What is 'The Truth about Dogs'?

Author provides insight into the mind of man's best friend

In this story: Making friends Holding on to the inner wolf How smart is your dog? RELATED STORIES, SITES

By Helyn Trickey
Interactivity Editor

ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- It may seem that humans have tamed dogs. They come when we call (most of the time, anyway), and serve as our helpmates, accessories, companions, and all-around good buddies.

But -- let's face it -- dogs are the world's biggest moochers and the most obsequious of social climbers. Several thousand years ago, when man was still barely dressed and probably still drooling, dogs captured our hearts, and soon after the bed, couch and La-Z-Boy recliner.

Did man tame the dog? It seems like it's the other way around.

How and why this relationship exists is something that author Stephen Budiansky examines in his new book, "The Truth About Dogs." The book dispels a number of misconceptions about Canis familiaris.

According to Budiansky, the ancient Egyptians tried to domesticate many types of animals. Though wolves, wild horses and rabbits made the cut, bison, zebra and squirrels were less enthusiastic about joining our ranks. They remained wild.

	INTERACTIVE
What is your dog trying to tell you?

In fact, Budiansky says in his book, "out of more than 4,000 species of mammals and 10,000 of birds that have inhabited the earth for the last 100,000 years, only about a dozen have entered into a domestic relationship with man."

So how did this unlikely pairing happen in the first place? Thousands of years ago, Budiansky points out, wolves and humans shared the same hunting territories. Wolf and human remains dating back 400,000 years have been found in close proximity to each other.

But dogs are distinctly not wolves. Instead, Budiansky writes, our tail-wagging friends are a hybrid of the wolf, a "proto-dog" that slowly separated from wolf packs to follow human hunters and scavenge our camps. At night, Budiansky surmises, perhaps they gathered at the outskirts of a human dwelling to share the warmth of the fire.

"Those wolf populations that were less fearful and more subservient in their approach toward man would have gained an edge in the Darwinian struggle for survival," he says in his book.

In some ways dogs have moved leaps and bounds away from their wolf ancestry, yet in several important ways they hold on to traditional wolf behavior. For instance, dogs, like wolves, cling to an innate social ranking system. They want to know which dog, or human, is the "alpha," or top dog. Indeed, many of the most common aggression problems in dogs can be traced back to confusion over dominance, says Budiansky in a phone interview from his home in Virginia.

"Sometimes a dog will come up and nose you and demand to be petted and that is a dominance encounter," he says. "When dogs jump up on people and put their paws on your shoulder, that is clearly a dominant move from the dog's point of view."

Many dog behaviors we think are "cute" or "smart" are actually tests of the social hierarchy in our living quarters. Once a dog thinks he has won several dominance challenges, it is difficult to put him back in his rightful secondary place in the "pack."

Budiansky asserts that aggressive dog behavior can, for the most part, be attributed to mismatched signals about dominance between man and dog.

"There are dogs that are most assuredly more aggressive breeds than others," he says. "Even dogs in the same breed can be more aggressive than others, but dogs are essentially social climbers, always testing limits. If he (the dog) is given a warning growl, dogs know to back off."

Another way man sizes up his canine companion is when he tries to determine Fido's intelligence. Some breeds, deemed to be the brightest of the bunch, bask in the spotlight of popularity, such as Jack Russell terriers, Labrador retrievers and border collies.

But Budiansky says humans are unfair to dogs when we assess animal intelligence by our standards.

"It is a very self-centered way of looking at it," he says. "We think a dog is smart when it does what we want it to -- when you see the dog do something that we characterize as smart from our point of view. But things they do that are smart for them are not credited. For instance, the tracking skills used by some dogs are quite remarkable."

Something that's even more remarkable, Budiansky says, is the relationship between us and our dogs. It's amazing, he says, that we have learned to co-exist in a world we both view so differently.

The best way to enjoy our canine pals, he says, is to learn more about the way they perceive the world and their role in it. If we can learn to revel in our dog's silly, cold-nosed, cock-eared, wild-eyed glory, we will be the richer for it.

Dog and owner duet judged 'howling success'
November 13, 2000
Dogs, like people, suffer from weekend sports injuries
October 24, 2000
Assistance dogs are trained as partners for the disabled
August 10, 2000
Dog sledding at the tip of South America
September 1998

The Virtual Dog Show
The Dog Hause -- A playground for pets and pet lovers
Complete List of Dog-related Email Lists
Welcome to uComics featuring Citizen Dog
Dog Breed Information Center

Note: Pages will open in a new browser window

External sites are not endorsed by CNN Interactive.