointing gesture just alerts them to follow your gaze.
Both sets will pick it up a lot more quickly if you just gesture with your chin and look where you want them to look.
I had a cat that would look if you lowered your forehead in the direction of what you wanted her to look at. Again, I don’t know if that’s all cats.