• samus12345@lemmy.world
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    11 months ago

    I’m more of a cat person, but I always thought it was really cool how well dogs and humans can communicate from 30,000 years of living together. I remember hearing about an experiment that showed dogs could read human body language (even humans they didn’t know) better than chimps, our closest relatives.

    • LazaroFilm@lemmy.world
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      11 months ago

      My dog knows when my wife gets a panic attack before me. She’s not a service dog or anything. Je was not trained for it. But if she starts hyperventilating or sobbing, she will go to her and boop her and try to put weight on her to comfort her. Sometimes it’s great sometimes it’s annoying but every time she gets a compliment.

    • WarmSoda@lemm.ee
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      11 months ago

      Cats can too. My cat reads my body language and understands some words.

      If I say treats she bolts from wherever she was sleeping right to me. Are you hungry brings her to the food bowl. Time for bed sends her off to the bedroom waiting for me.

      I think it says more for our own intelligence that we can create languages that other animals understand than anything. The chimp thing is interesting though. Another thing that always stuck with me is that throughout all the times people have tried teaching chimps sign language they’ve never once asked a human a single question.

      Dogs and cats seem to ask what we mean sometimes. Maybe chimps are just really dumb.