After watching countless hours of my dogs entertaining themselves, it gave me a very good reason to sit down and think a while. I sparked up a bowl, climbed a hill behind my house with my dogs, and let them play in the fields.
Simply by letting out a highly complex series of hormone combinations, dogs can easily tell what is going on with each other; whether it's a combination of body language and fear being sensed in the pack, or a silly play bow and ginning face, dogs readily pick up these phermones from not only their own species, but humans and other animals as well. This combination instantly signals to a dog what may be occuring, what has happened, who has been in the area, when, and what it is. All of this from one scent.
Hierarchy from animals always follows a specific pattern- you have loners, packs of alpha male and female, beta, etc; prides of lions, groups of whale swimming together, the hypnotic array of a formation of swiftly moving birds- so efficient and sudden; each member of the flock can predict every other bird's movements so rapidly to do what is best for the group.
Animals don't NEED written language to survive, adapt, evolve, and live together peacfully- natural hierarchy determines each animal's involvement due to importance, yet most animals in hierarchival groups tend to get along well and let the other members thrive with equal personal freedom. The animals KNOW instinctively that the leader of the pack knows what's best, and they trust him. But he can be overthrown.
Sure, animals haven't found ways to perform open heart surgery, nor do they constantly die from heart attacks. Depression is essentially non-existant in wild animals, they work together as a team to support each other, hunt, eat, protect, and raise their future generations. Dogs can sense human emotions and act accordingly, hear a car- YOUR car- come up the road before your family knows, help the blind, save human lives.
Dogs don't judge you on what you wear, look like, or even smell like... They just love and accept you. Kids bring guns to school becuase their classmates tease them; they don't wear the right clothes, say the right things... Even the lowest wolf in the pack is treated with respect. Everything is constructive criticism.
And it's kind of sad seeing how the human race has lost its most basic set of instincts in turn for a mechanical heart and more power.
Sorry about this looong post, it just hit me so suddenly.
