BED RUGS FOR TRUCKS

Here is Chloence being scared--and smart!-- during what I think she interpreted as a thunder/lightning storm. I mean it may have been such a storm but I could not tell. I didn't have my hearing aids in so I couldn't hear and I saw no lightning but there was a storm, true enough, and thunder and lightning make her tremble and huddle . . and head for the rubber-based rugs in the house. Now think about this for a moment . . .

Before she planted herself in this pose, she had been on the bed with me about to take a nap. Instead of choosing to stay with me and snuggle under the covers out of harm's way, she sat up, trembled a bit (vibrated is more like it) and then jumped off the bed. I went to find her and this is what I expected because this is what she does every time.

The part to think about is that we all know rubber (or some means of grounding) is essential when it comes to electrical safety. They say being in a car with its four tires is a really safe place during a lightning storm. But how would a dog know to head for a rubberized bath mat? And why would she turn it over to lay directly on the rubber part? Could she have programmed into her DNA that when XYZ happens then she should search for ABC surfaces? I mean she would not have words which is why I replaced the words "lightning" and "rubberized" with XYZ and ABC.

It can be hard to understand thoughts without the conveyor belt provided by words but if you consider the cognitive experience of fear, you would probably agree that it isn't just an emotional state but a state that is informed or produced by a rather immediate and sudden intake of data that spells DANGER, in not so many letters. We do not say, "I will now be afraid." We simply are afraid and experience the flood of thoughts (of which I would contend feelings are a category) resultant from that fear.

This must be what creatures who can't speak our languages are doing routinely: thinking without words. Our experience of the fight or flight response is often described by us using phrases like "before I could even think..." and what we really mean is "before I could put it into words..." And what is a photograph but an immediate impression on the mind without words? Surely, we can label the elements in a photograph, but then we'd be "taking the picture apart", reducing it to its parts which, when as a whole, are more.

Somewhere in here is that old but abiding idea/question of "how complex does something have to be before it becomes more than the sum of its parts?". The emergence of life from primordial slime is described as being a sort of ultimate example of the right stuff in the right place at the right time under the right conditions. A complexity adequate to produce something the result of which is entirely different from its components. As an aside, this, in part, is also a little bit of the theme behind Tron.

So I am totally prepared to accept that Chloe is much more complex than we can imagine and has tons of things "programmed" into her, things she just Knows to do but from our perspective would appear to require an understanding which we then, using our typical circular reasoning, conclude means that she (and others like her) could not possibly "know" THAT, whatever the THAT is at the moment. A dog could not possibly know best ways of staying safe from lightning, right? They only had to live bared under the elements much more than we ever did so why would anyone think dogs know anything about our natural environment? I think it is the understanding part that is not required (Chloe does not understand about electrical safety) but in our anthropomorphic bent we insist that understanding is a requirement of Knowing. But animals show us every day that this isn't the case. They show us knowing without understanding. I think babies show us every day that knowing is independent of understanding. I think understanding is what requires words. Francis Bacon anyone?

A corollary musing is that I have gradually come to think it matters less and less that we find the right words to express ourselves. Which happens to be nicely adaptive for me right now.

Photographically, I took a lot of shots (she wasn't going anywhere) and tried some exposed for her face. I knew this would blow out the white parts of the frame and I really like how it turned out with a sort of warm glow to it but you can see her little eyes as though she is worrying and waiting.

After much hemming and hawing, I finally managed to choose a rug for the living room and a rug for the office - nothing too overwhelming, just something to absorb some sound, make it a bit more cozy, and "pull the room together", of course. I'm quite pleased with how the rugs look, and Jeremy really likes them too. Success!