Does your family dog . . . .

I don't know about a conscience, but I do believe she's knows a little about yes and no through learned behaivor training.

 

Our family dog my growing up years was Calvinist. It was totally depraved.

 

No. My cats are refreshingly simple. Their little cat brains are ruled by:

1. What I want.

tempered by:

2. What my humans will yell at me for.
3. What my humans will stop me from doing/take away from me.

Generally they want to be petted, to play, to sleep, and to eat. They get yelled at for scratching at the window blinds, jumping on the kitchen counters, stealing from the trash can, scratching the furniture, being too nosy at meal times, or meowing and scratching the bedroom door at 5:30 in the morning. They are stopped from eating yummy stuff they stole from the trash or off the counter or from eating inedibles.

They see this as The Way Things Are, and don't feel the least bit guilty for stealing my pork chop off the counter.

 

Petrel,
My inside cat is Calvinist because from the foundation of the world, it was ordained that the cat would scratch the side of my couch to shreads.

Now the dog on the other hand is Arminian. He chooses when he tells us he needs to go out and when he does not.

The outside cat is obviously a pre-trib cat. Havent seen him in weeks.

The parakeet is an ordained minister. He leads a chorus of "Showers of Blessings" every time we let him out of the cage.

 

Yup to the above. All of the above!

King: four years old. Will pick up things and hand them to me on command. Will sit, stay, come, lie down. Will not be quiet. When I am not there, anything goes and it's probably fun. When I get upset with something, his basic attitude is "Come now, you don't really mean that, do you?" with tail madly wagging.

Dusty: a year old. WILL be quiet on command. Will sit, stay, come, lie down, speak on command. Will also eat birch trees, liquidambers, strawberry tree parts, and door mats. Takes socks outside to play with. He is a natural excavation machine. A total people dog who once practically gave some poor man a heart attack when he ran up to a truck that was turning around in the driveway across from us and jumped up to the open window on the driver's side and gave him a lot of licking. Cowers properly when I get upset, which King doesn't do. But cheerfully goes back to being a dog again.

What they don't want is for me to be upset with them. What they do want is to be doggy. They are eager to make me happy, which is neat, and both respond well to training. But it is far more a matter of pleasing me "the alpha female" than of any sense of right and wrong or of conscience.

We also take care of Tia, Gina's dog, while she and the kids are gone everyday. Tia is a rescue dog (from the streets) and is still gaining a little weight to try to hide her ribs. She cannot stand being away from people and is eager to please. A sweetie who seems quite intelligent and responsive. But a dog from the inside out, and not part human!

 

She definitely has her own personality. Beyond that, I don't know that she realizes the difference between right and wrong, but she has a good sense of what we don't want her doing, where we don't want her going, etc, and more than once I have caught her starting to go into a forbidden room and then hearing me or catching a glimpse of me and turning around before entering. She'll also "shrink" herself if we scold her.
Oh, but mommy doesn't scold her little baby too often because she is such a sweet thing!!

 

saturneptune -- LOVED that post. Still giggling.

 

He knows what I want him to do and not do, because I have taught it too him. But no I do not believe he has an actual conscience.

 

I would say my dog has a little bit of an awareness of what's right and wrong. She know's what NO means.

 

Shes been trained to understand what you want from her when you say NO. If she had a conscience would you have to keep telling her no for the samethings?

 

VERY funny!!!!!

Seriously, my dog now knows what gets him whacked with a newspaper. It's a learned behavior, nothing to do with a conscience.

 

So does all this mean that "All Dogs Go To Heaven"?

 

oh yeah, I have one that knows. Then I have an idjit dog.

 

Sure. But they have to hold their lickers there...

 

I put the fear of ME in her but she ain't the smartest thing and will still do some things over and over knowing she will get in trouble. She definitely knows, I can see it on her face. lol Dumb but sweet. My last dog was very smart, a boxer, and didn't do a whole lot wrong after teaching her. She would talk back (snort at us) though when we wanted her out of our seat or side of the bed.

 

I don't think I know any dogs that drink liquor, but I'd imagine they could hold their own if they tried...

She's right about Tia. This dog will not even look like she wants to be on furniture when we're here.
However, not only did we come home last night to see a doggie face with big uh-oh eyes peeking over the back of the couch, but she has been using my pillow too while she lay there. THE NERVE!
She scrambled down and tried to lay on the floor looking innocent. She OBVIOUSLY knew she's been wrong. Did she feel bad? I doubt it. Probably just worried. Haven't had her long enough for her to learn that I don't discipline with hitting, which I think was done to her before as one time I yelled across the room and she scrambled to hide under the table, as if she was afraid of getting hurt. Poor doggie..

 

My dog actually sheds tears when wife and I both leave the house for a while. I believe she thinks we are not coming back. She goes into total depession. Indeed Poor doggie.

 

"As I explained to Retch (NOTE: the author's best friend was "Retch Sweeney"), when Strange first started hanging out around our place, I didn't pay much attention to him. I thought he was just passing through our farm on his way home. I fed him a few scraps from the dinner table, thinking he would be gone in a day or two. Weeks later he was still loitering around the house, hitting me up for a handout at every opportunity. When it became apparent that he was intent on establishing a permanent relationship with us, I decided I had better think up a name for him.

"Since I was doint a stint in the Cub Scouts at the time, I thought at first that I might name him Scout. It soon became apparent, however, that he was untrustworthy, disloyal, unhelpful, unfriendly, discourteous, mean, disobedient, uncheerful, unthrifty, cowardly, dirty and irreverent. I decided it wouldn't be right to name such a dog Scout.

"My mother suggested Stranger, still hoping the dog might be passing through. For a few weeks, we called him Stranger, but this was soon shortened to Strange. The name fit. In the years to come, we would learn only how well."

From Rubber Legs and White Tail-Hairs, by Patrick McManus (pp. 117-119), whose works I highly recommend for anyone with a humor deficit. Except don't read McManus while your mate is sleeping, because the shaking bed tends to wake your mate up!