Gifts of the Crow: brain scan proof these birds are devious, silly and smart

Biologists use brain scans (and entertaining experiments and anecdotes) to show that crows, ravens and other corvids think like people.

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We adopted 2 beagles from the NC research lab Peta closed

This weekend my husband David and I adopted two of the 200 beagles sprung from a NC medical research lab shut down after Peta produced and unwatchably disturbing undercover video that shut the lab down.

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Why Dog-Haters Should Be Banned Instead of Dogs

Gratuitious Picture of Happy Dogs

Gratuitious Picture of Jolly and Shadow,courtesy ofAnimalTourism.

Are people who hate dogs mean and maladjusted? Yes! That’s the highlight for me of a New York Magazine story on The Rise of Dog Identity Politics. The John Homans piece sprawls over many peculiar developments in the evolution of the urban dog, but the most interesting to me was this finding:

A 1999 study found that people who strongly dislike dogs score significantly higher on the measure of anal character and lower on the empathy scale of the California Psychological Inventory, indicating “that people who liked dogs have less difficulty relating to people.”

Haven’t dog- and animal-lovers always known that? On the extreme side, we’ve connected for a long time how serial killers get their start torturing animals. But we haven’t seen so clearly how misanthropes may start as dog haters. But any urban dog person knows the type: They jump back from your dog on the street, talk up their allergies, complain about dogs being dirty, then frequent dog-friendly places and whine.

Another thing about dog-haters? They love signs banning dogs. Maybe it’s part of their inability to communicate with other humans. A woman down the street from me has made it her one woman crusade to turn a public area into a no dog area, with wordy signs, which are frequently defaced. (My household, let us say, is not completely innocent.)

Since my own dog Jolly died in August, I don’t even have a dog in this fight

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World Loses Its Best Dog Ever

Wednesday we lost our great friend and incredible dog, Jolly. He was pushing 16 (by some calculations, 105 in human years) and in the last few weeks, after his longtime girlfriend Shadow died, all of his systems seemed to fall apart.

Even though it’s been a long time since he was able to hear us and run to the door—or just awkwardly block the door by napping in front of it—our home and life is unimaginably empty and quiet without him. But that’s the price you pay for having a sweet, devoted, goofy, clever, complicated dog like Jolly.

Jolly came to me 13 years ago as a foster dog after spending a couple years in a shelter, Mighty Mutts. He was a huge scaredy cat, but eventually he came to believe me when I told him, as I always did, that he was the best dog in the world. He was the king of the dog run and East Village and knew that he was handsome, smart and well-loved. After spending years in isolation, he especially loved friends. “Friend” was just one of the many words he knew. He loved his mommy, daddy and longtime girlfriend Shadow most of all. Shadow was at first the only dog he would play with; she remained the only dog he would roughhouse with, kiss or let enjoy his treats, toys or Jollymobile. But he loved being part of an extended family and community, his aunts, friends of the dog run, street and

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