Preface
This entry is an extract from a book I have recently written with title ‘How to talk to your robot dog’.
See link at end of post for more details of this publication.
Understanding the ‘canine persona’ has moved from in depth observations of behaviour to measurements made using state of the art brain scanning technology. Such high tech research, however, is very much seen as something on the outer fringes of orthodox science research.
The format of the book ‘How to talk to your robot dog’ uses a ‘question and answer’ format which works well to communicate specific details of the subject matter. In this format the questions are answered by the ‘robot dog’ and the text is in italics.
Details of the story line relate to findings of Gregory Berns in his book ‘What It’s Like to be a Dog’ – which contains some interesting insights into our four legged friends.
QUESTION: Are there examples of how modern technology is providing fresh perspectives on canine behaviour and sensory systems?
ANSWER: To date, most assessments of canine cognition have related to direct observation of traits and characteristics involving human interaction. Modern technology, however, which has for some time been used to reveal the cognitive pathways in the human brain, is now beginning to be used in animal studies – notably in dogs. Specific work has, for example, been undertaken to investigate the neural connections associated with the sense of smell in dogs. Using a technique known as fMRI (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging), multiple areas of the canine brain can be observed to ‘light up’ in an MRI scanner when specific tasks related to the sense of smell are being undertaken. This is due to increased blood flow associated with higher levels of neuronal activity. The relative response from these centres, however, varies with the nature and level of intensity of the test scent, indicating that there are hidden levels of complexities involved in this sense in dogs. Recent research has shown that the administration of zinc nanoparticles with test scents tends to enhance the sensitivity of the dog. One theory relating to this effect is that such nanoparticles enhance the ‘electron tunnelling’ effect considered to be a factor in odour detection. This could provide a means of enhancing the olfactory sensitivity of dogs for specialist applications. Separate studies, again using fMRI techniques, have suggested that where dogs can detect separate scents A and B, the mixture of A + B is probably sensed as a separate scent and not as an awareness of its separate components.
In addition, fMRI studies have shown that separate centres in the canine brain manage human facial feature analysis and canine facial feature analysis. This duality of facial recognition has presumably taken place over the period of domestication of the dog, where it became a necessity to be able to recognise individual humans. Thus this neural function in dogs of human facial recognition, is already ‘wired’ up to cope with the life of domestication with humankind. There are probably, also other areas of ‘duality’ for ‘behaviour with humans’ and ‘behaviour with dogs’ that have been acquired over time but have not yet been validated. Is, for example, the ability of dogs to effortlessly ‘blend in’ with human society one of these evolutions of neural mapping and which is ‘wired up’ and ready to roll prior to any human contact?
QUESTION: How did technologies such as fMRI come to be used in this way to investigate canine behaviours?
ANSWER: The first such fMRI scans were undertaken by Gregory Berns in 2014. From observation of the abilities of dogs trained in military roles, he correctly guessed that dogs could be trained to be motionless in the noisy environment of an MRI scanner for extended periods. This was identified as an essential requirement for such studies.
QUESTION: What did the initial studies show?
ANSWER: There was an attempt to replicate some of the basic cognitive tests used on human subjects. This was set up by prompting dogs to actively undertake an action, such as ‘poking’ a target with its nose or being instructed not to ‘poke’ the target through use of visual cues. Dogs were initially trained in such tasks in a ‘mock-up’ of an MRI scanner tunnel, in order to be able to respond appropriately to the prompts during the real experiment. The initial study in a series of dogs confirmed that the separate instructions to the dog were seen to activate separate regions of the dog’s brain, confirming that the technique of fMRI could be applied to more general studies in dogs. This early phase of work is outlined in the book ‘What it’s like to be a dog’ by Gregory Berns. It should also be noted that Gregory Berns would subsequently also use a technique called Diffuser Tensor Imaging (DTI) to investigate the structural mapping of animal brains – including dogs. This technique essentially used post mortem specimens due to the lengthy scan periods involved. This DTI technique detected the direction of preferred diffusion of water molecules in such structures and provided information on how bundles of neurons are physically connected within the anatomy of the brain. Such studies provided insight into how such brains had been structurally organised, revealing varied adaptions to specific environments. The brain sizes of dogs tested in this way were typically comparable with that of a ‘lemon’, and where there were similarities with human brains in mapping of various functions.
QUESTION: What has been the impact of these findings on related science subjects?
ANSWER: There was been ‘polarisation’ between scientists in the field of animal neuroscience where one group identifies the findings are highly relevant and another group that dismisses such investigations as of little value in terms of insight into the level of awareness of dogs and of animals in general. The body of evidence of such investigations, however, is steadily increasing, though the research field is probably not regarded as a prestigious field of endeavour.
QUESTION: Have there been any useful observations about general interaction of humans with dogs?
ANSWER: Observations relating to the use of language would seem particularly relevant. Dogs can be made familiar with specific sets of words, and fMRI scans can identify an area of a dog’s brain that is active for familiar words and another separate area which is active for unfamiliar words. There is the suggestion that dogs have difficulty identifying words which relate to ‘objects’ and words that relate to ‘actions’ and where words are usually interpreted as ‘actions’.
QUESTION: Are there consequences associated with this research?
ANSWER: Such work has provided the Animal Rights movement with what is claimed as objective evidence of the ability of animals to experience essentially many of the basic emotions and feelings experienced by humans.
QUESTION: How mature is the research field?
ANSWER: It is likely that with developments in technology and observational techniques, new findings will continue to increase understanding of animal cognition.
Link
Just search in Google for ‘How to talk to your robot dog’. This will find the title in Amazon as a paperback or Kindle.
