One reason NDT is hard to propagate is that it requires seeing the evidence through an unfamiliar lens, what I call an immediate-moment manner of analysis. Some mistakenly think the shift required is metaphysical, others think it’s mechanical. Some say my interpretations are too simplistic, and then at another juncture they say it’s too complicated. (I […]

(This is a very, very long post on NDT theory)   Canine body language revolves around the same question that drives much social research, what is the nature of impulse control? I propose that a primal impulse can only be held in check by an impulse of equal primacy. Otherwise an individual will be in […]

After being stimulated by something, the first step in an act of mental apprehension is the phenomenon of emotional projection. The animal projects its physical center of gravity into the form of what it’s attracted to and thus arrives at a feeling. This is the most conservative statement that can be made about the mental lives […]

PBS this week featured two excellent shows on animals. One was a Nature episode about the Turkey man, Joe Hutto, who grafted himself into a flock of wild turkeys and learned their ways. In this new documentary he makes contact with mule deer simply by being among them for two years. http://www.wgbh.org/programs/Nature-26/episodes/Touching-the-Wild-51073 {It seems to […]

One of the best parts of the NDT conference was the variety and quality of the various venues we visited. The Von Liche Kennel tour took us through the greatest privately owned working dog kennel in the world, an inspiring example of a dream coming true through the power of passion. We also rode on […]

NPR reported on some intriguing research. http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2012/10/09/162401053/a-lively-mind-your-brain-on-jane-austen Professor Natalie Phillips who specializes in literature and neuroscience and who is especially interested in the nature of distractibility given that it is a prominent theme in Jane Austen’s work, engaged in a study examining the difference in a reader’s mind when deeply immersed versus skimming. “Phillips said […]

http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-01-infants-ascribe-social-dominance-larger.html I believe that the interpretation of this experiment is a case of leaping to a foregone conclusion. I temper this however with the acknowledgment that social dominance is indeed possible between human beings because human beings are capable of comparing one moment or one point-of-view to another. Thus it takes a certain amount of […]

The physical center of gravity is the kernel of a dog’s self and a dog’s sense of it is activated by external forces and sources, specifically when dealing with other beings, it is activated by eye contact. This is because a state of attention is composed of two beams, the external focal gaze by which […]

Here are some good examples on Youtube of advanced forms of emotional projection and emotional center of gravity. Persistence Hunting The Barefoot Professor Kevin: What’s profoundly compelling to me is watching these hunters get into an almost musical rhythm as they synchronize with the movements of their prey, they pick up the cadence and I […]

I really like Damasio, but in the interest of time I’m going to be abrupt because simply put, the brain can’t feel a thing. With all due respect to Dr. Damasio: there’s a reason why we place our hand on our heart when we feel moved. We do not point to our brain and this […]

Some of my definitions are scattered across this site and mostly in terms of why-dogs-do-what-they-do, but what follows is a more concise summary. ENERGY: An action potential, a differential of force between two poles. Energy in animals builds up by virtue of a bipolar, two-brain makeup each with its own divergent agenda just as if […]