Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Broadcasting intimate details and useless information from an undisclosed location in New York City. The Last Show with David Cooper. We've all seen the videos online, they circulate, of dogs pressing buttons to talk to their humans. But are they communicating ideas or are they just very good at pushing buttons?
Let's look at what the science says about how well dogs understand language, or at least button language, here with Dr. Holly Molinaro, an animal welfare consultant at Animal Wellbeing Solutions. Holly, welcome into the program.
Thank you.
I'm always very skeptical when I see like a crow playing tic-tac-toe, a chicken playing tic-tac-toe, a dog pressing buttons like they know, you know, oh, I'm ready for a walk or I'm happy. I think they've just memorized what to do to get a treat. I am skeptical. But people have actually researched this, haven't they?
Yes, it's actually interesting because the researchers even doing the science on this stuff, it's really looked down upon in the scientific literature. People are like, most scientists are like, absolutely no way. But that means we don't really have a lot of science about it.
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Chapter 2: What do dogs really mean when they press buttons?
And then there's some like the button pressing companies want to fund science to... Big dog button has got an agenda?
Oh boy.
Yes, it does.
So there's not that much research on it right now. But what we know about dogs in general and like language and animals and all that stuff is that I think you're right to be skeptical. Dogs can learn. They're very smart. They can learn a lot of things. Like we used to train our dog at home to ring bells to go outside when you had to go to the bathroom.
So we can train dogs to press a bunch of buttons to tell us, you know, treats, outside, walk. But when it starts to go into, oh, my dog's telling me a complex story with sentence structure, then I'm like, I don't think so.
That's where they've lost you. Animals can learn, press this, get that. I mean, but that doesn't show like a deep understanding of grammar. And it's more like a concept of, oh, button pressed, treat got. Is that kind of like... Exactly. But these videos online, they're pretty convincing. Do you think they're fake or the creator took a thousand takes?
Like, we've got, I don't know if it's good evidence, but we've got some evidence that dogs are maybe smarter than we think. But, okay, so... I'm interested in why scientists look down at this research. That seems very unscientific to me.
Yeah, so I think it's because of those videos online where it's like the dog is saying, I had a dream about wandering through the clouds or something like that. And then scientists are like, there's no way that dogs can tell us about their dreams. So yeah, I think that's why scientists for a long time just didn't even want to touch it.
Because if they did, I even know of a scientist who wanted to research it. And his other scientist friends were like, don't you dare. Oh, wow.
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Chapter 3: How do scientists view research on dog communication?
I imagine like if your dog could talk, they would not be saying much other than like, oh, I like the smell of that. Oh, that dog looks scary. Oh, I'm frustrated right now. Oh, I'm hyperactive. I want to be taken outside. Like, I'd like to think if my cat were able to speak, he would say these profound things, but they would probably just be pretty dumb thoughts, to be honest.
Yeah. To us, they would be dumb thoughts because we're like, do you have anything else to say? But they have such a just a different inner working life than we do. And so maybe if we don't even probably don't even have the buttons to, you know, create to to understand what they're trying to say or think.
I've seen videos of parrots. They seem like they can speak English. Are they smarter than dogs or are they just really good at like saying what we want to hear and making it seem like they're communicating to us?
Yeah, parrots, it's a whole different thing. They're just really good at copying what we say. And they're also very smart. Parrots are just, again, you always have to think about animals. When it comes to animal behavior, you have to think about them in terms of what works for their evolution. So with parrots, they developed this great repertoire of copying speech to help them out evolutionarily.
Dogs didn't need that. So they just have a different type of smarts.
Now, owners that get their dogs buttons, I never know how to say that properly. Is there a risk they're kind of over-interpreting what the pets are quote unquote saying?
Yes. So again, if you get like buttons for like go for a walk, bathroom, food, that I think makes sense. It's actually a great way to like communicate with your dog. If like you are having a hard time learning their signs, you can train them for these buttons. I see no harm in that.
But when I see those huge boards and there's words like clouds and things like that, I just, I think it's more about the human at that point than the dog.
And what does that say about their humans? They're really looking to treat their pets as if they're other humans when they're just not?
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Chapter 4: Can dogs truly understand complex language?
I hope I didn't press too many of your buttons during this interview.
Yeah, no worries. All good.
Welcome to Survivor 50. February 25th on Global. We chose you to represent 25 years of the greatest adventure on television. It's the biggest season ever. The twist is going to open a Pandora's box. Now I see Zach Brown on Survivor. Welcome to Survivor. Mr. Beast. Feels a little like a high school reunion meets a massacre. Survivor 50th season. Wednesday, February 25th on Global.
Stream on Stack TV.
Thank you.
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