Your Best Friend Has A Conscience Too
If you share your life with one or more dogs, I’m sure some of these questions have already come to mind: What’s behind their eyes? How can you understand so many things? Are they really intelligent beings? Do they have a conscience? Is he my best friend?
For the first time, neuroscientists have tackled these questions in an attempt to unravel some of the doubts that have historically been on the minds of generations and generations of dog lovers. For this, a set of dogs were subjected to an fMRI scanner to observe the behavior of their brains, just as we do with humans. The results were very revealing.
Does my best friend have a child-like conscience?
Before knowing what were the conclusions of neuroscientist Gregory Burns, let’s talk a little about what consciousness is. How can we describe it? Consciousness is this knowledge we have about ourselves and the world around us, formed, in turn, by a sense of morals: knowing what is good and what is bad, knowing the world we are part of and integrating , in turn, a sense of ethics.
Well, once this is clear, we can go on and say that Dr. Burns’ results revealed that dogs have a conscience comparable to a child’s. Your brain is rich in dopamine receptors, one of the neurotransmitters that work at the level of the caudate and brainstem just like in humans.
In people, tailing implies being able to anticipate the things that happen around us: knowing that a certain company is not pleasant, that we need affection to be happy, that certain situations can cause harm to others and also to ourselves…
In other words, dogs have a refined cognitive connection that allows them to recognize that certain situations are linked to certain emotions. Furthermore, they are not only able to recognize their own emotions, but also the emotions of others. Never happened to be sad and notice the presence and even the concern of your faithful friend?
The brain structure of caudates is not the only one similar to that of humans: many other parts of the brain are activated in the same way as ours. For example, dogs feel, dream, think, fear loneliness, and are able to devise very simple schedules to achieve basic goals. Scientists also speak of a concept called “brain homology”; this concept makes, for example, dogs establish rudimentary associations in the face of certain behaviors: if we are not at home, they know they will feel alone, that they will not receive affection or food.
Dogs are emotionally attached to us and this goes far beyond the practical or instrumental sense, and it is not just a mere sense of feeding. Let’s think about those cases where lost dogs manage to find their owners, even if they have moved to another city. Or in the death of their owners, when the sadness at the loss is usually clearly visible in animals. Scientists speak of a bond, of a union that remains in place within them.
The ability to experience positive emotions such as love and attachment shows us that dogs have a level of wisdom very comparable to that of a human child. All of this comes up to make us think about many things: that maybe they understand more than we think, that they are able to give us as sincere emotional support as any of our friends and that, believing it or not, they suffer just as we suffer when we are rejected, or abandoned.
So remember that this friend who looks at you with respect is also aware that he is happy living with you.
