Puppy Powers
2006-10-19 07:44 AM | Posted by Sumangali Morhall | Permanent Link | Nature
(
6 votes)
This is our miniature dachshund. Yes she's pretty cute but she's got a temper (or "character" as we prefer to call it in her presence), so don't get too close.
There's a ritual in the house, faithfully followed by both dogs, whenever a human puts on shoes. It involves a lot of tail wagging plus a chorus of heart-softening whines and yelps. Their cocked heads, raised ears, and glossy eyes feign destitution and dreadfully protracted confinement, however recent their last trip out.
This one had to go to the vet with a bad back last week (there's a lot of back for such small legs). She was obviously in a lot of pain, but kept her stoic poise throughout all sorts of pummeling and prodding. A humiliated sulk followed her return home, accompanied by injured looks and lot of huffing and puffing.
A few days later she needed a check-up. It was a new week - the sulking forgotten - and a different time of day. The shoes came out of the cupboard, but she cowered as if to duck a blow. When she was called to her fate she hastily reversed into the office where I was working, hanging her ears.
Her "character" brings its share of amusement, and this attempted escape was highly amusing to me. I joked that she was trying to avoid the vet, assuming some outer event - unseen to me - had upset her, but my mother was not at all surprised. They just seem to know these things, she assured me, and later told me of all sorts of research that's been done to prove that dogs have a sixth sense. Truly amazed, I went to find out more.
Perhaps Rupert Sheldrake, one of the world's most innovative biologists, can explain. Excerpts from his article, The Unexplained Powers of Animals follow:
According to recent random household surveys in England and the USA, many pet owners believe their animals are sometimes telepathic with them. An average of 48 per cent of dog owners and 33 per cent of cat owners said that their pets responded to their thoughts or silent commands.
The commonest kinds of seemingly telepathic response are the anticipation by dogs and cats of their owners coming home; the anticipation of owners going away; the anticipation of being fed; cats disappearing when their owners intend to take them to the vet; dogs knowing when their owners are planning to take them for a walk; and animals that get excited when their owner is on the telephone, even before the telephone is answered.
He goes on to say...
All three types of perceptiveness — telepathy, the sense of direction and premonitions — seem better developed in non-human species like dogs than they are in people. Nevertheless they occur in the human realm too, but they seem to be better developed in traditional cultures than in the modern industrial world. Maybe we have lost some of these abilities because we no longer need them: telephones and television have superseded telepathy; maps and global positioning systems have replaced the sense of direction. And perceptiveness is not cultivated in our educational system. Indeed the existence of unexplained powers is not only ignored but often denied.
Nevertheless, human ‘sixth senses’ have not gone away. They look more natural, more biological, when they are seen in the light of animal behaviour. Much that appears ‘paranormal’ at present looks normal when we expand our ideas of normality.
I guess that could apply to a lot of things...
- LINKS:
Renaissance Universal: Rupert Sheldrake's article The Unexplained Powers of Animals
Sri Chinmoy TV: Abhinabha Tangerman presents the famously faithful dog Hachiko on Inspiration News
More on my own love of dogs:
The Guide Dog and Her Man (a poem)
