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Browsing articles in Marc Bekoff
Dog Culture: Reviews
By Raymond Coppinger and Lorna Coppinger
Dogs, dogs, and more dogs: Fact, fiction, or something in between?
In their book, Ray and Lorna Coppinger promise a startling new understanding of many matters pertaining to canines, including how the domestic dog became a separate species from the wolf. Coppinger is a behavioral ecologist, he and his wife have studied dogs for many years, and their book is filled with personal stories.
The...
Blog: Guest Posts
We need more research to really know so right now we should keep the door open
(This post is a response to Which Emotions Do Dogs Actually Experience? by Stanley Coren, Ph.D., F.R.S.C.)
Dogs are amazing nonhuman animal beings (animals) and anyone who's known a dog knows this. Just today Dr. Stanley Coren published a very interesting essay called "Which Emotions Do Dogs Actually Experience?" and concluded, among other things:
"However, we know that the...
Dog Culture: Reviews
Dispelling the Myths of Dog Training
Many books about dogs cross my desk, and a few immediately catch my eye. Often, it’s simply a title or a cover photo that attracts my attention. Mark Derr’s How the Dog Became the Dog was one of the more recent ones, as was Stephen Budiansky’s The Truth About Dogs some years ago. Unfortunately, Budiansky’s book had so many errors in it that I became suspicious of any book with the word “truth” in...
Blog: Guest Posts
LA is considering a ban on the sale of commercially-bred animals
Despite laws and regulations protecting companion animals, these magnificent beings still can be treated very abusively with little to no penalty to their human guardians (aka owners) because in the eyes of the law they and other nonhuman animals (animals) are considered to be mere property.
In an earlier essay I wrote about the staggering number of homeless animals who need a safe home and puppy...
Blog: Guest Posts
We all need someone we can lean on, and so do they.
Last night I watched a most wonderful documentary about the many ways in which rescued dogs can help rescue humans, each of whom needs someone to lean on. It's called Shelter Me. A synopsis of the docmentary can be seen here. A snippet should be all that's needed to get you to watch it:
"The first episode shows how shelter pets are helping our returning war veterans cope with PTSD. We go inside...
Blog: Guest Posts
A great place to explore and enrich our interrelationships with other animals
“…animals are always the observed. The fact that they can observe us has lost all significance.” (John Berger, About Looking, 1980)
Our relationships with other nonhuman animals (aka animals) move us all over the place. We love some, hate others and are indifferent to a wide range of fascinating species. Animals intrigue and inspire us and as we inquire about who they are we learn much about who...
Blog: Guest Posts
Social dominance is real but has been widely misunderstood and misused
The concept of social dominance is not a myth. A myth is an invented story. The concept of dominance has been, and remains, a very important one that has been misunderstood and misused, often by those who haven't spent much time conducting detailed studies of other animals, including those living in the wild.
Dominance is a fact. Nonhuman (and human) animals dominate one another in a number...
Blog: Guest Posts
Idaho is considering this sick possibility
Just as I was preparing for a nice relaxing evening I received an email telling me that there is a bill pending in Idaho that will allow ranchers to use live bait, including dogs, to lure in wolves so they can be killed. For a summary of articles about this sickest of sick ideas, please click here and here.
You can register your point of view (nicely, please) but time is of the essence....
Dog Culture: Readers Write
The human-dog interconnection is the way forward
Our relationships with animals are challenging, complicated, frustrating, awkward, ambiguous, paradoxical and range all over the place.We already know a lot about animals’ lives and what they want, more than we often give ourselves credit for. Indeed, their lives aren’t all that private, hidden or secret.We know that animals experience deep feelings, and care about what happens to them.When...
Good Dog: Studies & Research
Of course they do
One of the hottest questions in the study of animal behavior is, “Do animals have emotions?” And the simple and correct answer is, “Of course they do.” Just look at them, listen to them and, if you dare, smell the odors that pour out when they interact with friends and foes. Look at their faces, tails, bodies and, most importantly, their eyes. What we see on the outside tells us a lot about what’...
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