The Smartest Dog in the World (60 Minutes)
 

Pretty cool! :)

The smartest dog in the world - CBS News

http://www.dognition.com

I watched 60 Minutes tonight just to see that story. Chaser, was that his name? What a precious, smart doggie! He and his elderly owner sure have it going on, don't they?

That is so cool. I just watched the whole story online, and then looked up and it is now playing on my tv.

I wonder how many of us will now test our dogs? I know that my Tiki is more telepathic than any of my other dogs, and I actually have to be careful what I am thinking about sometimes, cause she knows.

I've done the pointing to the hidden treat under one of two cups on either side of me and Tibbe has gone to the one I point to - even if it's not the one with the treat under it - every time. But he's been going to where I point all his life to get things, as all dogs do. But I'd like to try some of the other tests that guy talked about on the show.

What a great article! Thanks for sharing :) I am looking forward to referencing that link tommorow and playing some of these tests with my little lady- how fun!

That's AWESOME. I'm watching it now from the link.

I wonder how he's motivating the dog. I can't teach anything without treats. I know some dogs who will do anything to play with a toy. But Chase is doing it with no real reward. He's not playing with the toys. He's just doing what his owner tells him to do.

Very cool. Thanks for the link, FE!

I thought it was interesting that they said there is not much study done on dog's brains, yet they study extensively monkeys, dolphins, etc.

I wonder if the new studies now will differentiate between different dog breeds.

The sweetest thing the owner said, when asked "how do you think of Chase", and he answered as my child. We all know that feeling very well!

Yeah, loved that :) And I like how the studies validate what people think -- that their dogs really do love them.

Oh, and I like how I just won the last person to post thread.

Very interesting indeed, I will have to try some of these techniques. Since I have Cody he knows the names of about 20 toys, but it's only the ones that he will occasionally play with. He has his fav. toys and will find them when he's told go get the .....Thank you for sharing this video.

I've come to the conclusion that Chaser, like other smart dogs with involved trainers who work almost daily training their dogs using positive reinforcement, has a developed, learned ability to physically enjoy the learning, training process, through the vehicle of his training, made so rewarding for him that his brain stimulates his body to produce a reward hormone in his system that makes him feel good.

Tibbe has it - he adores learning and working for the joy of just doing it. He did NOT start out that way, worked solely for treats at first, but now he is always pestering me to "train" and gets such joy from it that the work of learning and doing is its own reward. And just like human elastic brains, it appears that the more dogs learn under rewarding conditions, the faster and more they enjoy learning. It's like winning a game to them. And the dog learns in the process that doing what his trainer asks of him keeps the good feeling rolling so he keeps doing what the trainer requests.

Just my theory but I've seen it work in more than one dog who works and obeys just for the joy of it.

Recognizing over ONE THOUSAND toys seems almost unbelievable to me! Just wow! Yes, I do wonder if Chaser just likes to learn? I haven't been around too many of them to know what they are like, just wondering how they differ cognitively versus our Yorkies.... :)

I love this subject - dog learning. Chaser probably learned to like learning, as most dogs can do, given the right circumstances. He might have a larger brain than other dogs his size or larger portions of his brain devoted to memory than other dogs but likely the ability to learn and remember is present in all dogs, especially the larger, working/herding/retrieving breeds - when its developed on a consistent basis and the dog begins to see rewards for himself in the process of learning what his owner teaches him and then he begins to feel good about the entire process and want more. But with the working/herding/retrieving dogs, I wonder if their amazing learning abilities are largely the product of their training/working with humans due to human needs plus simply larger memory/cognitive centers in the brain over smaller dog.

I've never known trainer/owners as devoted to working with their dog in learning to identify objects and obey words as Chaser's owner/trainer but I have known some very happy dogs over the years who loved to learn and obey, many of them small and toy breeds.

My sister had a standard poodle that was absolutely brilliant at understanding and appropriately reacting to spoken words and seemed to be able to think in some concepts. He was jealous of my sister talking on the telephone and Buffy concluded that going into another room, taking that phone off the hook with his mouth and barking into it until my sister would come for him, thus interrupting the conversation, worked to stop her long conversations better than anything else he tried! I've been on the other end of the line when that happened.

Do I remember correctly that the piece said his owner worked with Chaser 5 hours a day teaching him since he was about 5 months old so it could be repetition and rewards has just worn pathways of rote-like response in his brain over his nine years of life. Wasn't there another dog who could remember up to 750 toy names covered in one of those same type pieces years back?

And I'd be willing to bet, Chaser almost never misbehaves as well-trained, happy dogs rarely do.

Yes, I stopped on 5 hours a day too! All the training classes I've taken suggested short sessions, 30 minutes a day max! They were probably just trying to make it easy on us trainers. It makes sense that a dog would LOVE to work with someone 5 hours a day instead of sleeping all the time.

Haha. I don't know any other owner/trainer who works that long training a dog - certainly not me. Wow! I bet Chaser now sees it all as fun work rather than anything boring. But beginning and "continuing education" training sessions I have always kept very short to 3 -5 minute sessions a few times a day to keep the dog attention from wandering. But as Chaser's owner is a retired psychology prof and interested in investigating dog's mental abilities, he seems very dedicated to his and Chaser's mission to show the world how smart dogs can be.

Besides being a smarty-pants, Chaser is a cutiepie, too. Sweet dog smile on his face!

Border Collies are certainly a 'special' kind of breed, too. They also sweep all the doggie intelligence tests, followed by poodles and german shepherds. They were bred to work hours and hours each day. So breed definitely comes into play in this case, I think, but it's also of course the amazing bond and time spent between owner and dog. :)