INTRO: WHAT IS THE DOGIVERSE?

The Dogiverse is reality as seen through the eyes and memories of the dog species. Although dogs can communicate, we cannot talk the way short-snouts ("humans") do. However, while my short-snout servants have been away much of each day, I have finally figured out how to read and write and how to post my thoughts on the Internet, all to your benefit as you will see. I'll start with some basic questions about the dogiverse, and move on to some history about humans and dogs that you will find surprising.

Chapter 1: How smart are dogs?

Dogs aren't "smart" the same way as short-snouts. We can't memorize math equations, or the third basemen on every baseball team in the 1980's, and we can't do inventive things like build bridges or weed-wackers or machines to open cans in which humans hide two-year old vegetables. Humans are the engineer species of our planet.

But dogs are born with sharp instincts and sharp abilities, some of which humans don't have. And we are even born with built-in instinctual memories, some ancient- more on that in a later blog. First, we use odors to identify and catalog every living thing we meet. My bearded man-servant is for me odor 112, the Australian terrier next door is odor 161, and the tree outside my living room is odor 286. Steak is number 9. I love steak. The majority of our brain is devoted to detecting and analyzing smells close and very far-away. And why not use our head space for that? Humans don't even use 95% of their brains.

Anyway, dogs can also sense emotions in other living things. We can sense when our human pack members are ill or sad or happy. Or when strangers are kind or fearful or dangerous. As you already know, not all humans are kind-hearted.

Most importantly, we are born imprinted with certain memories, so that we don't have to learn much in order to live a dog's short life. We all instinctively understand the mutually beneficial bond with mankind, and we know the workings of the pack and role of each member. We also have a sense of the history of the dog species, including how we came to be.

It's possible that in more ancient times, humans possessed some of these capabilities and senses too, but no longer. And because of that, these intuitive dog abilities complement those of the engineer species. Dogs make fine companions and assistants to humans, but this was not always the case. More on this history later. Wait, I hear the door opening...GTG

Chapter 2: Do Dogs Understand What People Say?

Are you kidding? Just because we don't have vocal cords that allow us to babble all waking hours, doesn't mean that we can't understand much of what short-snouts say to us. We just don't know how to react when it isn't a useful instruction. I understand "let's go outside". But "Sandie is a good girl" communicates no useful instruction to a dog.

Dogs communicate with other dogs in a variety of ways, including speechless communication. I don't know what humans call that. But you can see it happening whenever your dog greets another dog in the neighborhood, and then they stop and stare at each other face to face for while. It almost looks like we're about to lick each other, but there is definitely some dog thought exchange going on there.

We try it with humans all the time. We stare at you, and you act as if you have heard nothing. What we put up with for food, shelter, warm couches and membership in the human pack! So then we use pointing signals with our head (let's go outside to take a dump, manservant) and even barking, a tool that humans bred into us after our ancient wolverine days. I'll be honest- it isn't always easy to get our messages across to short-snouts.

Chapter 3: Shata Rom- The Forgotten Secret of Human Evolution

One of the memories imprinted in dogs and passed on from ancient times is the recollection of how dogs and humans came to work together and how dogs played a role in the evolution of human species.

A very long time ago, most humans were of a different species than you. They were strong and smart, and excellent hunters. They had a developed sense of smell, strong intuitive skills, and communicated with hand signals and music-like tones. Modern humans appear to refer to them as Neanderthals.

Neanderthals had no interest in or need for the services of dogs. When very cold times came, competition grew among species for the other animals that you could hunt and eat. Neanderthals and dogs competed for meat, and dogs feared the relentless Neanderthals. Over time, the Neanderthals began to kill members of the Dogiverse for food. Dogs have a racial, imprinted visual memory of the Neanderthal faces, the spears and the snow and ice. To defend themselves against the new enemy, dogs drew themselves into larger packs so that more guarding dogs could be available while other members of each dog pack slept.

Over time, a new type of human appeared on the land mass occupied by the Neanderthals. They were thinner, taller and were not immediately acclimated to the Ice Age conditions of what humans call Europe. They had come from the lands south and east of Europe and had brought entirely different ways to live and hunt and grow food. And they quickly realized how dogs could fit into the life of their clans. For instance, with farms, dogs could perform the perimeter guarding duties, and be trained to herd farm animals. When hunting game or burrowed animals, dogs could quickly sniff them out, accurately and from a distance. When fishing, dogs could help by swimming out and bringing home some of the bounty. At night, people could use dogs as warm blankets. For all of this work, our canine ancestors in return received four things the Dogiverse needed as pack animals: food, defined work roles, protection from the dreaded Neanderthals, and a sense of belonging. At this time, dogs were not used by humans as pets, but were viewed by humans as valuable partners.

As the new people spread through Europe, there was more contact and competition with the Neanderthals for food. Over time, violent clashes ensued, and people died. Our canine ancestors were there, at the side of the new humans, protecting them as is our instinct. Today, people don't use dogs for as many purposes as in the ancient days. In battle, dogs were trained to stealthily circle around the attacking Neanderthals, and charge from the side while the humans charged from the front. Without this distraction, the accurate spears of the front-line Neanderthal hunters would have sealed the fate of these skirmishes.

Eventually, after many, many years of violent and difficult coexistence, most of the remaining Neanderthals gathered for self-preservation and lived at the side of a mountain in a valley called Rom. The new humans banded together for what they hoped would be a final battle to exterminate the Neanderthals. They gathered their dogs and spears and tents and food, and traveled to Rom, surrounding the valley. Using information now available to me on the Internet, I place this event around 28,840 B.C. The bloody carnage of the battle of Rom, what was at the time called Shata Rom, has been imprinted in canine brains since that time so long ago. The vital role that dogs played in the killing of the Neanderthals was not only critical to the outcome, but was a choice made by the Dogiverse for its own survival.

Chapter 4: Dog Food is Such Crap

So I guess that I have to spell it out for our short-snout servants. Dogs prefer people-food to those dry pellets that we get fed day after day. Perhaps you've noticed from the hints that we drop at every meal.

I started thinking about this at the human gorge-fest called Thanksgiving. People talked about how they read that turkey should not to be fed to dogs (that means me!) because we have trouble digesting the meat. Are they kidding? For thousands of years, dogs have been ingesting every plant, animal, feces, stick and acorn that passed under our face. Our bodies keep the good stuff, and get rid of the bad. And we live through it.

Yes, there are a few items that humans should probably not send our way (garlic, raisins and chocolate, I've heard), but for all the other good stuff, please share it! I like what my pack likes. A nice cheeseburger and french fries hits the spot, thank you.

Chapter 5: The Dominant Life Form

Oh my. I now see that short snouts no longer have the knowledge of their surroundings that their ancestors had long ago. For instance, if you ask a short snout to identify the dominant species on Earth, they would probably name the human race. After all, people are "smart", have developed technologies and engineering methods, and as evidence that humans are in control they have smothered most of the planet with artificial or constructed "stuff".

Just for fun, a few short snouts might offer up dolphins or whales as advanced species.

But think about the form of life that is more numerous than people, physically larger, and has a longer life span. TREES. Until recent centuries, people respected and worshipped trees as forms of life that possessed spirits- animated beings that should be treated with deference. Dogs have a special reverence for trees and we show our appreciation for trees when we stop and sniff.

Trees perceive time passing at a different, slower rate than humans, so it's easy for you to miss much of what they do for the planet. There are over 400 billion trees, with a collective consciousness, and memories scattered through their networks of leaves. In the autumn, it's fun for dogs to romp in the fallen leaves to smell and read the memories of the past season the way people read newspapers.

Chapter 6: The Best Invention Ever

Of all of the machines and inventions of short-snouts, it is cars that are universally loved in the Dogiverse. Dogs love the speed of the views and air going by, testing our ability to analyze all of the smells we pass as quickly as we can breathe the experiences in.

Dogs have no idea how cars work, nor for that matter do most humans. But here is the interesting part- dogs don't realize that the underlying purpose of a car is to transport a human so that they can perform a task, e.g. to buy a shirt, or visit a friend. Most dogs, playful as they are, think that cars are large toys, acquired and maintained by their servants to give the dogs a special experience, roughly equivalent to an Evelyn Woods speed-reading course, or a theme park ride.

Yes, I agree, most dogs are tards.

Chapter 7: IT'S A MATTER OF TIME- Does the Dogiverse have advance notice of impending natural disasters?

Have you ever wondered how it is that dogs bolt and run just before an earthquake, bombing, or tornado? Is it a superior sense of hearing or smelling? Not relevant.

Have you ever wondered how it is that a dog runs to the door when its owner or family member is still two blocks from the driveway? Or knows to lie down with its owner just before the owner passes away? Or, when on a walk in the street, doesn’t seem to be concerned with cars careening around the corner?

The answer is that dogs experience and perceive time in a different manner than short-snouts. Here’s my attempt to explain it: the Dogiverse experiences time in a more flexible manner. A moment in time is not a fixed snapshot, but includes a level of perception of what has recently happened and what is going to occur. It is in a sense a richer package of information than humans receive. For physical events, such as a natural disaster, or the appearance of a visitor at the door, this ability provides the information about 60 to 90 seconds in advance.

For data about a state of being, dogs can perceive much further into the future and past. For example, when a short-snout looks at another human who is 24 years old, you see only the snapshot- a young adult, wearing a particular set of clothing. Dogs don’t view the 24 year old as such; they sense the lifecycle of the human, from childhood to the wrinkles of old age. Dogs are not focused on today's physical imperfections, but the human as a whole.

Many other animals have these additional senses as well. Why not humans? My guess is that as the human species developed, whether by evolution or by design, there were trade-offs that had to be made to allow the human brain to focus on its innovative design. Perhaps to enable a huge memory and superior analytic and communication abilities, other more ancient abilities had to step aside. Dogs devote the majority of their brain functions to odor processing, memory imprints, instinctive emotive processing, and speechless communication. Dogs aren't better equipped; it's just a different package.