[fostermom]

I just read another posting and this comment really got me thinking:

"stating that dogs actually have complex thought processes and think through situations is something humansa are only capable of. not that dogs dont think because they do when you condition and train certain scenarios and stimulas the dog thinks through these things he has been taught and reacts with the proper decision. but no reasoning capabilities"

I've read many stories and seen a few videos of dogs doing things that (in my mind) demonstrate a certain level of intelligence and complex thought:
--the recent posting about the two dogs (a pit and rott) who saved a child from drowning and then prevented him from getting near the water until help arrived.
--a story posted by the founder of Pets Alive (Middletown, NY) where she related a story of an old golden that had been abandoned by her neighbor who was found holding her toddler up against a tree next to a ravine (one of the dogs feet was literally hanging over the precipice), preventing the child from falling in.
--a story I recently watched on TV where a woman was on a ventillator for sleep apnea. The power went out and the machine stopped. The woman was unable to breath through her mouth and was suffocating...her dog (a rottweiler) chewed through the tube to the ventillator so that she could get air.
--a video on UTube where a beagle wanted some cookies left on the counter but wasn't tall enough to reach them. After futively jumping up at the counter several times, he then changed his "approach" and pushed a chair over to the counter, jumped up on the chair, and ate the cookies.
--my parent's dog Taffy who (when my mother accidently stepped on one of her pups) and the pup was lying, unresponsive on the floor, flipped her puppy onto her back and started licking the pup's abdomen until the pup revived (canine equivalent of CPR).

So....Intelligent thought or not????