Larry Blanchard wrote:
snip

Instinct doth prevail :-).


It often does. This part of the debate is a rehash of the old
nature/nurture debate. It's very hard to prove stuff along these lines,
since you can't have one without the other, which makes experiment
difficult. However, there have been a number of studies recently that
show that genetics is more important for human behavior than previously
thought. It's simply not true that you can blame all behavior problems
on poor parenting. In fact, barring very good evidence, it would be a
very arrogant thing to claim. Since genetic traits are so important for
human behavior, it seems likely that it's quite important for dog
behavior as well, as we're genetically quite similar. It follows that
not all bad dog behavior can be blamed on poor training. Note: pointing
out that humans are not dogs would not count as a rebuttle. You'd
actually have to have evidence that genetics plays less of a behavioral
role with dogs than it does with humans.

Consider two people, Mary and Tom. Assume that both are raised in a
relevantly similar environment. It's perfectly possible in this
situation for Tom to have a problem with alcohol, due to a genetic
predispostion, but Mary does not, since she lacks the genetic
predisposition. Let's now put Tom in rehab, and let's say he stay's
clean. Good going Tom! Does anyone really think that Tom's desire for
alcohol has been removed? Moving back to the canine world, does my dog's
desire to chase the squirrel stop even when I tell him "no" and he
doesn't chase it?

Does anyone really think that a dog's genetics doesn't influence his
behavior, or that differn't breeds have, on average, different
behavioral traits? Such a claim flies in the face of overwhelming
evidence, such as, for instance, the various studies that analyze the
intelligence of different breeds. Yet such an unlikely claim must be
assumed by those who say that all doggie behavioral problems are caused
by bad training. It's simply not true.

-Peter De Smidt