SENSORY CAPACITIES AND INTELLIGENCE OF DOGS 



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was this equivalent to understanding 

 words in the human sense? The question 

 as to whether a spoken word is a true 

 language element, or merely an auditory 

 stimulation of the non-language type, is 

 after all a highly technical one, and de- 

 pends in the last analysis upon an accept- 

 able definition of an elementary language 

 element. So far as the present writers 

 know a satisfactory distinction on this 

 point has not as yet been made. If we 

 define too strictly, many responses of the 

 human that we ordinarily think of as 

 language are probably not really such, 

 whereas a broader definition of the term 

 might easily overthrow the distinction 

 entirely. Perhaps we are here faced with 

 the usual difficulty of scientific classifica- 

 tion, where genuinely discrete elements 

 are not involved but only differences in 

 degree. May it not be that here as in 

 most cases we have not distinct classes 

 of stimuli — language vs. non-language — 

 but a graded series of stimulus situations 

 in which the application of arbitrary 

 classificatory criteria is almost worthless, 

 if not absolutely misleading? The prob- 

 lem is not strictly confined, moreover, to 

 studies of auditory responses in infra- 

 human forms. In the human infant and 

 young child it bobs up again and again 

 to disturb the human psychologist. A 

 genetic account of the development of 

 language in the child would undoubtedly 

 throw much light on our own problem. 

 Perhaps it would be found that in this 

 case words are responded to at first as 

 purely auditory stimuli, and as develop- 

 ment proceeds these sounds take on more 

 and more of the attributes which we have 

 come to associate in our thinking with 

 language in the more exact sense. 



As a result of the completion of this 

 first examination of the dog we issued the 

 following statement to the press in order 

 to avoid the usual scandal of newspaper 



accounts. That we were not able wholly 

 to escape will be seen when this statement 

 is compared with the headlines that have 

 appeared both at home and abroad in 

 connection with the test. 



We have just completed a test of an hour and a half 

 on "Fellow," the famous movie-actor dog and it is a 

 most remarkable dog in many respects. It is certain 

 that the dog obeys commands given by the human 

 voice with remarkable speed and facility. The 

 commands do not need to be given in any set order 

 as the dog has been taught so well that a routine line 

 of command and performance is not at all necessary. 

 This is the more surprising in view of the fact that no 

 punishment has been used in training the animal — he 

 has been given much the same treatment by Mr. 

 Herbert as one would give a child. 



One point is definitely settled — the dog docs not 

 require gesture in addition to the human voice, at 

 least in many of its performances. Mr. Herbert gave 

 commands from an adjoining room with the door 

 closed, and with no one but total strangers in the 

 room with the dog. The animal would go to the 

 window, go into another room and do various things, 

 pick out objects from among several, etc., when the 

 commands were given from the room in which Mr. 

 Herbert was concealed . 



One point remains to be settled, if indeed it can be 

 settled at the present state of our knowledge of animal 

 behavior. That is, does the dog understand words 

 in the human sense? This is a difficult point to settle 

 inasmuch as it is possible for an animal to obey com- 

 mands to words, not as words but as sounds. Such 

 tests as were made, that of changing the tone in 

 which the commands were given and of giving 

 confusion commands still leave the matter in doubt. 

 Personally we are of the opinion that the dog has 

 learned to associate certain sounds, rather than 

 words in the human sense, with the proper objects 

 and commands. However, the large number of 

 associations clearly mark the dog as most extra- 

 ordinary. 



(Signed) Professor C. J. Warden and 

 Dr. L. H. Warner. 



It will be noted that the statement is 

 in general conservative and contains no 

 comparison whatsoever between the intel- 

 ligence of Fellow and that of a child. 

 Such comparisons are manifestly absurd 

 since a common rating scale, or test 

 applicable to both has not yet been de- 



