What the Dog Saw: And Other Adventures

Dogs, the titular animal of Gladwell’s book, are a primary symbol of how other minds—in other words, minds that are not our own—think. In his work, these four-legged creatures represent ways of knowing and interpreting the world that are radically different from humans. His essays “What the Dog Saw” and “Troublemakers” argue for a dog-centered perspective on canine behavior and canine-human interactions.

US and Canadian citizens, who often dote on their dogs like children and in extreme cases bear their bite marks on their skin like battle scars, think that the problem lies with the breed or individual temperament of a dog. Blanket bans on particular breeds arise from this misconception, and even hard-line stances like Ontario’s pit-bull ban run into a human-created problem: the way we have bred pit bulls over the decades means that it is difficult to draw the line between what constitutes a true pit bull and what has been hybridized enough to divest the dog of its characteristics. Moreover, Gladwell’s research has shown that the breed of dog that is most dangerous to humans changes with the generations. For example, in the 1970s, Dobermans were most responsible for human fatalities, and pit bulls did not make it into the statistics, whereas in the 2000s, the conditions were reversed. The problem, then, lies not with the particular dog but with the type of owner who selects a breed that might be aggressive and provides the abusive conditions that bring out its more dangerous traits. The dog’s irregular behavior, much like that of an abused human, thus reflects the problems within human society rather than innate character deficiencies. Gladwell uses these statistics as an entry point into human psychology: It is only by exploring why certain people who feel themselves to be outcasts from mainstream society hothouse the conditions for dangerous dogs that we can alleviate the problem. He suggests that the instinct to take a hard-line stance like a pit-bull ban is indicative of a cultural tendency to treat symptoms rather than causes.

Dog-whisperer Cesar Millan’s work with badly behaved pets further exemplifies that errant dogs have a human problem and not the other way round. In forgetting that their dogs are animals who need boundaries and clear instruction conveyed through body language, indulgent owners confuse their dogs, making them feel insecure, which in turn causes them to act out and seek to dominate. Gladwell uses this example to explore the idea that most 21st-century Americans are increasingly disconnected from their bodies—even for character actor Scott, who can employ his body to great effect at work, there is a clash between his soothing tone of voice and tense body language that confuses his dog. Millan’s training thus extends to humans as much as dogs, as he shows how owners need to get into a dog-centered mindset to promote interspecies harmony. In a book about journeying into other minds, the ability to meet an animal on its own terms acts as a metaphor for interactions in the human world: we cannot expect that everyone is coming from the same perspective as we are.