Show test fails to find marvel owners give pets too much v credit for brains say scientists new lork the average dog own tr could write an enthusiastic book about his pets intelligence and keen ness but scientists have only be gun to penetrate into the dogs world to find out carefully and exactly how much a dog sees and understands experiments so far made indicate that the average dog has far more faulty vision than most dog lovers suppose according to a survey of what Is known as dog psychology made in the quarterly journal of biology by dr CL J warden and L H warner psychologists of colum bia laboratory experiments in russia and other countries have led most to believe that the dog has little or no ability to see colors A puppy that seems to enow red from green may be responding to a difference in the brightness of the two colored objects or some other clew that his human friends overlook A dogs vision for still objects appears to be decidedly inferior to that of a man but he Is keenly sen to moving objects the evidence indicates sense of smell superior A dogs sense of smell appears to be far superior to that of a man the psychologists report in their survey A german shepherd dog for example was able in every instance to pick out a small piece of pine wood that had been handled by her beeper even when the piece 0 wood was placed with as many as twenty other pieces that he had never touched two seconds contact between the keepers hand and the object was sufficient to insure the dogs identifying the keeper with the object on the other hand police dogs were tested in germany by them the glove of a person and tell ing them to pick out the owner from row of men the dogs all failed on this test and on a number of other tests intended to prove their usefulness in police work As a result of the tests the use of dogs in criminal detection was forbidden by theP government it Is not clear the columbia psychologists point out whether the dogs really understood what was wanted of them in these tests question of understanding whether dogs recognize words as a human being does or whether they respond to sounds or merely to tones and inflexions ions of the voice Is not agreed apon by experimenters in testa with the thoroughbred german shepherd dog fellow recently made by doctor warden and mr warner the dog responded to word used in various commands given by his master jacob herbert of detroit in many cases mr herbert gave the commands from an adjoining room with the door closed thus showing that the dog did not depend on watching his masters face or gestures for clews taking commands through a closed door was new to fellow and the voice was muffled but be made a good record though not a perfect one one of the chief reasons why acl enlists disagree on the dogs capacities Is that all sizes and sorts of dogs have been used in experiments from highly bred bull terriers to an assortment of mongrels mon grels the psychologists point out A representative breed of dog should be settled upon for study they suggest |