Why do dogs bark at car tires?
INSTINCTS AND LONELINESS: Dogs are very curious in nature and an approaching vehicle perks up their instincts and urge them to chase the vehicles suddenly. So, they end up running behind them. … Dogs are social creatures and when they feel lonely they just pass their time simply by barking at people or chasing vehicles.
While only the Big-Brain can flex muscle, tendon, bone and move the body around, either brain can supply motive and they can combine to render a range of settings as a complex motive that can fall at one end of a spectrum to another. When a dog is wholly motivated via a Big-Brain orientation, actions are implemented to achieve immediate stabilization. In this mode, change is perceived as “bad.” At the opposite end of the spectrum when a dog is acting via a little-brain orientation, it is concerned with the experience of being-in-process rather than attaining equilibrium. In this modality, change is perceived as “good.” In the Big-Brain balance frame of reference, a moment of change is experienced as pressure and this makes the dog feel separate from its surroundings. In the little-brain hunger frame of reference, change is experienced as potential and the dog feels a positive pull to its surroundings. Below the function of supplying motive, the counterbalancing function of the two nervous systems in juxtaposition to produce tension is more vital and fundamental a role than either the Big-Brain’s neurological function or the little-brain’s digestive function. This built-in contradiction inherent in a two brain makeup renders a dynamic state of tension diffused uniformly throughout the body. Therefore emotion is a “force” of attraction, the more tension released; the stronger the force of attraction. Release from tension is the number one “hunger” in animal consciousness and is the underlying motive to all behavior. Even eating food is fundamentally an act of resolving tension more than it being an act of nourishment.
Therefore, if when dealing with a complex situation or stimulus, an individual can subliminally focus on its heart while simultaneously focusing on the object of attraction, it can thereby apprehend a uniform sense of tension and a persistent impression of release and this feeling of flow renders a sense of wholeness, well-being and resonance with everything in its surroundings. As long as the individual can hold onto a sense of a uniform state of tension this affords a feeling the time to elaborate into its higher reaches of a multi-party state of synchronization. When interacting with complex things, such as animals and especially others of its own kind, the mechanical action of the heart pumping blood is a physical statement of bipolar satisfaction. The uniform pressure is always there since the heart is always pumping blood; the question is whether or not the animal can “tune in” to this internal statement of reconciliation when displaced by a change in its perceptual environment. This capacity segregates species of organisms into their respective niches and specialized network functions. In this heightened state of attention, a uniform diffusion of tension as the basis of consciousness makes the body/mind a displaceable medium that “vibrates” with neuro-chemical energy at both poles (Big and little brain) when disturbed. Every perception of change, even internal physical states such as hunger, causes a displacement of the prevailing state of tension and this generates neuro-chemical energy in both brains. The animal mind is a self-charging psycho-somatic battery with two terminals, to repeat, one end of the organism is a pole that ionizes towards output in favor of stasis while the other end is a pole that ionizes towards input in favor of change. (Perceptually this means that the Big-Brain is fixated on form; whereas the little-brain discerns essence within the form.) Subliminal attention on the heart will turn sensory input into a uniform sense of tension in the animal’s mind.
This ultimately means that any two animals can communicate and potentially connect if they can both apprehend a uniform state of tension in the other, and this can only happen if they can apprehend a uniform state of release within their own body, i.e. if they can reference their heart. To do this, they must calculate the negative as a point of access to the positive by sensing the object of attractions’ center mass. This requires that the animal must be able to hold in mind simultaneously and in equal juxtaposition the positive preyful aspect of what it’s attracted to with its predatory aspect, typically the eyes. Another way of saying this is that the individual must be able to transpose its emotional battery onto a complex form in order to perceive it as a Being and thereby be able to compute a coherent response by way of becoming its emotional counterbalance so that ultimately they can both act in accord with the principle of emotional conductivity, with this being in service to the underlying network agenda. Unless an animal deals with a complex object of resistance (in this case the car) as its emotional counterbalance, then it doesn’t have a point of access and in the interaction and if it is not able to synchronize it will end up acquiring more charge than it is able to discharge and ends up feeling more incomplete than before the interaction. Therefore there is an inborn inclination to conform to the principle of emotional conductivity if an individual is endowed with the capacity to do so. The net effect of this calculus is that the eyes of the being become the pivot point around which a sense of a stable footing feels ensured. Because of this constitutional makeup on which a “psychology” is predicated, this means that release for one constitutes release for the other. This will then prove to be the basis of a subsequent sociability because this will motivate them to align around a common object of release so as to find mutual satisfaction for their attraction to each other since when there is subliminal attention on the heart one can’t find release unless their counterpart finds release. If a dog can “tune into” its heart, it will forge a bond and cooperative relationships as it seeks to align around a common object of attraction that can absorb and reconcile their combined energies. This more complex understanding of the nature of Drive explains why the criticisms of Drive as being inadequate to explain complex behavior are in error. Drive compels organisms toward the path of highest resistance (via the principle of emotional conductivity as well as toward a feeling of attunement with complex objects and a coordinated style of being deflected onto a common object of attraction) rather than the pursuit of simple pleasures. Drive is fundamentally about achieving a state of resonance and the highest expression of this compulsion is the human drive to experience beauty as a means of feeling resonant with the surroundings.
Neotony And Sexuality However if it is true that every animal experiences emotion as the release from tension, and given that every mammal has a heart, why has only the dog become integrated into human society? The fundamental distinction between species of animal is how much tension their body/mind as an emotional battery can accommodate before this build up of energy breaches an individual’s capacity and then triggers a genetically hardwired instinct, or a habit, or, in the case of humans (and perhaps even apes and chimps) a thought. The ability to apprehend a uniform state of tension when excited or under duress is a carrying capability, an “emotional capacity.” The higher the species or individual’s emotional capacity the more it can “go by feel.” This is a critical distinction because an animal can only learn something new, in other words adapt to change, if it can frame a situation in terms of release from a uniform whole-body state of tension. If on the other hand, the experience of change is too much for the capacity of the individual, then a uniform state of tension collapses into a concentration of sensations and this obscures the potential for release and under such circumstances the individual cannot go by feel but must respond by instinctive reflexes or by habit and this will always be in service to the Big-Brain balance mandate, which itself is in service to servicing a species specialized-niche participation in evolution. Therefore, the more pronounced the biological hunger in a species of animal, most vividly characterized by the urge-to-ingest, an overwhelming oral fixation that persists into adulthood, the higher the emotional capacity of a species and therefore the more it can adapt in real time to changes in its circumstances because it can combine and deflect their collective energies onto a common object of resistance. Species of animals vary, and individuals vary from situation to situation, depending on which polarity of their body/mind is predominant in their perception of change. It can’t be both; it must be one or the other. (I liken this to the quantum essence of nature, as in one cannot know both the location and the momentum of a subatomic particle at the same time. In animal consciousness, either the individual attends to the form of a thing, or to the essence of the thing. If it goes by form, then it proceeds from an already established value either from its direct experience in the past or from its genetic endowment. Whereas if it goes by essence because it can discern the essence by way of its subliminal focus on its heart, then it feels the internal vibration within the form, its emotional center-of-gravity now serves only as an emotional counterbalance rather than dragging into this particular frame of reference the particulars of how the physical memory was acquired. In other words, if the dog can project its emotional battery in toto onto the form by being able to discern its negative-as-access-to-its-positive then it can FEEL THE OBJECT-OF-ATTRACTIONS’ CENTER MASS, and this high level of apprehension allows its emotional ballast to move freely through its body AS A FEELING, the exact epicenter of its mind now being its heart. One way to directly experience the distinction in a dog’s mind between form and essence in terms of physical memory is the following simple exercise. For example, dealing with problem dogs I show the dog a piece of food and clasp it in my hand. Then I swing my hand rapidly toward the dog’s face. If the dog has been hit, it attends only to the form of my hand rushing at it and a reflex and habit related to fear comes up. Whereas if the dog has not been hit then it may blink and retreat a bit out of reflex, but it doesn’t flinch with a lifting of its lips, or cower in an exaggerated manner as it can still perceive the food within my hand despite the sudden motion and it readily opens its mouth for the treat. Its muzzle is SENSUALIZED by essence rather than SENSITIZED by form. So in complex interactions, if balance is too strong, then the Big-Brain takes over and sensations overwhelm the feeling of tension/release and the animal conforms to ingrained habits and/or species-specific gene-driven reflexes. Whereas if orienting from the little-brain/hunger perspective, then the two brains are reconciled and it is safe as well as pleasurable to proceed with any given interaction so that the interaction can elaborate into higher expressions of feelings as a more complex statement of the simple principle of emotional conductivity. Due to a two brain makeup, species of animals segregate into their specific environmental niches according to their emotional capacity, all of this stratification in service to the network, not to any individual species particular genetic agenda. The capacity to adapt to novelty is dependent on referencing the little-brain-in-the-gut over the Big-Brain-in-the-head. When two dogs meet in a park and they are stressed by the presence of the other, they will eat grass. They are orienting from a little-brain perspective and they are feeling release by eating the grass, and they attribute this experience of pleasure to the presence of the other dog that has triggered sensations attendant to being displaced but then reconciled through the grounding experience of eating something. In short order they will make direct contact and get along. A little-brain orientation inevitably leads to the physical action of the heart becoming the predominant frame of reference thus providing a template by which the individual can successfully negotiate a complex response to a complex situation. In other words, even when the rate of change becomes very intense, by maintaining subliminal attention on its heart the dog can continue to perceive the essence within the form of a thing or situation because it is always conscious of the experience of flow via the mechanical action of its heart. Dogs are remarkably adaptable because the number one characteristic of the canine makeup is a profound constitutional and temperamental state of hunger, i.e. a little-brain manner of orientation, an oral impulse that persists into adulthood. For example, I have never known of a cat that managed its way into a bag of cat food and then eat much beyond a state of satiation whereas I once lived with a Doberman that broke into a 50 lb bag of dog food and ate 40 pounds before being discovered. The dog almost died. Many dogs dig up and eat rocks necessitating emergency surgery. Dogs have been known to chew slippers, sofas, cameras, steel belted radial tires, galvanized metal buckets, to oblivion. I heard of two labs that got into the refrigerator and ate everything inside; meats, milk, butter, cheese, eggs, containers and all: a spectacular feat of consumption that was only to be surpassed by a spectacular feat of elimination. A man once told me that he returned home from work and found his young dog sitting on his front step; problem being that the dog had been locked inside when he left. Next to the stoop was a gaping hole with insulation and wires dangling, the dog had eaten and ripped through moldings, sheetrock, plywood, studs and siding. A prodigious physical appetite as the basis of a high emotional capacity spills over into an overwhelming tactile, sexual and social appetite as well. Hungering for the forms of things IS SEXUAL ENERGY. The owner of every puppy soon runs into this conundrum of the canine makeup in the first months of their dog’s life and dealing with this “biotonus” lust for all things fluffy, crushable or penetrable is the relentless focus of the modern behavioral marketplace as puppies grab everything with their jaws and anything it can fit into its mouth. This basic constitutional fact is the source of all so-called disobedience and behavioral “problems” in the domestic dog; which by way of contrast the domestic cat doesn’t manifest. A particularly vivid manifestation of this canine hunger for release-from-tension is the fact that an owner can play tug-of-war with their dog, even lifting it off the ground and flinging it about, the dog loving every moment of being airborne. This kind of play turns out to be the reward of choice when training a dog for specialized duties such as the detection of drugs, contraband, cadavers, gas leaks in underground pipes, gypsy moth larvae, felons hiding in buildings and even cancer. This serviceability has been mischaracterized as a canine desire to please and as the result of human design; when it really is an innate capacity within the dog by dint of a little-brain orientation to pick up and align with the tension/release dynamic within the dog’s trainer. Neotony the retention of infantile characteristics into adulthood as it is presently entertained in scientific circles is not enough to account for the domestication of dogs because all species of animals are cute and endearing as infants and elicit the human care giving impulse, and all animals have enjoyed scavenging access to village dumps as per the Coppinger thesis, and over the course of civilization human beings have consciously tried to domesticate all species of animals without success on the order of the domestic dog. The real reason infantile traits can migrate into adulthood and become fixed features of a mature disposition is because sexuality is BUT AN ELABORATION OF the neotony phenomenon, and this is because fundamentally sexuality exists in service to synchronizing highly coordinated group activity more than it is about reproduction. And the reason that only wolves (or a wolf-like ancestor) begat the domesticated dog is because of a little-brain orientation as the basis of hunting, reconciling complex objects of resistance via subliminal attention on the heart and thereby deciphering the essence within the form of a large prey animal and then collectively synchronizing around this complex object of resistance so that by intuitive and coordinated team work they can bring it to ground. There are many behavioral ramifications of a two-brain makeup in general and a little-brain orientation in particular. A high emotional capacity (hunger-over-balance—little-brain predominance) means a dog can transpose its internal two-poles onto its surroundings. This is critical because if an animal is to adapt to something novel, it must be able to externalize and affiliate these poles with corresponding elements of the environment so that a uniform state of tension can be achieved. In other words a dog must simultaneously perceive a “negative” (the source of tension) SIMULTANEOUSLY IN CONJUNCTION with a “positive” (object of release) in order to “know” by feel what to do in terms of tension/release and this is the key to emotionally aligning with a complex object of attraction. Without tension there can’t be release, and if the source of tension isn’t simultaneously affiliated with a hunger for release, then the Big-Brain takes over and along with this, habits, instincts, and in the case of humans, thoughts take over. If an animal can apply this bipolar perspective to its environment by way of a little-brain orientation (thus paving the way for a heart frame of reference), this allows it to sense the wholesale state of tension distributed uniformly throughout its body, which is a fine and subtle kind of apprehension existing below the intensity of nerve sensations and Big-Brain focus on form. Therefore the stronger its constitutional state of hunger, the more the individual can transpose the emotional battery onto a situation. This for example is why when a dog is on a walk in the woods with its owner, it frequently turns around and makes eye contact with its owner; it’s re-acquiring the sense of tension (owner as source i.e. the “negative”) that then makes the act of going forward into the unknown and the higher rate of change resonant with the feeling of release. Otherwise, in the absence of apprehending the negative-as-access-to-the-positive, an animal’s species-specific instincts and acquired habits will govern its actions and this limits its capacity to adapt. Because a dog can transpose its emotional battery onto a human being under the wider array of circumstances and under a high rate of change, it is able to sense how to connect with a human being in any kind of lifestyle. It can feel whole by being in the company of human beings.
Animal consciousness is a tension/release dynamo. Tension is energy, its manner of acquisition and release is information. Release from a uniform state of tension is the experience of emotion. Animals are at all times attracted to that which can release tension and conduct emotion, but before they can go forward, the “negative” (a point on which to focus) has to be “defined” by which I mean perceived as a point of access to the positive. In other words, the negative has to be held in mind simultaneously with the positive as if they are two poles on the same continuum, thereby completing a circuit. Every mammal has two brains, the Big-Brain-in-the-head (central nervous system), and the little-brain-in-the-gut (enteric nervous system). Each brain operates from a different agenda and this creates tension. For example, the Big-Brain seeks stasis, for things to stay the same. It equates unfamiliar stimuli with danger as its primary concern is balance. External circumstances must fit within familiar parameters before it will execute an action and so it demands a “point” of equilibrium so that an action can unfold on stable footing. This fixation ensures survival. Meanwhile in opposition, the little-brain seeks constant input. It is always in flux and craves fluidity. It equates stasis with blockage and change with ingestion because its primary concern is process. This ensures growth. Both nervous systems produce electrochemical energy and in animal consciousness serve as opposite terminals of the body/mind, a biological action potential that stores energy as tension and then releases it as action, just like a battery powering a device (not to mention informing the action).
Do dogs know to avoid cars?
Yes, you can teach your dog to avoid streets, traffic, and cars. Dogs are afraid of a lot of things; however, most of them are not afraid of cars initially—it simply isn’t an instinctual fear for them and hasn’t made it into their DNA.