DOGS KNOW FAIRNESS

DOGS KNOW FAIRNESS

You make an error
If you think dogs don't know or care.
They'll do for you to their ability,
But if not treated with equity,
They're out of there.

A dog isn't about to play
For less than equal pay.
At that point the dog is through,
Won't even look at you,
But turns and walks away.


The News & Advance, 9 December 2008:

Study: Dogs have sense of fairness

Animal will walk away if it has been cheated

"Ask them to do a trick and they'll give it a try. For a reward, sausage say, they'll happily keep at it."

"But if one dog gets no reward, and then sees another get sausage for doing the same trick, just try to get the first one to do it again."

"Indeed, he may even turn away and refuse to look at you."

"Dogs, like people and monkeys, seem to have a sense of fairness."

"The dogs sat side-by-side with an experimenter in front of them. In front of the experimenter was a divided food bowl with pieces of sausage on one side and brown bread on the other."

"The dogs were asked to shake hands and each could see what reward the other received."

"When one dog got a reward and the other didn't, the unrewarded animal stopped playing."

"When both got a reward all was well."

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Helen and I arrived here in Madison, WI about 5:30 PM yesterday (Friday) after about 6-1/2 hours of driving from the Indianapolis area and were greeted by an accumulation of about 10 inches of snow which had fallen during Thursday night. The Interstate highways and the highways leading into Madison had been completely cleared but a lesser road leading to and the streets in Eric's neighborhood had only been partially cleared. We had no significant problems. Between Indianapolis and Bloomington, Ill and immediately north of Bloomington we experienced light mist, and off-and-on fog, wind, and fear of but not actual road ice from freezing rain. As we progressed northward from Bloomington, driving conditions improved, but we then had problems with dirt kicked up by trucks obscuring our view and had to stop twice to clean the windshield. (Our windshield washer line is plugged.)