I quite understand it’s hard to give a generalized intelligence test especially between species, but it seems tere could be some general ones. A general test could see how much variation in behavior occurs to get to a goal such as food and how long it is remembered. The tests might not be enough to give a definitive answer but would maybe show dogs and cats are both smarter than say horses.
Dog story: My last dog was good at opening a swinging screen door (both in and out). There was some protective mesh and he would hook his nails in that and pull to open the door in and of course he could just push for it to swing out. This got complicated by the fact that I locked it with a deadbolt some of the time. The good part for me is that the door is on a spring so always shut itself after him.
I have a new, small cat (not quite a kitten, but not full grown). I had a plate of food on the coffee table and cat was curious. I told the cat “no” and pushed it off the table. It returned and was still curious. Repeated “no” and pushed again. It returned again, this time I said “no” and thumped it on the head. It backed off, squinted its eyes, shook it’s head and came back. “No”, thump. Back off, squint, shake, return. “no”, thump. Back off, squint, shake, return. “no”, thump. Back off, squint, shake, return. This happened 18 times! yes, I counted the thumps. After about 10 times, it squinted like it knew the thump was coming (which it was) and still proceeded toward my plate. It was hilarious! I’d say “no” and it would cringe, hunch it’s shoulders and close it’s eyes very tight, while still inching it’s nose toward my plate.
My point is the only thing the cat learned was that “no” preceeded a thump on the head. It never has, to this day, figured out the correllation between it’s actions and the thump. And for the purposes of animal intelligence, this illustrates the inablility of a cat to learn.
You tell a dog “no” and thump it on the head, it knows after a thump or two that whatever it’s doing, it shouldn’t be doing. Dogs figure it out. The understand “no” to mean “don’t do what your doing/about to do”. Cats are not smart enough to figure it out. When I tell the cat “no”, it just cringes, squeezes it’s eyes closed and goes about doing whatever it’s doing and ends up in the garage for the night.
And before the cat people say “he’s just playing you to get into the garage”, uh, no. He hates the garage. he runs when I open the door to the garage.
And what is it that makes you so sure that dogs are better? A key element in problem solving is the motivation. The animal must have some reason to want to solve the problem. Dogs, by nature, desire to please their masters, and cats do not. So if you give a dog a problem and make it clear that you want the dog to solve it, it’s going to try to solve it in order to please you. Do the same to a cat and it’ll sit there thinking, “What’s in it for me?” That doesn’t make the cat a bad problem solver, it just means it needs a better reason to try. Even using food or treats as the motivator is not equivalent. Because, again, cats just don’t (necessarily) have the same level of desire for food NOW that dogs do.
So in order to really determine which is the better problem solver, you’d have to set up an experiment in such a way that each had a similar level of motivation. Note that it’s level of motivation to the animal that’s important, not some particular motivation (like praise, food, play time, etc.) that looks the same to us.
Anecdotes about individual animals prove nothing. I have two cats that very clearly demonstrate that they know what “stop it” means, in a generalized sense. I.e. they know that “stop it” means they should stop whatever it is they’re doing, even when it’s something new.
They also clearly demonstrate that they understand differences in the tone of voice I use when I say their name. If I say “Bug!” in a somewhat high-pitched, drawn-out, happy way, she’ll come over to me and expect to be petted. But if I say “Bug!” in a lower-pitched, sharp, stern way, she’ll stop what she’s doing, often give out a little “mer-mer” of protest, and then walk away. She knows that the high-pitch means “come here if you want to be petted” and the low-pitch means the same as “stop it”.
On the other hand, I have a number of friends with dogs who, after years and years, still can’t get the dog not to bark at the doorbell and jump all over visitors. So my experience is pretty much the opposite of yours.
All serious discussion aside, I believe you’ve bred a Rat. (fink)
I have also had cats who’d fink each other out.
Proves nothing.
I’d suggest changes be made in the home-life environment to extinguish the morally questionable behavior.
'less you like playing Good Cop to your dog.
and, hey, nothing’s wrong with that.
That being said, I maintain that over the course of my life with cats and dogs I have determined that cats have a higher intelligence than dogs in general. I now live with three dogs, an old Kerry Blue Terrier and two Doodles. Never mind that the male Doodle is just a little guy in a dog suit.
I had a female cat who learned on her own to use the toilet because it observed me doing so and understood its purpose. That same cat was highly trainable - she could stay or come on command and learned to obey hand signals.
I had a male cat who learned to “meow” words like “rain”, which he used frequently when he was being called in from the rain. I had taught him to associate the phenomenon of rain with the word. It takes a modicum of patience and the appreciation that cats do have the ability to learn things like that. Believe it or not, he had a vocabulary of about six words, none of them very precise, but recognizable nonetheless. As he grew up, he realized that he was not actually human, and the lack of a voice box makes it difficult for cats to speak like we do so he stopped. He never tried to speak again as an adult cat.
My reasoning that cats are more intelligent is also based on their anatomy. Cat anatomy is actually more complex than human anatomy - they have more bones for one thing, and retractable claws which project from little hands with five “fingers”, and a very human-like endocrine system.
The convincing argument for cats being more intelligent is that unlike dogs, they learn primarily from observation, which requires deduction and logical reasoning. Dogs need to be trained. Anybody who doubts this abuot cats should see the video of a group of cats co-operating to open a French door off the patio to get inside a house on America’s Funniest home videos. That one is very compelling. They weren’t taught this, but learned it from observing how humans did it.
What we seem to be getting at here is that dogs are socially, usefully intelligent. They learn quickly what you teach simply. They can be made to perform roles you specify. Dog society is parallel to, part of, and relevant to, human society.
Cats’ intelligence is internal and idiosyncratic. Cat society is only parallel to ours in that we live together. Cats socialize with us, but they are not socially useful. Most will only perform roles intrinsic to them, like hunting.
But cats are undoubtedly intelligent (though there are dumb cats), as the examples here indicate. So are dogs, in many of the same ways.
It’s all a continuum, but if you value intelligence as social and useful, dogs win. If you value intelligence as intrinsic and intuitive, cats win.
As far as intelligence goes, you got me there. An argument could be made for either.
However, with no intention of hijacking this thread, I would offer up the theory that dogs are more like men and cats, more like women.
(following this train of thought, I’m referring to dogs as men and cats as women)
A dog will give you his undying love & loyalty for a few simply things.
If he likes you, maybe he’ll come up, sniff your crotch, decide you’re capable of giving him food and lick your face incessantly. Give him a few treats & rub his belly and he’s yours for life. He’ll come when called & generally obey… well, more like a child with raging ADHD (God help you if a squirrel runs by)
A cat, on the other hand, sees you coming & plans her entrance. She’ll pop into view, present herself and meow to get your attention. Thinking she is saying, “come pay attention to me! I want to be petted!” You go over and just before you can pet her, she runs away and hides. You might follow in a nonthreatening posture assuring her its okay, but she’ll keep running. She’s playing hard to get and likes to keep it that way. Only when she deems you worthy will she let you pet her. If she doesn’t like something you are doing or did, she’ll let you know indirectly, like knocking over your flowers or ravaging all the toilet paper in the house. She reads your emotion and plays on it for her benefit. Basically, once she has you, you’ve committed to a life of slavery.
Basically, a dog will give you his undying love unconditionally, but a cat will make you work for it.
According to the Swallowing String and Death thread, cats rampantly eat yarn, which their owners yank out their butts, killing the cats.
I didn’t see anyone mentioning a messy dog death from tinsel-pulling.
So, although I like and believe down to my bones that cats are smarter, just based on that one anecdotal thread, maybe we should give dogs another look…
And apparently you have never, to this day, learned that hitting an immature cat repeatedly is what civilised people call ‘abuse’.
Especially when you acknowledge that the cat in question “hasn’t figured out” your sophisticated Judeo-Christian guilt-based concepts of sin and retribution, yet you persist in ‘punishment’ for the ‘principle’ of it.
You also acknowledge that the cat hates and fears the garage, yet you repeatedly imprison him in there, presumably due to this same twisted ‘principle’ regarding ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ which, again, the cat couldn’t possibly ever stand a chance of understanding.
Do you actually understand that a cat is not a human, and incapable of “taking to heart the error of its ways”?
Thank you so much for resolving the question of which animal, out of cat, dog, and human, is the LEAST intelligent. :smack:
Please never own an animal again. Clearly you are a sadist and unworthy of such responsibility.
And if you have children, I truly pity them.
If you do breed, or if you have already, then for the sake of our own species, please choose adoption.
Dominique in Key West has had a trained cat act on the docks at sunset for years. They jump through hoops even flaming hoops. They walk a tight rope . Three of them sit on stools. At his signal .all 3 get up on their back feet and stand up. So cats can be trained .
