"Go look at a dog. Go on, look - maybe at one lying near you right now, curled around his folded legs on a dog bed, or sprawled on his side on the tile floor, paws flitting through the pasture of a dream. Take a good look - and now forget everything you know about this or any dog."

Clearly, we humans have been left in the dark with man's best friend.

The truth is that dogs just aren't the laboratory subjects that, say, mice, are. We treat them as pets, or more, like family, and so science has shied away from them, causing us to know next to nothing about their psyches. But Horowitz, a psychologist with a Ph.D. in cognitive science, has set out to change that on her adventurous journey to see what a dog sees. And what they see is vastly different from our world. One of Horowitz's examples is a rose. To us, a rose is beautiful, colorful, and full of symbolism in its familiarity. But to a dog, a rose is virtually worthless unless adorned with the scent of urine. Her conclusion, is that dogs don't see things the way we see them- a knife would be meaningless unless it smelled of urine or was wielded by a love one: there needs to be a connection from the dog's mind for it to see things.

Horowitz also discusses the hugely effective nasal system of dogs, their eyes, hearing, and their evolutionary descent from wolves. In one interesting deviation during evolution, dogs will and can look into humans' eyes, much unlike wolves, Horowitz says, explaining: "Though they have inherited some aversion to staring too long at eyes, dogs seem to be predisposed to inspect our faces for information, for reassurance, for guidance."


Horowitz's book will be released on September 15.