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Analysis: Are Dogs More Intelligent Than Cats

Decent Essays

In Stanley Coren’s, “Are Dogs More Intelligent than Cats?” the main question simply is, are dogs or cats smarter. Although the question is simple the solution is much harder to find. Different animals have different abilities so measuring the intelligence of a cat by having it move “from place to place, where speed is a measure of performance” (Coren) would not be logical. Since there is difficulty measuring an animal’s intelligence psychologists and biologists needed a new technique. The idea that the bigger the brain of an animal the smarter an animal is came into play. This had its flaws because this method claimed the “super geniuses” (Coren) would be whales who have a larger brain mass than human beings. Finally in the 1970’s, Harry J. Jerison created the Encephalization Quotient. The Encephalization Quitient or EQ is a method that calculates an animal’s brain weight to its body size. With this method it was found that dogs have a higher EQ than cats do. The social interactions and higher demands on domestic dogs make them in fact smarter than the cat. …show more content…

The article talks about how dogs are a more social animal than cats. In past experiences I have found that a cat can be just as social if not more social than a dog can be. So that agreement does not seem valid. Another issue with the article would be how it states that the demands we put on dogs puts more pressure on a dog than it does a cat. Coren says that dogs demands such things as “understanding human communication gestures and words.” The fact that it says this makes it seem like we only put pressure on dogs and no pressure on cats whatsoever. The things is as a society we seem to be wanting cats to be more like dogs so that puts pressure on a cat. We cannot expect cats to give out more than they are willing to give. Knowing the limit between what a cat will and will not do is something everyone needs to

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