Do Dogs Dream? by Stanley Coren

Author:Stanley Coren
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Published: 2012-06-18T16:00:00+00:00

PART 4

How Do Dogs Learn?

Compared to Other Animals,

How Smart Are Dogs?

JUST HOW INTELLIGENT are dogs when we look at their mental abilities relative to other animals, or even in comparison to other mammals? Comparing the intelligence of animals of different species is difficult, although certain tests and problem sets have proven to be useful. However, making the tests equivalent for, say, a dolphin that lives in the water and a horse that lives on land is complicated and may prove to be virtually impossible. Charles Darwin claimed, “Intelligence is based on how efficient a species became at doing the things they need to survive,” but one might argue that by that definition, all species that stay healthy, remain numerous, and avoid extinction are equally intelligent.

Such problems have prompted psychologists and biologists to look for a technique to assess intelligence that doesn’t require specific tests or even the cooperation of the animals involved. It starts with the argument that a bigger brain must be better, since it allows more memory storage and faster processing because it has more neurons and neural connections. For example, a person with a brain size of 1,500 cubic centimeters would have an average six hundred million more cortical neurons than a person with a brain size of 1,400 cubic centimeters. So the first guess might be that animals that have bigger brains must be smarter.

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