
Alexandra Horowitz, the author of the lively, highly informative New York Times bestselling blockbuster Inside of a Dog , explains how dogs perceive the world through their most spectacular organ the nose and how we humans can put our under-used sense of smell to work in surprising ways.
To a dog, there is no such thing as fresh air. Every breath of air is loaded with information. In fact, what every dog the tracking dog, of course, but also the dog lying next to you, snoring, on the couch knows about the world comes mostly through his nose.
In Being a Dog , Alexandra Horowitz, a research scientist in the field of dog cognition and the author of the runaway bestseller Inside of a Dog , unpacks the mystery of a dog s worldview as has never been done before.
With her family dogs, Finnegan and Upton, leading the way, Horowitz sets off on a quest to make sense of scents, combining a personal journey of smelling with a tour through the cutting edge and improbable science behind the olfactory powers of the dog. From revealing the spectacular biology of the dog snout, to speaking to other cognitive researchers and smell experts across the country, to visiting detection-dog training centers and even attempting to smell-train her own nose, Horowitz covers the topic of noses both canine and human from surprising, novel, and always fascinating angles.
As we come to understand how complex the world around us appears to the canine nose, Horowitz changes our perspective on dogs forever. Readers will finish this book feeling that they have smelled into a fourth dimension breaking free of human constraints and understanding smell as never before; that they have, however fleetingly, been a dog."
To a dog, there is no such thing as fresh air. Every breath of air is loaded with information. In fact, what every dog the tracking dog, of course, but also the dog lying next to you, snoring, on the couch knows about the world comes mostly through his nose.
In Being a Dog , Alexandra Horowitz, a research scientist in the field of dog cognition and the author of the runaway bestseller Inside of a Dog , unpacks the mystery of a dog s worldview as has never been done before.
With her family dogs, Finnegan and Upton, leading the way, Horowitz sets off on a quest to make sense of scents, combining a personal journey of smelling with a tour through the cutting edge and improbable science behind the olfactory powers of the dog. From revealing the spectacular biology of the dog snout, to speaking to other cognitive researchers and smell experts across the country, to visiting detection-dog training centers and even attempting to smell-train her own nose, Horowitz covers the topic of noses both canine and human from surprising, novel, and always fascinating angles.
As we come to understand how complex the world around us appears to the canine nose, Horowitz changes our perspective on dogs forever. Readers will finish this book feeling that they have smelled into a fourth dimension breaking free of human constraints and understanding smell as never before; that they have, however fleetingly, been a dog."
Publisher:
Waterville, ME : Thorndike Press, 2017.
Edition:
Large print edition.
Copyright Date:
©2016
ISBN:
9781410495648
Branch Call Number:
Large Print 636.7 Hor
Characteristics:
467 pages (large print) ; 23 cm


Opinion
From the critics

Community Activity

Comment
Add a CommentAlexandra Horowitz M.S., Ph.D. Cognitive Science, University of California, San Diego
Barnard College, Columbia University
https://psychology.barnard.edu/profiles/alexandra-horowitz
Horowitz, expanding on her success in parsing the human-dog relationships in her "Inside of a Dog," zeroes in on the canine sense of smell. You will learn how the unique and *powerful* physiology of the dog's nose operates (fully 7% of dog DNA going towards olfaction!), and hear fascinating tales of the training and work of detection dogs of all stripes. Most fetching is the author's discussions of how we as humans can use our nose even more emphatically - expect to experience the world with different senses after reading.