Can dogs lie?
One of my Corgis is a liar. Really, she is.
She lies to us. If I say "ah-ah", she will put her ears back and apologize and swear she'll never do it again..... until the second I turn my back and then she's right back at it.
And she lies to Jack. Huge, whopping lies. I don't have a lot of rules with my dogs, but Jack does not like being crowded by man nor beast, and moreover is not at all a lap dog; if he comes up next to me on the couch for cuddles once a week, that is a lot. Combine those two factors and I do have one rule: if Jack is on my lap, Maddie must stay on the floor (or at the other end of the couch). Since Maddie gets more lap time in a typical hour than Jack gets in a week, it seems fair enough.
Maddie knows we have this rule. She knows there is no point in arguing. So what does she do? She lies right to Jack's face.
She looks up at him from the floor. She play-bows. She says "Harf harf harf!!" in an endearing way.
Jack lays there. He looks at her. He says "You are lying to me. I know it. I am staying here."
She does it again. She bows. She barks. Jack has no will-power when it comes to games. The dog was born to play. He hops down. He trots over to her....
...and she promptly jumps into my lap. Smug. Self-assured. Jack looks at me like "Did you see what she did?"
She does it if he has a bone she wants, too. She lays next to him on the floor. She gives him the sad eyes. Then she rolls onto her back. She wriggles around. She makes little huffing noises. Jack perks right up. Time to play! His eyes sparkle. He goes over to her....
...and she flips over and grabs his bone.
I can't be the only one with a dog who is a certified liar. I know that behaviorists will try to say that dogs are not that complex. They react. Or they follow their instinct, and their nose. But I saw that study with the Border Collie, the one who knew the names of 200 toys. They put him in a room with 2 known toys and a 3rd that he did not know, and said a name he never heard before. He looked at the 3 toys, figured if he knew the names of 2 and he hadn't heard it, then the handler must want the 3rd toy and the never-heard name must belong to the new one, and got the correct one every time.
Surely if a dog can use deductive reasoning like that, they are capable of lying.
What do you think?
She lies to us. If I say "ah-ah", she will put her ears back and apologize and swear she'll never do it again..... until the second I turn my back and then she's right back at it.
And she lies to Jack. Huge, whopping lies. I don't have a lot of rules with my dogs, but Jack does not like being crowded by man nor beast, and moreover is not at all a lap dog; if he comes up next to me on the couch for cuddles once a week, that is a lot. Combine those two factors and I do have one rule: if Jack is on my lap, Maddie must stay on the floor (or at the other end of the couch). Since Maddie gets more lap time in a typical hour than Jack gets in a week, it seems fair enough.
Maddie knows we have this rule. She knows there is no point in arguing. So what does she do? She lies right to Jack's face.
She looks up at him from the floor. She play-bows. She says "Harf harf harf!!" in an endearing way.
Jack lays there. He looks at her. He says "You are lying to me. I know it. I am staying here."
She does it again. She bows. She barks. Jack has no will-power when it comes to games. The dog was born to play. He hops down. He trots over to her....
...and she promptly jumps into my lap. Smug. Self-assured. Jack looks at me like "Did you see what she did?"
She does it if he has a bone she wants, too. She lays next to him on the floor. She gives him the sad eyes. Then she rolls onto her back. She wriggles around. She makes little huffing noises. Jack perks right up. Time to play! His eyes sparkle. He goes over to her....
...and she flips over and grabs his bone.
I can't be the only one with a dog who is a certified liar. I know that behaviorists will try to say that dogs are not that complex. They react. Or they follow their instinct, and their nose. But I saw that study with the Border Collie, the one who knew the names of 200 toys. They put him in a room with 2 known toys and a 3rd that he did not know, and said a name he never heard before. He looked at the 3 toys, figured if he knew the names of 2 and he hadn't heard it, then the handler must want the 3rd toy and the never-heard name must belong to the new one, and got the correct one every time.
Surely if a dog can use deductive reasoning like that, they are capable of lying.
What do you think?
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Judith Andre on
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I think so. Corgis are master manipulators.
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Permalink Reply by Bev Levy on
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The favorite fib in my house is "No, I was not fed". However, our previous corgi Buffy was a very much dominated by Sparty. She figured out if he had a bone she really wanted, to bark at the door and Sparty could not resist running to see who was there so she would race back to get the bone. I thought that was very smart! Sparty never could resist running to see if someone was there.
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Permalink Reply by Beth on
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Yes, I have a theory that the more submissive ones "lie" as a trick to get what they aren't pushy enough to get otherwise! It is very clever, and it's clearly done with intent. In Maddie's case, it's not like she entices him to play and then plays for a second and decides she'd rather cuddle instead; the second he hops off the couch, she immediately jumps up. She had no intention of ever playing at all.
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Permalink Reply by Becky S on
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Yep, that's Brody! In fact hubby called me this morning to make sure I hadn't fed them and he wasn't lying again!
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Permalink Reply by Ashley and Copper on
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Me and my mom were witnessing this yesterday.(I love how you explained this story by the way. :) We went to tractor supply and got her three dogs and Copper, nylabones. Copper and Isabell (her black lab who are also best friends) had there's down in a minute. We were amazed. We didn't see it all happen so at first, we thought the little long haired Chihuahua Chica came out and stole it; we call her the bone lady because she steals them and hoards them under the bed. The other dogs don't dare try to take their bone back once it's under there. lol So, I asked Copper if he ate it all and he gave me the most pathetic look like " No ma, it was stolen!" So my mom gave him and Isabell two bigger bones that we knew they wouldn't be able to chew in a minute. Lupe (LOO-PAY), her long haired Chihuahua male wanted Copper's so bad he couldn't stand it. He was going into the kitchen and getting a mouthful of food and bringing it right in front of Copper's face and dropping it and eating some but leaving a couple kibbles. You all have corgis so you know they can't resist food. Copper knows he is not supposed to eat that food but how could he resist? So, Copper would look at him like "I know this is a trick but I can't let the food go." Copper would get up and go to get the kibbles of food and Lupe was gone with the bone like lightning. This was a vicious cycle. Lupe really did not want to give up and really wanted that bone. Copper doesn't like conflict so he would lay right at the end of the bone in Lupe's mouth and whine. My mom kept taking the bone back and giving it back to Copper. Then the last resort came about and I laughed so hard and was really amazed. Lupe was watching Copper chew on it, turned around and ran to the door and asked to go out. Copper always goes out with Lupe while he's there and never turns down going outside. He saw Lupe asking to go out, He stopped for a sec thinking "Is he really going to go out?" Copper got up and ran to the door and when he got to Lupe, Lupe ran and slid across the floor, grabbed the bone and was in his bed before you could ask what happened. It's funny how they are and when we asked Lupe why he was doing it when he knew it was wrong he just gave us the innocent look like "What? He gave it to me, I swear!" lol They are entertaining.
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Permalink Reply by Meredith and Paisley on
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The corgi that we had when I was little was a big liar too! He used to do lots of little sneaky things, but the worst was when he went out at night before bed. He knew he wasn't allowed in to go to bed until he peed, so he would go out and fake lift his leg! He would just go to a tree, raise his leg, turn his head to look at us to make sure we were seeing him lift his leg, and then without anything coming out would come running back to the door saying "I peed! Time for bed!!" Sometimes corgis are too smart for their own good haha!
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The fake peeing/ pooping is the best one yet. Funny that several people posted here that their dogs do that.
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Permalink Reply by Michelle on
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My hubby has a strict no dinky dog/dwadle behavior while walking. My female, that has a much bigger problem with taking pauses for the cause, will fake pee. She will find something of interest and squat all the while sniffing and noshing around in the grass........naturally I pretend that she is taking care of serious business. These corgis are just to smart!
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Permalink Reply by Liz on
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We have two corgis, boy and girl each, the girl likes to do the same thing like Maddie did, and the boy takes it every time, except when there is food envolved, nobaby can take the food away by whatever.
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Permalink Reply by Carla on
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When we were potty training Casey, she learnt quite quickly that she got a treat for going pee. After a couple of weeks of getting a treat for peeing, she would squat and pee out a few drops, then run over to me for her treat. Then she would go back and pee out another few drops, and run over again for another treat. She would squat and pee 3 or 4 times instead of peeing all at once, so she could maximize her treat intake. I don't know if it's lying so much as manipulating a situation to her advantage, but it was quite funny. Sometimes it was hard to tell if she'd actually peed at all, or if she was just squatting for a few seconds and then getting up (I guess if she was squatting without peeing, then it was lying!)
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Permalink Reply by Rebecca Brooks on
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Molly fake pooped me once! She ran out side and I told her to go poo poo and she squatted like she was pooping and ran back for a treat. I couldn't believe it! I told her no ma'am and made her go back out. She sulked and finally pooped. What a little fibber!
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