And here I thought this thread was about recommending a dog to for the OP.
As I have owned only one dog in my life (black Standard Schnauzer for the record) I don’t have any direct/anecotal evidence to support or refute **lissener’s **argument. Having said that can I check a point with lissener?
Clearly human selective breeding has radically changed the physical characteristics of dogs such that, say, a Labrador and a Bulldog are clearly distinguishable and the defining variations are passed down through the generations. Lissener, is it your contention that this selective breeding has had no impact of the mental or behavioural characteristics of the breeds? (Not specifically “intelligence”. As already noted, what does this mean in a dog?) In other words are you proposing that, for instance, breeding and the breed have no impact on a Pointer’s ability to flush game or a Border Collie’s ability to round up sheep? That any breed of dog could be trained just as easily to do the same task? My understanding was that generations of breeders had selected and bred from animals to whom this came easily, reinforcing this behaviour in the breed.
The idea that selective breeding of different breeds has had no impact on their mental abiliities or behaviours seems unlikely to me. If you can select for size why would it not be possible to select for - say - being content sitting on a lap? We actually have clear evidence from the Novosibirsk studyof the domestication of silver foxes that “tameness” can be selected for. And if you can select for tameness, why not for intelligence?
Of course not. But absent empirical evidence, it seems unlikely to have achieved a level of difference sufficient to be a measurable determining factor beyond the individual. Especially since other canids also tend to be very intelligent. Selective breeding within this one species has certainly not gone on longer than the natural selection that speciated the family and genus that dogs belong to, so it’s difficult for me to believe that such an extreme change has occurred in that relatively limited time.
My experience, and my limited knowledge of science, keep me convinced that any perceived behavioral differences between breeds are far, far less of a factor–approaching, if not reaching, nil–than training and expectations.
Q: What color album cover should I buy to get the best music?
A: There’s no correlation between album color and quality of music.
BigT*: Just answer the question.
Fine, if the OP and Zsofia and Sailboat et al. want IMHO-style anecdotal answers, which is the only possible response to the OP without actually discussing the nature of the correlation, I’ll give it to them: The smartest small dog I ever trained was a mutt. The second smartest was a Schipperke.
*Speculative quote; BigT did not literally say this.
Keep a thread on track? Why start with this one?
Wow. Two terrible analogies in one thread. Well, done, liss.
Did you look at the link regarding the domestication of the silver foxes? Here we have absolutely clear empirical evidence of canid behaviour being changed in less than 60 years.
Who said there were no aspects of behavior that are hereditary in humans? I’m sure there are many. Why wouldn’t there be? You seem to be taking the position that there is no genetic element to behavior – is that the case?
They are not as vague as human races at all. As someone else noted, human races are based more on culture than on evolutionary history. Groups labeled as “black” may share a closer history to some groups labeled as “white” than some other groups that are labeled as “black.” This is what happens when you come up with races based on one superficial characteristic such as skin color. Dog breeds are based on them having a different evolutionary history (through careful artificial selection, inbreeding, etc.) Would you expect a Mastiff to be equally genetically similar on average to another mastiff as to a Chijuajua?
Sure, it can, but that wasn’t the point. You said something along the lines of, “if dog breeds show differences in intelligence/behavioral patterns, then why wouldn’t human races also show that?” I then said,“There is a mechanism (selective breeding) to account for behavioral differences in dogs, but I don’t see what the mechanism would be in humans.” Natural selection can account for intelligence being selected for, but how does it account for DIFFERENCES in intelligence between groups? Why would intelligence selected for more in one population than another? Who knows, there may be differences, but I don’t see how you would see differences anything like that between various breeds of dogs.
(1) Human races have not evolved separately for millions of years.
(2) Again, you wont see big differences due to natural selection unless there are differences in selective pressures between the groups. What are these differences?
In whatever case, it’s highly unlikely that differences in intelligence have occurred anywhere near the level of distinctions sworn to by many breed fanciers, if there’s any measurable distinction between breeds at all. And certainly not to the level of distinction that can give the OP anything even approaching a definitive answer.
As to the fox experiment, it seems just as likely that any behavioral differences achieved through selective breeding, insofar as they are measurable, are more likely to have occurred across the entire C. l. familiaris species, as they have with the foxes. Especially a specific trait like intelligence, rather than a less distinct trait like domesticity.
Again, my personal experience, and what little I know about science, continues to confirm my observations that inborn differences in dog intelligence are far, far less significant at the individual level than training.
The contrary evidence included in this thread is more in the nature of questions than answers.
The OP remains unanswerable as stated.
Why is it highly unlikely? Dog breeds display frankly astonishing variation in size and strength; I find it almost laughable that you admit selective breeding can produce a chihuahua one tenth the size of the first domesticated canids, but not that it can produce a terrier with 50% more intelligence.
“Laughable” is about you, not about me. The burden of proving the outrageous possibility of a 50% difference in intelligence is on you, not me.
You’re making extraordinary claims, not us.
I think you’ve missed my point. The experiment clearly shows that a behavioural trait “tameness” can be selected for. I’m just saying that if one behavioural trait can be selected for so can another - intelligence. I have no idea why you see tameness as less specific than intelligence. As others have said there is no single measure of canine intelligence: speed of learning tricks? number of commands understood? ability to solve puzzles?
I’ve shifted my position somewhat to saying that “an individual’s behavior and trainability” is what we’re really talking about when we discuss what we call “intelligence” in dogs. I’m choosing to de-emphasize “problem-solving ability”…maybe replacing it with “initiative” might better suit my thinking (i.e., some dogs defer to humans too much to use their brainpower to make independent decisions, rather than “are stupid.”)
Hmm. The difference seems obvious enough to me that I’m able to explain it.
I think it has something to do with the fact that I see increased intelligence as an “upgrade,” and tameness as a “downgrade.” A weakening, rather than a strengthening. Since domestication and selective breeding are by definition inbreeding, I don’t have much problem accepting that such weakenings occur over time. Weakening through inbreeding is hardly unheard of in purebred dogs: collies go blind, dalmatians go deaf, etc. I’m not prepared to believe that a few centuries of inbreeding can lead to an improvement, after millions of years of natural selection selecting for intelligence, probably more than any single trait among dogs. (No cite for that; just an opinion.)
To the degree that there is any measurable difference in intelligence that aligns with breed distinctions–a theory I’m not able to accept, after my own experience–but for the sake of argument: to the degree that there is any difference, it can only be by a *decrease *in intelligence in some dogs. And if that’s so, what’s the friggin point? If you can show me empiric evidence that there’s a variation in breed intelligence, you can only possibly be showing me that some breeds have been inbred to the point of retardation. But again, while I’ve seen that in some dogs, mostly in my experience the purest of purebreeds, I haven’t seen it in one breed more than another.
So even if you can prove me wrong, which I haven’t seen yet, I’d call it a pyrrhic victory; you’d only be proving the longterm damage caused by inbreeding.
You’re talking about Guns, Germs, and Steel, right? I like Jared Diamond, but the part about the intelligence of his New Guinean friends always seemed a little odd to me. Who knows, maybe it is true, but it seemed out of place. it seemed more of a hunch on his part, rather than any sort of supported science, and it seemed to be sort of… thrown in with the rest of the book.
Years later, someone in the field related to me their feelings that Diamond largely put that in there to distance himself from environmental determinists of the past whose ideas were now criticized for being somewhat racist. That is, by making such a bold statement in the other direction, he could assure his audience that he was unlike these past scientists and head off any criticisms of that nature right from the start. Apparently, he has a habit of making statements like that before many of his talks as well.
:smack:
This is nonsense. There’s no “upgrading” or “downgrading”. That’s a purely emotional judgment that has nothing to do with reality. What matters - the ONLY thing that matters - is which traits will make the animal more likely to pass their genes on to the next generation. In artificial selection, we make that choice, so the most fit animal is the one that we like the best.
lissener, you’ve said repeatedly that you don’t know much science. You’ve also demonstrated it more than admirably with every post. I DO know a lot about science. I’m working on a PhD in evolutionary genomics.
You don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re wrong. Completely, totally wrong. Stop talking.
That’s never stopped him before, so why should he start now?
Wow, **lissener **hijacks a thread with his own brand of crazy. That’s *never *happened here before!
IME your choice of pronoun is appropriate. Male dogs tend to be clingier and more prone to separation anxiety .