January 9, 2025 • 51 mins
Imagine: at multiple points in history, despite their ecological rivalry, a few humans and a few wolves teamed up for a greater good. Fast forward thousands of years, and boom: dogs. Also, modern humans. Yet: Who domesticated whom? In part two of this special two-part series, Ben, Noel and Max explore the ridiculously inspiring story of humanity's best friend.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much
for tuning in. We are so over the moon to
be joined again with our super producer mister Max Williams.
He's a wild wolves of love. Yeah, you got three,
(00:48):
You got three handsome lone wolves. Here teaming up for
part two of How Dogs Went Domestic. They call me
Ben Bollen in this part of the world, and you, sir,
often go by the sober Kate Noel Brown.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
'tis true and I want saw Max Williams drinking a
Pina Colada Trader Vicks in His air was perfect.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
He's got great hair, he really does. That's good. Had
hair on it, almost dog like. Oh, we're doing segues.
So in part one, we explored the ongoing mystery, the
ongoing scientific discourse about how a now extinct version of
(01:34):
gray wolves could end up becoming the Great Danes, the
Saint Bnad's, the stoutzersund yeah, the bloodhound, uh, the shizoos,
the Pomeranians and way to keep it clean with your pronunciation,
(01:54):
the Tibetan mastives. Uh. Well, I have a shazoo in
my family. Uh, and I just can't believe you.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
The guy. I just can't believe you had squander an
opportunity to say, just to say the dirty way.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
I have too much respect for him. The only thing
I don't like about that dog is that his name
is Leo, which is technically a terrible name for a dog.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
My name is practically Leo in reverse. Yeah, think about it,
You're like a Leon. I'm a you know, it's funny.
I don't think we're gonna get into this too much today,
but it may well be fodder for a third episode
maybe down the line. But all of the crazy in
breeding that goes into dogs that yield some of these
(02:38):
creatures that you know, maybe shouldn't quite exist and that
have like some pretty significant challenges. Let's just say, like
the humble bulldog that really can't breathe super well.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
Yeah, nor reproduce that well. This is an excellent setup, Noel.
Please tune into part one, where we explore, as three
huge fanboys, the story of wolves to Dogs. This is
part two. We teased it a little bit, but we're
not going to leave you hanging without a dope beat
(03:10):
to step two. It's time to talk about domestication. Step two,
Step two, step two, Okay, Part two.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Yeah, and many times in Part one have really thrown
my support behind this discussion of domestication. It is an
often misunderstood concept.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
We sort of hinted at some of the early forms.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Of domestication that were a little more circumstantial. I believe
it was commensial domestication, which is basically just like circumstances
that yet yielded some changes, but not with the a
the abject intervention of humans quite yet, which is what
we're getting to now.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
That's what I was just sort of throwing around, Yeah,
commensal domestication, meaning our earlier exploration, the idea of domestication
as a two way streak. Check out our earlier stuff
They don't want you to know episode regarding the idea
that plants may have domesticated humans. And as we'll see,
(04:09):
maybe the wolves turning into dogs had a little bit
of a pushback or touch on their human pals as well.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
The Oxford English Dictionary what a tone defines domestication thusly
the process of taming an animal and keeping it as
a pet or on a farm. But as we indicated
more than once in Part one, That is an incredible
oversimplification of the concept because we even had a whole
section about like, what's the difference between taming and domesticating,
(04:45):
and they're not exactly the same. So I don't know, Oxford,
I think we might need a little bit more context here.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Yes, swing in a miss oed with all due respect,
swing and a miss whiffed on that one. Domestication is
not taming. Taming an animal refers to the process of
training a non human animal to be comfortable around humans,
(05:11):
to follow certain basic commands. This is often done with
wild animals to make them more manageable and less aggressive.
You can see so many videos of this on your
favorite social media platform of choice, your TikTok, your Instagram,
your YouTube. We've befriended a wild hip? How told this
(05:37):
hip how to leave amongst us?
Speaker 2 (05:40):
We boas or in the Seminole two thousand's nature documentary
by our boy Werner Herzog grizzly Man, wherein that type
of thinking, spoiler alert ends up with the humans being
brutally devoured eaten by wild bears because they're not super.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
Good candid for domestication, are they No, they're not old,
They're good candidates for taming, and we'll see the difference here.
Another good comparison would be the crows that I have
befriended in various parts of the world. Like, clearly those
guys are wild animals. They're savage af but they are
(06:23):
they They are intelligent, and they can work together with
humans on certain things, but they are by no means.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Domesticated, especially when you raise both arms up like the
night king and they just flock to you and do
your bidding.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Oh that's because I have eggs in my pockets. Oh yeah,
I was wondering what that sound was. So this idea
of taming an animals, it's not going to change the
animal's genetic makeup or its behavior. Instead, it occurs on
an individual level. Again as a two way street. You're
(06:59):
you're teaching me be one grizzly bear raised as a
cub to respond in a non threatened, non threatening way
to one human. But if that bear has a cub,
that cub is going to be Like my old college
roommate said savage.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Af absolutely, And like I said, with the Timothy Treadwell example,
that was the titular grizzly man.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
You know, he had really good experiences kicking it with
grizzlies in the wild, and he felt that his behavior
and the way he was interacting with them was conducive
to good like symbiotic relationship with them until the moment
that it wasn't. He wasn't exactly training them. He was
just sort of like living amongst them, and it seemed
like it was going fine until the moment that for
whatever reason, that wild instinct kicked in and things went
(07:47):
very poorly for the grizzly man. But his acclimating himself
I could make himself expressactly. And this also we just
have to put the PSA in here, folks. A wild
animal being acclimated to human contact can be dangerous for
all life forms involved, one hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
And I mean, you know, let's maybe give slight benefit
of the doubt to Oxford the folks who find folks
over the Oxford English Dictionary taming on a long enough
timeline through multiple iterations and generations.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
I guess is a better word is kind of domestication,
you know, can be right?
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Yeah, yeah, And I love we're going to get eventually
into some of the very important qualities that make an
animal domesticatable.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
I'm not I can't wait to get to it. Heart.
That just really blew my mind. I'm super excited, all right.
So domesticating animals not taming them. Right, you can tame
a wolf, you cannot domesticate a wolf. When people attempted
to tame wolves or domesticate them over time, they ended
up with dogs. So it involves our earlier conversation about
(09:04):
artificial the natural selection selective breeding. Just like Gregor Mindel
figured out with those peapods over many generations, you can
you can kind of decision tree reproduction to have a
higher probability of exhibiting traits that you perceive as desirable,
(09:27):
which is why domesticating an animal will change its genetic makeup,
meaning it changes its physical and behavioral traits. Domesticated animals
are often dependent upon humans for their survival. They've adapted
to living in close proximity to humans the same way
(09:49):
that a hippopotamus has adapted to living around water.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Well, and while domesticated animals certainly there is a possibility
that they could do okay, if they were to be
let's say an indoor outdoor cat, right, it could go feral.
They could go feral, or they come back and everything's fine.
It just kind of depends on what happens out in
the wild.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
Right, Yeah, And cats are a special case, perhaps an
episode for another day, because oh man, people loved cats.
People still love cats, even not counting toxoplasmosis. Gandhi, that's true.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
You get what I'm saying, though, Ben, Like, is there
something that in like, let's say you adopted a cat
from being wild, like a cat that was like, you know,
born feral, and then you, I guess the term would
be trained that cat, and then it were to be
released out in the wild. Would it immediately go back
to its wild roots or would it retain the kind
(10:48):
of training or I guess sort of domestication light that
you imparted on it.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
It's a fascinating question. One one good avenue for us
to explore that through would be the case of the pig.
A pig is domesticated at least twice throughout human history
and spread around the world. But we know well when
pigs are released into the wild or when they escape,
(11:16):
they can quickly return to their natural behavior. They'll grow hair,
they'll grow the tusk starts to resemble more of a
wild bore, just so, and reproduce with such The key
difference between taming and domesticating animals is, honestly the level
of human intervention. You can tame individual animals relatively quickly,
(11:42):
depending on the animal and depending on your own vibe
check role for initiative. But domestication is, to your point,
a long term process. It requires multiple generations, breeding, selection,
artificial kind of stuff.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Well, that's right, and chance and the cat scenario that
I was describing, whether the cat being astray isn't the
same as a cat being wild?
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Right? No, there are Again, I feel like we should
make a different episode on the housecat. In general.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
The house is sort of a special case, isn't it,
even even in terms of a lot of the stuff
we're talking about here, Yes, very much.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
So, And maybe we think of it this way. Taming
is not to go back too far into my hip
hop roots, but taming is an each one, teach one situation. Right,
If you make friends with that grizzly bear, it might
not be friends with other humans just over the jump.
(12:43):
When it reproduces, the creatures it makes will be wild.
Domestication is a group effort, and it has serious genetic,
physiological and as we'll see today psychological changes to a species.
That's right. Let's see.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
We've got a great line from archaeologist Angela Perry of
the University of Nevada in Las Vegas, who commented on
the improbability of hunter gatherers abducting and taming wolves, right,
which we had already said in the first episode was
kind of a debunked more or less debunked version of events.
Here this is what she had to say. I don't
(13:23):
know that many hunter gatherers would have had the time
or patience.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
To deal with a wolf pup. We kind of talked
about that too in part one, and I don't know
why they would want to.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Sorry, we really did kind of lean pretty heavily into
that at that point in history. It would have been
massively inconvenient to do any of those things because it
would have required so much attention, so much again training,
and without the proper knowledge on how to go about
these things, you'd have basically like a little predator amongst you.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
It would also be at that point extremely inconvenient to
stay alive as he without without having you know, man's
best friend. But thank you to any ancient communities who
are somehow alive and listening to podcasts. Thanks for giving
us dogs. Domestication gives superpowers in a kind of Faustian bargain.
(14:18):
We know that wolves and dogs again can indeed reproduce.
You know, this is where you get wolf dogskoi dogs,
things like that, coy dogs being coyote and dog wolf
dogs being wolves and dogs. But we also know that
a domestic dog from the day it is born shows
marked differences to every other single kind of canid out there.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Sure, and I'm sorry, I keep coming back to this
because i know it's different, but I'm getting what your
meaning when you're talking about the housecat. Even a quote
unquote domesticated housecat when exposed to like prey, well tear
that stuff up, you know, like an absolute apex predator,
whereas a you know, domesticated dog kind of just once is.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
Kibbles, you know. Yeah, Well, I mean house cats have
it both ways, almost right, m Yeah, again, very different case.
They're they're kind of bracketed with an asterisk in the
story of domestication. If we're going to dogs, we're gonna
look at something like there's this excellent study cooperative communication
(15:24):
with humans evolved to emerge early in domestic dogs. Many
authors on this you should be able to find it online.
The lead author is Professor Hannah Solomon's and she shows
us that dogs genetically evolve to interact with humans at
a level most other non human animals will simply never reach.
(15:48):
Take a dog that's born, take a wolf that's born.
The dog puppy is going to naturally be more attracted
to humans.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
And I do have to wonder if that is in
some part one of the those sort of I guess
perfect storms of evolution, where that original sort of genesis
breed of gray wolf that was just a little bit
more kind of predisposed to being chill with humans. If
that made such a if that made all the difference.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
Yeah, Also, dogs are excellent at vibe checks. Dog puppies
will use gestures that humans can understand, verbal and nonverbal.
They'll make eye contact. They do something called extended gaze
way more often than wolf puppies, like, for instance, uh,
(16:37):
you know, the best way to end your life in
in an interaction with a gorilla is to make eye contact.
It is seen as a challenge. They will mop you
you can't do it. But but if you if you
make eye contact with a dog, then it sees your
soul everywhere, or put your finger out so boopit with
(17:00):
its nose.
Speaker 2 (17:01):
But you know, all along in this conversation, from the
very start, we did talk about similarities in the way
that early humans and wolves hunted. So I do think
that there is sort of a chicken or egg question
here where were they domesticatable because they already kind of
shared some traits, you know, in the way they communicated
with one another and the way they executed their hunts.
(17:23):
Just some things that were sort of aligned already with
the two species humans and wolves.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Yeah. Yeah, Like I was saying in part one, I
think the ven diagram is our key piece of the puzzle.
If we go to folks like Robert Quinlan, professor of
anthropology over at Washington State University, will see the argument
that this domestication process, this coevolution occurred because like the
(17:53):
rom Com example, wolves and humans already had so much
in common. They probably started domesticating each other accidentally in
fits and starts. Wolves were scavenging the remains of human kills,
and they probably kicked off the domestication process themselves. It
(18:15):
probably was not a case of a enterprising human killing
a wolf pack and saving the cubs. They would have
just eaten the cubs. I think it's tremendously presumptuous for
us to assume humans would have had the foresight to say, Hey,
(18:36):
let me take the child version of this thing that
almost killed me and fall asleep around it. Just roll
the dice, see what happens. The wolves probably were probably
the initiators one hundred percent. I just wanted to use
this as a quick opportunity. I think we've discussed this
(18:57):
on this podcast as well as on stuff that I
want to know. But the notion of feral children and
of the idea of like children being raised by wolves,
which has kind of become a bit of a parlance,
you know, just like of like a wild child or whatever,
pretty much entirely debunked. Right.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
We do have a case of sisters Amala and Kamala
who were found living, you know, rough in the wilderness
in India. They were described in scientific writings at the time.
I guess, you know, results may vary in terms of
how vigilant the science was, but in nineteen twenty six
is having been quote unquote.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Raised by wolves in the forests of India.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
But again, much more likely that they were early examples,
early documented examples of autism.
Speaker 1 (19:42):
Well, yeah, we do know that. I'm glad you're bringing
this up. We do know there are examples of quote
unquote feral children who were taken care of by animals,
but those are exceedingly rare. The times that those things
may have happened, they gave way to a thousand ships
(20:07):
of folklore and mythology like Romulus and Remus. That would
be the earliest example, right of humans raised by wolves.
And yeah, so it's extremely uncommon for that to occur.
(20:29):
We do know that domestic dogs right now are more
vigilant than wolves, and they were bred to be increasingly vigilant.
This is where we get to, I would say, a
morally or ethically gray part of the equation. Domestication does
(20:53):
give you superpowers, but it is also a Faustian bargain
because were these early humanmans that were breeding dogs to
be useful to them? Were they not programming those dogs
with more anxiety than the dogs would have had they
if they stayed wolves? How are the dogs always like,
(21:14):
what's happening?
Speaker 2 (21:15):
What? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Whoa? Whoa? Yeah, what's going on? Also, dogs learned a
language that wolves don't speak. Dogs bark. Dogs can howl
just like a wolf, some of them at least, But
wolves don't bark. That's true. They growl and they howl,
(21:38):
but I don't think I've ever heard a wolf bark.
Seeing them bite, that's yeah, sure, yeah, yeah, their bite
is worse than their bark. So we also see that.
You know, there's this earlier point raised about domestication as
a two way street. You can argue that the wolves
evolving to dogs that process, they also evolve to hack
(22:02):
human psychology. Sure that the infantile features, the fancy work
for it is pedamorphic, the.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
You know, the the qt eyes that a dog will
make looking up at you all forlorn or you know,
excited or whatever, like its actually its master's feet. Certainly,
things like fetching you know, a stick or whatever, various
adaptations that make them more appealing to humans because over
time those yielded positive survival based results.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
Yeah, and we don't have to just speculate about dogs
for this. We can see a pretty fantastic experiment from
the nineteen fifties that proves this can happen with other
things similar to dogs. We know about the Russian scientist
Dmitri Belyev, who started he captured a bunch of silver
(23:01):
foxes like Richard Gere right, right, he got a bunch
of zaddies or whatever whatever you wish you add. These
were foxes that would have ordinarily been captured, bread for
a bit and then skinned in a fur farm. And
he said, what if I what if I try to
(23:21):
selectively breed them and make a domestic fox? If I
make them tamer over time, over each successive generation. And
he did just what the what we think the early
humans did. He chose foxes that were bold enough to
be around humans, not timid enough to run away, but
(23:44):
not too aggressive to instantly bite them in the throat.
He chose for tolerance and lo and behold. Over time,
these foxes became tamer. However, they also got their floppity
ear yep, and the early Q tales, Yeah, yeah, they
(24:04):
got They got cuter, they became kawhi. I was about
to say the same thing, then, oh, my goodness got
of my head. That's amazing.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
No, but also that I have to ask, though, why
don't we hear about domesticated foxes that much? No, I
don't know anybody that has a domesticated fox as a pet.
This experiment not last.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
It did last. I will give you the answers, though, uh,
first and foremost they're kind of clamped down on. It's
a little bit difficult to get one, especially if you
want to make a breeding population. Here's what I think.
The real answer is, fox urine smells terrible. Really, it's
(24:45):
so bad, okay, huh, astonishingly repugnant. I had no idea,
and you know that's glad. I'm glad. Don't experience no
no fox, just wave taking a picture and go, I'll
give it a pass.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
I can't help though, in talking about this experiment here
and thinking about one of our very first Ridiculous History
episodes where in Napoleon got absolutely inundated by domesticated bunny
rabbits mob who yeah, mobs, you know, like totally almost
knocked over his coach and his carriage and all that.
Because you'll remember if old school Ridiculous History heads that
(25:24):
they were domesticated, therefore they feared no human. In fact,
they loved them just so much and just wanted to
snuggle up on them, as opposed to a wild hair
which would of course run from the humans and give
chase and be a much more fun experience for a hunt.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
Get it wild hair, Yeah, I got it. So this
guy when he creates these foxes, he notices the bark boar,
and he also notices that they tend to reproduce more often.
These foxes indeed had a lot of the same qualities
(26:01):
we see in dogs, but none of the same qualities
we see in wolves. Retaining these juvenile features to your
earlier point, it is evolutionarily advantageous. Look at those eyes.
Trust me say the features. I'm rolling around my belly
when my cute little tail help me. Love me this
(26:24):
it's not manipulation either. It's like behavior that just becomes
innate over time because of the positive results that it yields. Right,
the dogs are the foxes that can do this, are
capable of doing this, They're the ones that are more
likely to reproduce. This brings us to another superpower of
(26:44):
the dog, a superpower of domestication, facial expressions. If you
are in love with dogs and you got a pooch
that is very close to you, and you always think,
how does this how's this little doggo know what's going
on with me? How does this guy read the room. Uh.
(27:06):
It turns out it's the ven diagram thing. Again. Wolves
and humans use facial cues when they are communicating in
their social environment and their cohort.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
But the ability to read facial cues in humans is
incredibly enhanced in domestic dogs. That's where they do like
Gaye alternation. So if you, like, if you've ever seen
a dog who is trying to get you to help
them solve a problem, they might stare at you and
just keep flicking their eyes over this way, like, what's
(27:41):
over there? What's going on over there? It's bro, you've
got thumbs man, Well, you know it's funny.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
A minute ago I said that this behavior wasn't necessarily manipulation,
but that I don't know.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
I think to me, that opens up a bigger question.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
It's almost like, even we as humans, is anything we
do towards anybody showing signs of affection, is that ultimately
just manipulation to get what we want? If you look
at it and dissect it and cut it enough ways,
the answer could be yes. So the question then becomes
like our dogs, actually, do they care about us?
Speaker 1 (28:18):
Or are we just a means to an end for them? Right? Yeah,
It's a question that plagues all living things. Does altruism exist? Right?
So do you want the best for another living thing
in the void of reality or do you only do
that because you want the best for yourself? You know
(28:39):
what I mean? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (28:40):
I mean, you know, you could argue, maybe it's a
bit of a nihilist way of looking at it, that
any act of kindness is ultimately an act of selfishness
because you're doing it to either make yourself feel better
or to improve your standing and be seen in a
certain way. You know, I don't think that's true. I'm
just saying this is getting me thinking about stuff.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
Like that, that's all Youah, No, I like it. Let's
walk a little further down then, because you could argue
in that vein that the best contrast to that would
be the fact that people sometimes help other folks with
no external benefit. A lot of folks who are tuning
in tonight, of course you're the best audience in all
(29:20):
of podcasting. Yea, You've helped this stranger who may have
never met may have never met you, you may never
meet them. You felt better, and so optimistic nihilism might
argue that you did that because it made you feel good. Still, externally,
you have no benefit. You simply helped another thing that
(29:44):
exists for sure, And I will say that I think
the psychology of the human experience is arguably a little
more complex than that of the canine experience.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
So I think for some people that internal treat is
maybe just as power for the dog the external treat.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
Yeah. Also, humans are at a great disadvantage because they're
studying themselves. I would love to hear cognition, yeah, thinking
about thinking, that's metacognition. I would love to hear from
a canine psychologist, from a canine behavioral therapist. Right, why
(30:23):
does man fetch? I did see a headline the other day.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
I did not read past it, but it said that
it within a decade or so, we may have technology
will allow us to quote unquote speak to our pets.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
Yes, there are things that are quite controversial now, usually
paw pads where the dog can hit can hit a
button that will translate to a human noise like walk treat,
et cetera. However, it's still pretty dicey because it goes
(30:55):
back to the days of chickens and horses counting in carnivals,
which parlor trick which was a parlor trick. Absolutely, we're
probably going to be able to talk to cetaceans. First.
There's some really interesting whale I can't believe I'm saying
this on air. Whale translation apps, okay, are are being made,
(31:19):
uh bray world, maybe in a positive sense for this,
I don't know why not Right at the end, you
know what I mean. Right at the end, we'll get
some cool stuff. Uh the end of the podcast or
the end of the world, you know, nothing else. Yeah,
right right at the beginning of the end of the world.
I think our podcast is going to go on for
a while, onish on that. Yeah, until the end of
(31:41):
the world. Yeah, I hope. So, I hope you feel
the same way.
Speaker 2 (31:45):
You know I do.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
Oh, I very much do. I would love to.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
I would podcast with you from the deck of the
Titanic Ben Oh geez.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Yeah, we got to get a violin guy to play too.
I can play the violin. I'll be I know, I
can be the guy. I could be both guys. So
all right, here's the craziest thing. You may be a
dog lover, and you've maybe never heard this. We said
dogs understand things that other non human animals don't. Dogs
(32:13):
understand when you nod, and they understand why you're nodding,
and they follow the direction in your face. Dogs are
one of the only non human animals that understands what
you mean when you point at something. A lot of
other primates here us closely primates don't understand pointing. You could.
(32:36):
You could be hanging out with a gorilla. Again, no
eye contact, be safe. You could point at something and
it would just be like this loser, I got fingers too.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
I think that Coco the gorilla could understand pointing pretty
well though, if I'm not mistaken.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
Ah, Coco can understand hand signals.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
Okay, all right, picture you know if you're right, though, Ben,
the idea of pointing, we think of it as obvious, like, Okay,
if I'm pointing my finger out a thing, you should
direct your gaze to that. But without that context, maybe
it is a little more abstract. Given it credit, they're like,
these guys are doing weird stretches. But for whatever reasons,
(33:17):
You're right, dogs will direct their gaze in the direction
of the point.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Yeah. Dogs can read the room, just like most humans
who are not on four chan. They walk down the
street for that.
Speaker 2 (33:30):
One yeah, manbit hole, and know we got to get
to something called the love hormone. Well, this is I think,
really really key in what makes dog goes so incredibly
appealing as companions to human beings. The idea that a
dog can sense the emotional state of a person and
(33:54):
act accordingly or react accordingly.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
Oh yeah, part of it is the amazing sense of smell,
the hyper focus on your nonverbal expressions or body language. Also,
domestic dogs and their human pals have something called oxytocin.
This is why I don't want to answer pomorphize too much,
(34:21):
but this is why when you see cute things, you
think they are cute if you are human. When you
see like we're describing, right, the big eyes, the big ears,
the tiny mouth. Yeah, I mean there's a reason that,
(34:41):
you know, depending on who you are.
Speaker 2 (34:43):
Most people think babies are cute because we're supposed to
like love them instantly and want to protect them at
all costs. And them being cute and having those doe
eyes or whatever. It is a I guess not skill.
Well as you call it adaptation, maybe that makes that
more likely.
Speaker 1 (35:01):
Yeah, So your dog friends are so sensitive to everything
about you when they see you smile. Get this, They
understand that you are happy, and if you do a
fake smile, they'll probably know you're faking it. It makes
them happy to see you happy, and then it makes
(35:21):
you happy to see them happy. You get a feedback loop.
Next thing, you know, you have a bro for life.
It's a real love fest.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think this is the real
crucial feature that makes that bond between a dog and
they're human so incredibly strong and so incredibly traumatic when
when a beloved dog passes away, because it's like losing
a member of the family, it's like losing someone that
you actually have an emotional connection with. Because of these
(35:52):
exact things that you're describing.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
Mm hmm, yeah, one hundred percent, well said. We know
the psychological ass there, We know the adaptations of domestication.
They extend to physiological aspects beyond what you would call
retention of juvenile traits. Dogs have developed facial musculature in
(36:19):
their evolution. It's one of the things they could do
is furrow the brow, you know, tilt the head. I'm confused,
what's going on? Where is the ball?
Speaker 2 (36:30):
The term puppy dog ey speaking of like domestication of
humans by dogs. That's become a term that is applied
to the way humans look at each other, making puppy
dog eyes when you want someone to feel a certain way,
whether it's a little kid that's trying to get a
certain reaction out of their parent. But you're right, then
those changes in muscles and actual a development of new
(36:53):
muscles and the ability to control them is part of
that long game of evolution and domestication.
Speaker 1 (37:01):
Yeah, yeah, you're right. No, if you we found a
fascinating study. If you go to an animal shelter, and
you always should, it's it's a fun way to volunteer,
you will see that dogs who have puppy dog eyes,
who have that stereotypically worried or sad expression as humans
(37:24):
experience it, they are adopted more quickly, which again shows
us that ancient selective advantage. They are genetically programmed to
hack the human mind. Unfortunately, this does come with a
bit of a price. Go back to our hippo example.
(37:46):
If a hippo as tame as it could be is
abused by humans, it's not going to mess with humans
again in a non confrontational way. It is going to
hate all humans because it will recognize a threat, but
a dog amid so many other animals in this wide world,
(38:10):
a dog can be abused by one group of humans
and then instantly bond with another group of humans, for sure.
Speaker 2 (38:20):
But then on the flip side of that, I have
I had a situation where a girl I was dating
at the time lived with, you know, a couple of folks,
and one of them had a dog who was a
rescue as a pit and hated to me. He had
been well, it was more than that, he hated bearded dudes,
and they had to put this dog o away every
(38:41):
time I came over, and over the course of that relationship,
I was able to kind of, you know, earn the
dog's trust, but it was very innate, like it was
specifically singling out me as a bearded man because they
said the person that had him before was a bearded man.
Speaker 1 (38:59):
Was a real, real pill. Well, you reached a ceasefire, though,
what you couldn't do with a with a wild animal
with most other animals, right, I got in a situation
with a parrot one time, and she's terrifying. Yeah, Well,
I'm gonna be honest with you. As a lover of
all animals, I wish that parrot specifically the worst. Yeah,
(39:25):
just that one little more bird hate. Come on, man, No,
just that one. There's just that one. But also we
have to see that there is a higher tendency toward
conflict avoidant behavior towards humans on the part of a dog,
and there's this increased inclination to want humans to like you,
(39:47):
or at least certain humans to your earlier example, perhaps
most different from wolves in the psychological aspect. Dogs are
a big fan of learning human rules and remembering those
rules and following those rules all for the approval and
consistent food from the humans. And we are coming right
(40:12):
up on I think what will be my favorite part
of this entire series. Forgive me, Ben, I've teased it
multiple times, but I think it's been clear throughout all
of our discussions that there are certain animals that are
much more inclined towards domestication. And it's because of certain
traits that they kind of innately have just by virtue
(40:34):
of being what they are, that makes them more likely
candidates for domestication. Yes, more domesticatable. God, I love how
ridiculous the English language is. Yeah, it's exceedingly rare to
domesticate a non human animal. Lets you know what, let's
go right to it. Professor Jared Diamond over at UCLA,
(40:59):
probably famous for his book Guns, Germs and Steel. We
know it's a little controversial. He is a prominent author
in the vein of Mark Kurlansky or our buddy ve
All Noah Harari mre that sapiens of course.
Speaker 2 (41:15):
Yeah, fabulous, fabulous writer, really great way of crystallizing some
pretty lofty concepts in a very understandable way.
Speaker 1 (41:23):
So Professor Diamond, which is such a ridiculously cool name.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
One, if he's related to Dustin Diamond, if you saved
by the bell he was screech.
Speaker 1 (41:32):
Yeah, he screech has been through it also would be
cool to call him doctor Diamond. But no, this is something,
as you said, we're both very excited about. According to
Professor Diamond, there are six basic criteria for domestica dobility,
(41:53):
which again English language, Oh yeah, gotta love it.
Speaker 2 (41:56):
The first one I think we've we've made really cleared
just this in this discussion, and it makes a whole
heck of a lot of sense. The animal needs to
be able to eat lots of different things and be
kind of malleable in that, you know, not needing to
have food from a certain type of source every single time,
be willing to.
Speaker 1 (42:13):
Like the early wolves, the pre dog wolves live off
of the scraps of humans. Yeah, no, picky eaters. And
number two, the animals need to grow up quickly or
at least faster than humans and often faster than their
wild counterparts. Going back to our example about the the
(42:35):
silver or Finnic foxes, think about it. You know again,
you're a hunter gatherer, you're classic human, live in your
classic human life. There's not really a good return on
investment for you to domesticate very long lived animals like
a galapago sea turtle. Oh yeah, it wouldn't take or
(42:59):
it would just take too damn long. How are you
gonna do that? It's gonna be years before they're useful,
their reproduction cycle is off. And then also a lot
of animals don't like to breed when they feel like
they're in jail.
Speaker 2 (43:13):
Ben I gotta ask really quickly. Just to backtrack, you
mentioned tortoises with the long lifespan. Elephants is another thing
that the good Doctor Diamond mentioned. So does that mean
there was really no such thing? As war elephants like
we know them in you know, Roman battle scenarios like
illustrations and stuff, because was that a real thing?
Speaker 1 (43:33):
Great question. Elephants African and Asian are phenomenally intelligent. They
are incredibly smart, smarter than dogs if we're being honest.
But they are not domesticated. They can be tamed, and
they are often forced into interactions in human society in
(43:56):
places like Thailand. Gotcha, you know?
Speaker 2 (43:59):
Okay, so this is more of a training situation, right,
you know, like you know now that I think about it,
that they often offer like elephant rides at zews. I
think I did that when I was a kid. You know,
whatever ethics aside on that, but that makes a lot
of sense, pained, but not domesticating, that's right, because again,
the domestication is the sort of long term version of
(44:19):
the taming that requires reproduction over you know, many generations
for it to kind of take and to the point
of the long lifespan.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
That is what makes these animals particularly poorly suited to
this kind of thing. Also, the third condition, and again
this is from Professor Diamond, the animals have to be
willing to breed in captivity in close quarters under human supervision.
So if you have a bunch of tigers, right, tremendously
(44:50):
intelligent animals. I mean, they're not as smart as an
elephant maybe, but they are smart cookies. They are boffins.
They need a lot if you put them, If you
just put them in a tiny, like human sized room
and say, okay, live together, have a issue, Yeah, we're good.
Speaker 2 (45:12):
You know that's true of even just breeding in general
in captivity of the certain species. I heard a really
great piece on NPR a couple of months ago about
how difficult it is to breed eels in captivity, and
they are only a handful of folks, companies or what
have you that have kind of this proprietary method of
farming eels and breeding them in captivity, because they actually
(45:34):
typically the largest source of eels you know that we
see in things like sushi are fished wild, and there
is an overfishing problem with eels because it is so
difficult to breed them in captivity.
Speaker 1 (45:46):
And they have a very sensitive reproductive cycle as well. Yeah,
this leads us to what I would call a soft
proposition on diamonds, part number four. Noel, tell me what
you think about this. The animals have to be quote
naturally pleasant.
Speaker 2 (46:06):
Well, that's an interesting thing because all along we've been
talking about sort of the nature of that first I
keep calling it sort of the genesis of the dog,
that gray wolf species that meet cute, that meet cute.
Where they were kind of a little more chill. It
would seem that they that particular subs breed or subspecies
or whatever you want to call it. It's probably something
(46:27):
specific to call it, but I'm not a scientist. So
there was something about their constitution or their kind of
demeanor that led it to them being a perfect candidate
for ultimate domestication. But it's tough because it's like pleasantness,
it's very vague. But let's just qualify that a little
bit calmness. Natural calmness certain animals that are skittish or
(46:51):
easily spooked, for example, that doesn't bode particularly well for domestication.
Speaker 1 (46:56):
Yeah, so number four is naturally pleasant. Number five called
keep your head and your wits about you right when
these crazy humans are asking you, you know, to fetch
them a ball. The number six is one of the
most I think behaviorally important. The animals need to be
(47:17):
willing to recognize humans as part of their in group
as part of their hierarchy.
Speaker 2 (47:25):
That's right, And you know even with certain zoo animals,
we know that is a thing that doesn't work with
certain types of animals, Like I believe in China there
is a zoo or maybe this is common practice where
in order to raise certain types of pandas, the zoo
keepers dress up as pandas themselves, Yeah, in order to
handle them correctly. And that may well be like they
(47:45):
just don't want them to get too imprinted by humans.
So I'm not one hundred percent sure exactly what the
endgame there is, but to your point, like, we do
know that there are certain animals that are much more
likely to be imprinted by humans and other ones that
really resist it.
Speaker 1 (48:03):
Yeah. Also, we got a deal on the costumes, thanks
Jeff Bezos. And with this, folks, we have so many
other questions and bits of ridiculous history to explore. This
conversation about dogs has inspired us. We're gonna be making
some episodes about dog breeds as well. Please send us
(48:26):
your favorites. We will probably also bust some myths about
dogs along the way in future episodes. In the meantime,
thank you so much for tuning in Big big thanks
to our super producer, mister Max Williams, who has been
a little bit off mic for this episode. That's okay,
we're just getting back from the holidays.
Speaker 2 (48:46):
We're all getting our sea legs back underneath us. And
I think you still sore at us for pointing out
the dog stats.
Speaker 1 (48:52):
I am yeah, okay, dude, okay, all right. I got
a way slowly like Homer Simps than another bush ido.
But you turned your camera on. That's good.
Speaker 2 (49:03):
You'd love to see a beautiful faces and the huge
thanks to to a producer, Max Williams. Again, if you
already said it, I'm sorry I got distracted. Huge thanks
to Alex Williams who composed our theme. And by the way,
if you do want to reach out to any of
the three of us, except for Max because he's off
the social media.
Speaker 1 (49:20):
You can't do so. Ben, How can people find you
if they so wish on the internets? Ah? Yes, further
into the breach, should you sip the social meds. You
can find me calling myself in a burst of creativity
at Ben Bullen on Instagram. You can find at Ben
Bullen hsw on X. You can also visit benbullin dot
(49:41):
com if you want to catch up with high Jinks,
Shenanigan's scenarios and adventures, and while you're snarios. While you're
up there, why not check out my good pal Noel
Brown's social media presence. Noel, are the rumors true? Are
you on Instagram?
Speaker 2 (49:59):
All? Lie?
Speaker 1 (50:00):
That's that's true. That's the only place I really hang out.
Speaker 2 (50:01):
You can find me there at how now, Noel Brown
and Ben Can I also just thank you for this
incredible deep dive on the history of domestication and really
just on doggoes in general, really really excellent work on
the super in depth research briefs. It so joy to
discuss this with you, and I'm happy to be back
after a sizeable break. I think we both enjoyed the recharge.
(50:24):
But we're back and we're better than ever and excited
for a new year.
Speaker 1 (50:29):
Oh gosh, thanks for saying that, Noll. It does mean
the world big thanks of course to Eve's Jeffcoat Chris
Frosiotis the Brew Dudes a ridiculous crime? And if you
disagree with my palell Nol regarding this episode, please please
please always remember we started a complaint department just for you.
(50:49):
Twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, anytime
of the year. We actually recommend sending it late at night.
Jonathan Strickland at iHeartMedia dot com our official complaint department.
Speaker 2 (51:05):
Yeah, you'll definitely write you back, no question. We'll see
you next time, folks. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit
the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows.
Ridiculous History is a production of iHeartRadio. Welcome back to
(00:27):
the show Ridiculous Historians. Thank you, as always so much
for tuning in. We are so over the moon to
be joined again with our super producer mister Max Williams.
He's a wild wolves of love. Yeah, you got three,
(00:48):
You got three handsome lone wolves. Here teaming up for
part two of How Dogs Went Domestic. They call me
Ben Bollen in this part of the world, and you, sir,
often go by the sober Kate Noel Brown.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
'tis true and I want saw Max Williams drinking a
Pina Colada Trader Vicks in His air was perfect.
Speaker 1 (01:11):
He's got great hair, he really does. That's good. Had
hair on it, almost dog like. Oh, we're doing segues.
So in part one, we explored the ongoing mystery, the
ongoing scientific discourse about how a now extinct version of
(01:34):
gray wolves could end up becoming the Great Danes, the
Saint Bnad's, the stoutzersund yeah, the bloodhound, uh, the shizoos,
the Pomeranians and way to keep it clean with your pronunciation,
(01:54):
the Tibetan mastives. Uh. Well, I have a shazoo in
my family. Uh, and I just can't believe you.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
The guy. I just can't believe you had squander an
opportunity to say, just to say the dirty way.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
I have too much respect for him. The only thing
I don't like about that dog is that his name
is Leo, which is technically a terrible name for a dog.
Speaker 2 (02:17):
My name is practically Leo in reverse. Yeah, think about it,
You're like a Leon. I'm a you know, it's funny.
I don't think we're gonna get into this too much today,
but it may well be fodder for a third episode
maybe down the line. But all of the crazy in
breeding that goes into dogs that yield some of these
(02:38):
creatures that you know, maybe shouldn't quite exist and that
have like some pretty significant challenges. Let's just say, like
the humble bulldog that really can't breathe super well.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
Yeah, nor reproduce that well. This is an excellent setup, Noel.
Please tune into part one, where we explore, as three
huge fanboys, the story of wolves to Dogs. This is
part two. We teased it a little bit, but we're
not going to leave you hanging without a dope beat
(03:10):
to step two. It's time to talk about domestication. Step two,
Step two, step two, Okay, Part two.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Yeah, and many times in Part one have really thrown
my support behind this discussion of domestication. It is an
often misunderstood concept.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
We sort of hinted at some of the early forms.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Of domestication that were a little more circumstantial. I believe
it was commensial domestication, which is basically just like circumstances
that yet yielded some changes, but not with the a
the abject intervention of humans quite yet, which is what
we're getting to now.
Speaker 1 (03:46):
That's what I was just sort of throwing around, Yeah,
commensal domestication, meaning our earlier exploration, the idea of domestication
as a two way streak. Check out our earlier stuff
They don't want you to know episode regarding the idea
that plants may have domesticated humans. And as we'll see,
(04:09):
maybe the wolves turning into dogs had a little bit
of a pushback or touch on their human pals as well.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
The Oxford English Dictionary what a tone defines domestication thusly
the process of taming an animal and keeping it as
a pet or on a farm. But as we indicated
more than once in Part one, That is an incredible
oversimplification of the concept because we even had a whole
section about like, what's the difference between taming and domesticating,
(04:45):
and they're not exactly the same. So I don't know, Oxford,
I think we might need a little bit more context here.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Yes, swing in a miss oed with all due respect,
swing and a miss whiffed on that one. Domestication is
not taming. Taming an animal refers to the process of
training a non human animal to be comfortable around humans,
(05:11):
to follow certain basic commands. This is often done with
wild animals to make them more manageable and less aggressive.
You can see so many videos of this on your
favorite social media platform of choice, your TikTok, your Instagram,
your YouTube. We've befriended a wild hip? How told this
(05:37):
hip how to leave amongst us?
Speaker 2 (05:40):
We boas or in the Seminole two thousand's nature documentary
by our boy Werner Herzog grizzly Man, wherein that type
of thinking, spoiler alert ends up with the humans being
brutally devoured eaten by wild bears because they're not super.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
Good candid for domestication, are they No, they're not old,
They're good candidates for taming, and we'll see the difference here.
Another good comparison would be the crows that I have
befriended in various parts of the world. Like, clearly those
guys are wild animals. They're savage af but they are
(06:23):
they They are intelligent, and they can work together with
humans on certain things, but they are by no means.
Speaker 2 (06:31):
Domesticated, especially when you raise both arms up like the
night king and they just flock to you and do
your bidding.
Speaker 1 (06:37):
Oh that's because I have eggs in my pockets. Oh yeah,
I was wondering what that sound was. So this idea
of taming an animals, it's not going to change the
animal's genetic makeup or its behavior. Instead, it occurs on
an individual level. Again as a two way street. You're
(06:59):
you're teaching me be one grizzly bear raised as a
cub to respond in a non threatened, non threatening way
to one human. But if that bear has a cub,
that cub is going to be Like my old college
roommate said savage.
Speaker 2 (07:19):
Af absolutely, And like I said, with the Timothy Treadwell example,
that was the titular grizzly man.
Speaker 1 (07:25):
You know, he had really good experiences kicking it with
grizzlies in the wild, and he felt that his behavior
and the way he was interacting with them was conducive
to good like symbiotic relationship with them until the moment
that it wasn't. He wasn't exactly training them. He was
just sort of like living amongst them, and it seemed
like it was going fine until the moment that for
whatever reason, that wild instinct kicked in and things went
(07:47):
very poorly for the grizzly man. But his acclimating himself
I could make himself expressactly. And this also we just
have to put the PSA in here, folks. A wild
animal being acclimated to human contact can be dangerous for
all life forms involved, one hundred percent.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
And I mean, you know, let's maybe give slight benefit
of the doubt to Oxford the folks who find folks
over the Oxford English Dictionary taming on a long enough
timeline through multiple iterations and generations.
Speaker 1 (08:24):
I guess is a better word is kind of domestication,
you know, can be right?
Speaker 2 (08:30):
Yeah, yeah, And I love we're going to get eventually
into some of the very important qualities that make an
animal domesticatable.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
I'm not I can't wait to get to it. Heart.
That just really blew my mind. I'm super excited, all right.
So domesticating animals not taming them. Right, you can tame
a wolf, you cannot domesticate a wolf. When people attempted
to tame wolves or domesticate them over time, they ended
up with dogs. So it involves our earlier conversation about
(09:04):
artificial the natural selection selective breeding. Just like Gregor Mindel
figured out with those peapods over many generations, you can
you can kind of decision tree reproduction to have a
higher probability of exhibiting traits that you perceive as desirable,
(09:27):
which is why domesticating an animal will change its genetic makeup,
meaning it changes its physical and behavioral traits. Domesticated animals
are often dependent upon humans for their survival. They've adapted
to living in close proximity to humans the same way
(09:49):
that a hippopotamus has adapted to living around water.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Well, and while domesticated animals certainly there is a possibility
that they could do okay, if they were to be
let's say an indoor outdoor cat, right, it could go feral.
They could go feral, or they come back and everything's fine.
It just kind of depends on what happens out in
the wild.
Speaker 1 (10:10):
Right, Yeah, And cats are a special case, perhaps an
episode for another day, because oh man, people loved cats.
People still love cats, even not counting toxoplasmosis. Gandhi, that's true.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
You get what I'm saying, though, Ben, Like, is there
something that in like, let's say you adopted a cat
from being wild, like a cat that was like, you know,
born feral, and then you, I guess the term would
be trained that cat, and then it were to be
released out in the wild. Would it immediately go back
to its wild roots or would it retain the kind
(10:48):
of training or I guess sort of domestication light that
you imparted on it.
Speaker 1 (10:54):
It's a fascinating question. One one good avenue for us
to explore that through would be the case of the pig.
A pig is domesticated at least twice throughout human history
and spread around the world. But we know well when
pigs are released into the wild or when they escape,
(11:16):
they can quickly return to their natural behavior. They'll grow hair,
they'll grow the tusk starts to resemble more of a
wild bore, just so, and reproduce with such The key
difference between taming and domesticating animals is, honestly the level
of human intervention. You can tame individual animals relatively quickly,
(11:42):
depending on the animal and depending on your own vibe
check role for initiative. But domestication is, to your point,
a long term process. It requires multiple generations, breeding, selection,
artificial kind of stuff.
Speaker 2 (11:58):
Well, that's right, and chance and the cat scenario that
I was describing, whether the cat being astray isn't the
same as a cat being wild?
Speaker 1 (12:07):
Right? No, there are Again, I feel like we should
make a different episode on the housecat. In general.
Speaker 2 (12:17):
The house is sort of a special case, isn't it,
even even in terms of a lot of the stuff
we're talking about here, Yes, very much.
Speaker 1 (12:22):
So, And maybe we think of it this way. Taming
is not to go back too far into my hip
hop roots, but taming is an each one, teach one situation. Right,
If you make friends with that grizzly bear, it might
not be friends with other humans just over the jump.
(12:43):
When it reproduces, the creatures it makes will be wild.
Domestication is a group effort, and it has serious genetic,
physiological and as we'll see today psychological changes to a species.
That's right. Let's see.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
We've got a great line from archaeologist Angela Perry of
the University of Nevada in Las Vegas, who commented on
the improbability of hunter gatherers abducting and taming wolves, right,
which we had already said in the first episode was
kind of a debunked more or less debunked version of events.
Here this is what she had to say. I don't
(13:23):
know that many hunter gatherers would have had the time
or patience.
Speaker 1 (13:26):
To deal with a wolf pup. We kind of talked
about that too in part one, and I don't know
why they would want to.
Speaker 2 (13:32):
Sorry, we really did kind of lean pretty heavily into
that at that point in history. It would have been
massively inconvenient to do any of those things because it
would have required so much attention, so much again training,
and without the proper knowledge on how to go about
these things, you'd have basically like a little predator amongst you.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
It would also be at that point extremely inconvenient to
stay alive as he without without having you know, man's
best friend. But thank you to any ancient communities who
are somehow alive and listening to podcasts. Thanks for giving
us dogs. Domestication gives superpowers in a kind of Faustian bargain.
(14:18):
We know that wolves and dogs again can indeed reproduce.
You know, this is where you get wolf dogskoi dogs,
things like that, coy dogs being coyote and dog wolf
dogs being wolves and dogs. But we also know that
a domestic dog from the day it is born shows
marked differences to every other single kind of canid out there.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Sure, and I'm sorry, I keep coming back to this
because i know it's different, but I'm getting what your
meaning when you're talking about the housecat. Even a quote
unquote domesticated housecat when exposed to like prey, well tear
that stuff up, you know, like an absolute apex predator,
whereas a you know, domesticated dog kind of just once is.
Speaker 1 (15:03):
Kibbles, you know. Yeah, Well, I mean house cats have
it both ways, almost right, m Yeah, again, very different case.
They're they're kind of bracketed with an asterisk in the
story of domestication. If we're going to dogs, we're gonna
look at something like there's this excellent study cooperative communication
(15:24):
with humans evolved to emerge early in domestic dogs. Many
authors on this you should be able to find it online.
The lead author is Professor Hannah Solomon's and she shows
us that dogs genetically evolve to interact with humans at
a level most other non human animals will simply never reach.
(15:48):
Take a dog that's born, take a wolf that's born.
The dog puppy is going to naturally be more attracted
to humans.
Speaker 2 (15:56):
And I do have to wonder if that is in
some part one of the those sort of I guess
perfect storms of evolution, where that original sort of genesis
breed of gray wolf that was just a little bit
more kind of predisposed to being chill with humans. If
that made such a if that made all the difference.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
Yeah, Also, dogs are excellent at vibe checks. Dog puppies
will use gestures that humans can understand, verbal and nonverbal.
They'll make eye contact. They do something called extended gaze
way more often than wolf puppies, like, for instance, uh,
(16:37):
you know, the best way to end your life in
in an interaction with a gorilla is to make eye contact.
It is seen as a challenge. They will mop you
you can't do it. But but if you if you
make eye contact with a dog, then it sees your
soul everywhere, or put your finger out so boopit with
(17:00):
its nose.
Speaker 2 (17:01):
But you know, all along in this conversation, from the
very start, we did talk about similarities in the way
that early humans and wolves hunted. So I do think
that there is sort of a chicken or egg question
here where were they domesticatable because they already kind of
shared some traits, you know, in the way they communicated
with one another and the way they executed their hunts.
(17:23):
Just some things that were sort of aligned already with
the two species humans and wolves.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
Yeah. Yeah, Like I was saying in part one, I
think the ven diagram is our key piece of the puzzle.
If we go to folks like Robert Quinlan, professor of
anthropology over at Washington State University, will see the argument
that this domestication process, this coevolution occurred because like the
(17:53):
rom Com example, wolves and humans already had so much
in common. They probably started domesticating each other accidentally in
fits and starts. Wolves were scavenging the remains of human kills,
and they probably kicked off the domestication process themselves. It
(18:15):
probably was not a case of a enterprising human killing
a wolf pack and saving the cubs. They would have
just eaten the cubs. I think it's tremendously presumptuous for
us to assume humans would have had the foresight to say, Hey,
(18:36):
let me take the child version of this thing that
almost killed me and fall asleep around it. Just roll
the dice, see what happens. The wolves probably were probably
the initiators one hundred percent. I just wanted to use
this as a quick opportunity. I think we've discussed this
(18:57):
on this podcast as well as on stuff that I
want to know. But the notion of feral children and
of the idea of like children being raised by wolves,
which has kind of become a bit of a parlance,
you know, just like of like a wild child or whatever,
pretty much entirely debunked. Right.
Speaker 2 (19:14):
We do have a case of sisters Amala and Kamala
who were found living, you know, rough in the wilderness
in India. They were described in scientific writings at the time.
I guess, you know, results may vary in terms of
how vigilant the science was, but in nineteen twenty six
is having been quote unquote.
Speaker 1 (19:34):
Raised by wolves in the forests of India.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
But again, much more likely that they were early examples,
early documented examples of autism.
Speaker 1 (19:42):
Well, yeah, we do know that. I'm glad you're bringing
this up. We do know there are examples of quote
unquote feral children who were taken care of by animals,
but those are exceedingly rare. The times that those things
may have happened, they gave way to a thousand ships
(20:07):
of folklore and mythology like Romulus and Remus. That would
be the earliest example, right of humans raised by wolves.
And yeah, so it's extremely uncommon for that to occur.
(20:29):
We do know that domestic dogs right now are more
vigilant than wolves, and they were bred to be increasingly vigilant.
This is where we get to, I would say, a
morally or ethically gray part of the equation. Domestication does
(20:53):
give you superpowers, but it is also a Faustian bargain
because were these early humanmans that were breeding dogs to
be useful to them? Were they not programming those dogs
with more anxiety than the dogs would have had they
if they stayed wolves? How are the dogs always like,
(21:14):
what's happening?
Speaker 2 (21:15):
What? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (21:16):
Whoa? Whoa? Yeah, what's going on? Also, dogs learned a
language that wolves don't speak. Dogs bark. Dogs can howl
just like a wolf, some of them at least, But
wolves don't bark. That's true. They growl and they howl,
(21:38):
but I don't think I've ever heard a wolf bark.
Seeing them bite, that's yeah, sure, yeah, yeah, their bite
is worse than their bark. So we also see that.
You know, there's this earlier point raised about domestication as
a two way street. You can argue that the wolves
evolving to dogs that process, they also evolve to hack
(22:02):
human psychology. Sure that the infantile features, the fancy work
for it is pedamorphic, the.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
You know, the the qt eyes that a dog will
make looking up at you all forlorn or you know,
excited or whatever, like its actually its master's feet. Certainly,
things like fetching you know, a stick or whatever, various
adaptations that make them more appealing to humans because over
time those yielded positive survival based results.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
Yeah, and we don't have to just speculate about dogs
for this. We can see a pretty fantastic experiment from
the nineteen fifties that proves this can happen with other
things similar to dogs. We know about the Russian scientist
Dmitri Belyev, who started he captured a bunch of silver
(23:01):
foxes like Richard Gere right, right, he got a bunch
of zaddies or whatever whatever you wish you add. These
were foxes that would have ordinarily been captured, bread for
a bit and then skinned in a fur farm. And
he said, what if I what if I try to
(23:21):
selectively breed them and make a domestic fox? If I
make them tamer over time, over each successive generation. And
he did just what the what we think the early
humans did. He chose foxes that were bold enough to
be around humans, not timid enough to run away, but
(23:44):
not too aggressive to instantly bite them in the throat.
He chose for tolerance and lo and behold. Over time,
these foxes became tamer. However, they also got their floppity
ear yep, and the early Q tales, Yeah, yeah, they
(24:04):
got They got cuter, they became kawhi. I was about
to say the same thing, then, oh, my goodness got
of my head. That's amazing.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
No, but also that I have to ask, though, why
don't we hear about domesticated foxes that much? No, I
don't know anybody that has a domesticated fox as a pet.
This experiment not last.
Speaker 1 (24:22):
It did last. I will give you the answers, though, uh,
first and foremost they're kind of clamped down on. It's
a little bit difficult to get one, especially if you
want to make a breeding population. Here's what I think.
The real answer is, fox urine smells terrible. Really, it's
(24:45):
so bad, okay, huh, astonishingly repugnant. I had no idea,
and you know that's glad. I'm glad. Don't experience no
no fox, just wave taking a picture and go, I'll
give it a pass.
Speaker 2 (24:59):
I can't help though, in talking about this experiment here
and thinking about one of our very first Ridiculous History
episodes where in Napoleon got absolutely inundated by domesticated bunny
rabbits mob who yeah, mobs, you know, like totally almost
knocked over his coach and his carriage and all that.
Because you'll remember if old school Ridiculous History heads that
(25:24):
they were domesticated, therefore they feared no human. In fact,
they loved them just so much and just wanted to
snuggle up on them, as opposed to a wild hair
which would of course run from the humans and give
chase and be a much more fun experience for a hunt.
Speaker 1 (25:40):
Get it wild hair, Yeah, I got it. So this
guy when he creates these foxes, he notices the bark boar,
and he also notices that they tend to reproduce more often.
These foxes indeed had a lot of the same qualities
(26:01):
we see in dogs, but none of the same qualities
we see in wolves. Retaining these juvenile features to your
earlier point, it is evolutionarily advantageous. Look at those eyes.
Trust me say the features. I'm rolling around my belly
when my cute little tail help me. Love me this
(26:24):
it's not manipulation either. It's like behavior that just becomes
innate over time because of the positive results that it yields. Right,
the dogs are the foxes that can do this, are
capable of doing this, They're the ones that are more
likely to reproduce. This brings us to another superpower of
(26:44):
the dog, a superpower of domestication, facial expressions. If you
are in love with dogs and you got a pooch
that is very close to you, and you always think,
how does this how's this little doggo know what's going
on with me? How does this guy read the room. Uh.
(27:06):
It turns out it's the ven diagram thing. Again. Wolves
and humans use facial cues when they are communicating in
their social environment and their cohort.
Speaker 2 (27:17):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (27:17):
But the ability to read facial cues in humans is
incredibly enhanced in domestic dogs. That's where they do like
Gaye alternation. So if you, like, if you've ever seen
a dog who is trying to get you to help
them solve a problem, they might stare at you and
just keep flicking their eyes over this way, like, what's
(27:41):
over there? What's going on over there? It's bro, you've
got thumbs man, Well, you know it's funny.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
A minute ago I said that this behavior wasn't necessarily manipulation,
but that I don't know.
Speaker 1 (27:56):
I think to me, that opens up a bigger question.
Speaker 2 (27:58):
It's almost like, even we as humans, is anything we
do towards anybody showing signs of affection, is that ultimately
just manipulation to get what we want? If you look
at it and dissect it and cut it enough ways,
the answer could be yes. So the question then becomes
like our dogs, actually, do they care about us?
Speaker 1 (28:18):
Or are we just a means to an end for them? Right? Yeah,
It's a question that plagues all living things. Does altruism exist? Right?
So do you want the best for another living thing
in the void of reality or do you only do
that because you want the best for yourself? You know
(28:39):
what I mean? Yeah?
Speaker 2 (28:40):
I mean, you know, you could argue, maybe it's a
bit of a nihilist way of looking at it, that
any act of kindness is ultimately an act of selfishness
because you're doing it to either make yourself feel better
or to improve your standing and be seen in a
certain way. You know, I don't think that's true. I'm
just saying this is getting me thinking about stuff.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
Like that, that's all Youah, No, I like it. Let's
walk a little further down then, because you could argue
in that vein that the best contrast to that would
be the fact that people sometimes help other folks with
no external benefit. A lot of folks who are tuning
in tonight, of course you're the best audience in all
(29:20):
of podcasting. Yea, You've helped this stranger who may have
never met may have never met you, you may never
meet them. You felt better, and so optimistic nihilism might
argue that you did that because it made you feel good. Still, externally,
you have no benefit. You simply helped another thing that
(29:44):
exists for sure, And I will say that I think
the psychology of the human experience is arguably a little
more complex than that of the canine experience.
Speaker 2 (29:54):
So I think for some people that internal treat is
maybe just as power for the dog the external treat.
Speaker 1 (30:02):
Yeah. Also, humans are at a great disadvantage because they're
studying themselves. I would love to hear cognition, yeah, thinking
about thinking, that's metacognition. I would love to hear from
a canine psychologist, from a canine behavioral therapist. Right, why
(30:23):
does man fetch? I did see a headline the other day.
Speaker 2 (30:26):
I did not read past it, but it said that
it within a decade or so, we may have technology
will allow us to quote unquote speak to our pets.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
Yes, there are things that are quite controversial now, usually
paw pads where the dog can hit can hit a
button that will translate to a human noise like walk treat,
et cetera. However, it's still pretty dicey because it goes
(30:55):
back to the days of chickens and horses counting in carnivals,
which parlor trick which was a parlor trick. Absolutely, we're
probably going to be able to talk to cetaceans. First.
There's some really interesting whale I can't believe I'm saying
this on air. Whale translation apps, okay, are are being made,
(31:19):
uh bray world, maybe in a positive sense for this,
I don't know why not Right at the end, you
know what I mean. Right at the end, we'll get
some cool stuff. Uh the end of the podcast or
the end of the world, you know, nothing else. Yeah,
right right at the beginning of the end of the world.
I think our podcast is going to go on for
a while, onish on that. Yeah, until the end of
(31:41):
the world. Yeah, I hope. So, I hope you feel
the same way.
Speaker 2 (31:45):
You know I do.
Speaker 1 (31:46):
Oh, I very much do. I would love to.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
I would podcast with you from the deck of the
Titanic Ben Oh geez.
Speaker 1 (31:52):
Yeah, we got to get a violin guy to play too.
I can play the violin. I'll be I know, I
can be the guy. I could be both guys. So
all right, here's the craziest thing. You may be a
dog lover, and you've maybe never heard this. We said
dogs understand things that other non human animals don't. Dogs
(32:13):
understand when you nod, and they understand why you're nodding,
and they follow the direction in your face. Dogs are
one of the only non human animals that understands what
you mean when you point at something. A lot of
other primates here us closely primates don't understand pointing. You could.
(32:36):
You could be hanging out with a gorilla. Again, no
eye contact, be safe. You could point at something and
it would just be like this loser, I got fingers too.
Speaker 2 (32:45):
I think that Coco the gorilla could understand pointing pretty
well though, if I'm not mistaken.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
Ah, Coco can understand hand signals.
Speaker 2 (32:53):
Okay, all right, picture you know if you're right, though, Ben,
the idea of pointing, we think of it as obvious, like, Okay,
if I'm pointing my finger out a thing, you should
direct your gaze to that. But without that context, maybe
it is a little more abstract. Given it credit, they're like,
these guys are doing weird stretches. But for whatever reasons,
(33:17):
You're right, dogs will direct their gaze in the direction
of the point.
Speaker 1 (33:22):
Yeah. Dogs can read the room, just like most humans
who are not on four chan. They walk down the
street for that.
Speaker 2 (33:30):
One yeah, manbit hole, and know we got to get
to something called the love hormone. Well, this is I think,
really really key in what makes dog goes so incredibly
appealing as companions to human beings. The idea that a
dog can sense the emotional state of a person and
(33:54):
act accordingly or react accordingly.
Speaker 1 (33:57):
Oh yeah, part of it is the amazing sense of smell,
the hyper focus on your nonverbal expressions or body language. Also,
domestic dogs and their human pals have something called oxytocin.
This is why I don't want to answer pomorphize too much,
(34:21):
but this is why when you see cute things, you
think they are cute if you are human. When you
see like we're describing, right, the big eyes, the big ears,
the tiny mouth. Yeah, I mean there's a reason that,
(34:41):
you know, depending on who you are.
Speaker 2 (34:43):
Most people think babies are cute because we're supposed to
like love them instantly and want to protect them at
all costs. And them being cute and having those doe
eyes or whatever. It is a I guess not skill.
Well as you call it adaptation, maybe that makes that
more likely.
Speaker 1 (35:01):
Yeah, So your dog friends are so sensitive to everything
about you when they see you smile. Get this, They
understand that you are happy, and if you do a
fake smile, they'll probably know you're faking it. It makes
them happy to see you happy, and then it makes
(35:21):
you happy to see them happy. You get a feedback loop.
Next thing, you know, you have a bro for life.
It's a real love fest.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think this is the real
crucial feature that makes that bond between a dog and
they're human so incredibly strong and so incredibly traumatic when
when a beloved dog passes away, because it's like losing
a member of the family, it's like losing someone that
you actually have an emotional connection with. Because of these
(35:52):
exact things that you're describing.
Speaker 1 (35:54):
Mm hmm, yeah, one hundred percent, well said. We know
the psychological ass there, We know the adaptations of domestication.
They extend to physiological aspects beyond what you would call
retention of juvenile traits. Dogs have developed facial musculature in
(36:19):
their evolution. It's one of the things they could do
is furrow the brow, you know, tilt the head. I'm confused,
what's going on? Where is the ball?
Speaker 2 (36:30):
The term puppy dog ey speaking of like domestication of
humans by dogs. That's become a term that is applied
to the way humans look at each other, making puppy
dog eyes when you want someone to feel a certain way,
whether it's a little kid that's trying to get a
certain reaction out of their parent. But you're right, then
those changes in muscles and actual a development of new
(36:53):
muscles and the ability to control them is part of
that long game of evolution and domestication.
Speaker 1 (37:01):
Yeah, yeah, you're right. No, if you we found a
fascinating study. If you go to an animal shelter, and
you always should, it's it's a fun way to volunteer,
you will see that dogs who have puppy dog eyes,
who have that stereotypically worried or sad expression as humans
(37:24):
experience it, they are adopted more quickly, which again shows
us that ancient selective advantage. They are genetically programmed to
hack the human mind. Unfortunately, this does come with a
bit of a price. Go back to our hippo example.
(37:46):
If a hippo as tame as it could be is
abused by humans, it's not going to mess with humans
again in a non confrontational way. It is going to
hate all humans because it will recognize a threat, but
a dog amid so many other animals in this wide world,
(38:10):
a dog can be abused by one group of humans
and then instantly bond with another group of humans, for sure.
Speaker 2 (38:20):
But then on the flip side of that, I have
I had a situation where a girl I was dating
at the time lived with, you know, a couple of folks,
and one of them had a dog who was a
rescue as a pit and hated to me. He had
been well, it was more than that, he hated bearded dudes,
and they had to put this dog o away every
(38:41):
time I came over, and over the course of that relationship,
I was able to kind of, you know, earn the
dog's trust, but it was very innate, like it was
specifically singling out me as a bearded man because they
said the person that had him before was a bearded man.
Speaker 1 (38:59):
Was a real, real pill. Well, you reached a ceasefire, though,
what you couldn't do with a with a wild animal
with most other animals, right, I got in a situation
with a parrot one time, and she's terrifying. Yeah, Well,
I'm gonna be honest with you. As a lover of
all animals, I wish that parrot specifically the worst. Yeah,
(39:25):
just that one little more bird hate. Come on, man, No,
just that one. There's just that one. But also we
have to see that there is a higher tendency toward
conflict avoidant behavior towards humans on the part of a dog,
and there's this increased inclination to want humans to like you,
(39:47):
or at least certain humans to your earlier example, perhaps
most different from wolves in the psychological aspect. Dogs are
a big fan of learning human rules and remembering those
rules and following those rules all for the approval and
consistent food from the humans. And we are coming right
(40:12):
up on I think what will be my favorite part
of this entire series. Forgive me, Ben, I've teased it
multiple times, but I think it's been clear throughout all
of our discussions that there are certain animals that are
much more inclined towards domestication. And it's because of certain
traits that they kind of innately have just by virtue
(40:34):
of being what they are, that makes them more likely
candidates for domestication. Yes, more domesticatable. God, I love how
ridiculous the English language is. Yeah, it's exceedingly rare to
domesticate a non human animal. Lets you know what, let's
go right to it. Professor Jared Diamond over at UCLA,
(40:59):
probably famous for his book Guns, Germs and Steel. We
know it's a little controversial. He is a prominent author
in the vein of Mark Kurlansky or our buddy ve
All Noah Harari mre that sapiens of course.
Speaker 2 (41:15):
Yeah, fabulous, fabulous writer, really great way of crystallizing some
pretty lofty concepts in a very understandable way.
Speaker 1 (41:23):
So Professor Diamond, which is such a ridiculously cool name.
Speaker 2 (41:27):
One, if he's related to Dustin Diamond, if you saved
by the bell he was screech.
Speaker 1 (41:32):
Yeah, he screech has been through it also would be
cool to call him doctor Diamond. But no, this is something,
as you said, we're both very excited about. According to
Professor Diamond, there are six basic criteria for domestica dobility,
(41:53):
which again English language, Oh yeah, gotta love it.
Speaker 2 (41:56):
The first one I think we've we've made really cleared
just this in this discussion, and it makes a whole
heck of a lot of sense. The animal needs to
be able to eat lots of different things and be
kind of malleable in that, you know, not needing to
have food from a certain type of source every single time,
be willing to.
Speaker 1 (42:13):
Like the early wolves, the pre dog wolves live off
of the scraps of humans. Yeah, no, picky eaters. And
number two, the animals need to grow up quickly or
at least faster than humans and often faster than their
wild counterparts. Going back to our example about the the
(42:35):
silver or Finnic foxes, think about it. You know again,
you're a hunter gatherer, you're classic human, live in your
classic human life. There's not really a good return on
investment for you to domesticate very long lived animals like
a galapago sea turtle. Oh yeah, it wouldn't take or
(42:59):
it would just take too damn long. How are you
gonna do that? It's gonna be years before they're useful,
their reproduction cycle is off. And then also a lot
of animals don't like to breed when they feel like
they're in jail.
Speaker 2 (43:13):
Ben I gotta ask really quickly. Just to backtrack, you
mentioned tortoises with the long lifespan. Elephants is another thing
that the good Doctor Diamond mentioned. So does that mean
there was really no such thing? As war elephants like
we know them in you know, Roman battle scenarios like
illustrations and stuff, because was that a real thing?
Speaker 1 (43:33):
Great question. Elephants African and Asian are phenomenally intelligent. They
are incredibly smart, smarter than dogs if we're being honest.
But they are not domesticated. They can be tamed, and
they are often forced into interactions in human society in
(43:56):
places like Thailand. Gotcha, you know?
Speaker 2 (43:59):
Okay, so this is more of a training situation, right,
you know, like you know now that I think about it,
that they often offer like elephant rides at zews. I
think I did that when I was a kid. You know,
whatever ethics aside on that, but that makes a lot
of sense, pained, but not domesticating, that's right, because again,
the domestication is the sort of long term version of
(44:19):
the taming that requires reproduction over you know, many generations
for it to kind of take and to the point
of the long lifespan.
Speaker 1 (44:27):
That is what makes these animals particularly poorly suited to
this kind of thing. Also, the third condition, and again
this is from Professor Diamond, the animals have to be
willing to breed in captivity in close quarters under human supervision.
So if you have a bunch of tigers, right, tremendously
(44:50):
intelligent animals. I mean, they're not as smart as an
elephant maybe, but they are smart cookies. They are boffins.
They need a lot if you put them, If you
just put them in a tiny, like human sized room
and say, okay, live together, have a issue, Yeah, we're good.
Speaker 2 (45:12):
You know that's true of even just breeding in general
in captivity of the certain species. I heard a really
great piece on NPR a couple of months ago about
how difficult it is to breed eels in captivity, and
they are only a handful of folks, companies or what
have you that have kind of this proprietary method of
farming eels and breeding them in captivity, because they actually
(45:34):
typically the largest source of eels you know that we
see in things like sushi are fished wild, and there
is an overfishing problem with eels because it is so
difficult to breed them in captivity.
Speaker 1 (45:46):
And they have a very sensitive reproductive cycle as well. Yeah,
this leads us to what I would call a soft
proposition on diamonds, part number four. Noel, tell me what
you think about this. The animals have to be quote
naturally pleasant.
Speaker 2 (46:06):
Well, that's an interesting thing because all along we've been
talking about sort of the nature of that first I
keep calling it sort of the genesis of the dog,
that gray wolf species that meet cute, that meet cute.
Where they were kind of a little more chill. It
would seem that they that particular subs breed or subspecies
or whatever you want to call it. It's probably something
(46:27):
specific to call it, but I'm not a scientist. So
there was something about their constitution or their kind of
demeanor that led it to them being a perfect candidate
for ultimate domestication. But it's tough because it's like pleasantness,
it's very vague. But let's just qualify that a little
bit calmness. Natural calmness certain animals that are skittish or
(46:51):
easily spooked, for example, that doesn't bode particularly well for domestication.
Speaker 1 (46:56):
Yeah, so number four is naturally pleasant. Number five called
keep your head and your wits about you right when
these crazy humans are asking you, you know, to fetch
them a ball. The number six is one of the
most I think behaviorally important. The animals need to be
(47:17):
willing to recognize humans as part of their in group
as part of their hierarchy.
Speaker 2 (47:25):
That's right, And you know even with certain zoo animals,
we know that is a thing that doesn't work with
certain types of animals, Like I believe in China there
is a zoo or maybe this is common practice where
in order to raise certain types of pandas, the zoo
keepers dress up as pandas themselves, Yeah, in order to
handle them correctly. And that may well be like they
(47:45):
just don't want them to get too imprinted by humans.
So I'm not one hundred percent sure exactly what the
endgame there is, but to your point, like, we do
know that there are certain animals that are much more
likely to be imprinted by humans and other ones that
really resist it.
Speaker 1 (48:03):
Yeah. Also, we got a deal on the costumes, thanks
Jeff Bezos. And with this, folks, we have so many
other questions and bits of ridiculous history to explore. This
conversation about dogs has inspired us. We're gonna be making
some episodes about dog breeds as well. Please send us
(48:26):
your favorites. We will probably also bust some myths about
dogs along the way in future episodes. In the meantime,
thank you so much for tuning in Big big thanks
to our super producer, mister Max Williams, who has been
a little bit off mic for this episode. That's okay,
we're just getting back from the holidays.
Speaker 2 (48:46):
We're all getting our sea legs back underneath us. And
I think you still sore at us for pointing out
the dog stats.
Speaker 1 (48:52):
I am yeah, okay, dude, okay, all right. I got
a way slowly like Homer Simps than another bush ido.
But you turned your camera on. That's good.
Speaker 2 (49:03):
You'd love to see a beautiful faces and the huge
thanks to to a producer, Max Williams. Again, if you
already said it, I'm sorry I got distracted. Huge thanks
to Alex Williams who composed our theme. And by the way,
if you do want to reach out to any of
the three of us, except for Max because he's off
the social media.
Speaker 1 (49:20):
You can't do so. Ben, How can people find you
if they so wish on the internets? Ah? Yes, further
into the breach, should you sip the social meds. You
can find me calling myself in a burst of creativity
at Ben Bullen on Instagram. You can find at Ben
Bullen hsw on X. You can also visit benbullin dot
(49:41):
com if you want to catch up with high Jinks,
Shenanigan's scenarios and adventures, and while you're snarios. While you're
up there, why not check out my good pal Noel
Brown's social media presence. Noel, are the rumors true? Are
you on Instagram?
Speaker 2 (49:59):
All? Lie?
Speaker 1 (50:00):
That's that's true. That's the only place I really hang out.
Speaker 2 (50:01):
You can find me there at how now, Noel Brown
and Ben Can I also just thank you for this
incredible deep dive on the history of domestication and really
just on doggoes in general, really really excellent work on
the super in depth research briefs. It so joy to
discuss this with you, and I'm happy to be back
after a sizeable break. I think we both enjoyed the recharge.
(50:24):
But we're back and we're better than ever and excited
for a new year.
Speaker 1 (50:29):
Oh gosh, thanks for saying that, Noll. It does mean
the world big thanks of course to Eve's Jeffcoat Chris
Frosiotis the Brew Dudes a ridiculous crime? And if you
disagree with my palell Nol regarding this episode, please please
please always remember we started a complaint department just for you.
(50:49):
Twenty four hours a day, seven days a week, anytime
of the year. We actually recommend sending it late at night.
Jonathan Strickland at iHeartMedia dot com our official complaint department.
Speaker 2 (51:05):
Yeah, you'll definitely write you back, no question. We'll see
you next time, folks. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit
the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to
your favorite shows.
Ridiculous History News
Hosts And Creators
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations.
Monster: BTK
'Monster: BTK', the newest installment in the 'Monster' franchise, reveals the true story of the Wichita, Kansas serial killer who murdered at least 10 people between 1974 and 1991. Known by the moniker, BTK – Bind Torture Kill, his notoriety was bolstered by the taunting letters he sent to police, and the chilling phone calls he made to media outlets. BTK's identity was finally revealed in 2005 to the shock of his family, his community, and the world. He was the serial killer next door. From Tenderfoot TV & iHeartPodcasts, this is 'Monster: BTK'.
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.