Good Dog!: The Easy Way to Train Your Dog [Paperback]

On the plus side, there are a lot of good training ideas in this book, which can help owners to teach their dogs good manners, develop their dogs' skills, and have a good relationship with them. I'd recommend it for this reason, but it needs to come with a health warning.

First, the section on 'how dogs learn' is misleading. It implies that dogs only learn if owners give treats or affection, or the dog finds something it likes in the environment. But there is no mention of stuff that dogs like doing because it is rewarding in itself, and this varies from dog to dog. Naturally obsessive retrievers will retrieve till they collapse. Sheepdogs do sheepdogging because it is inbuilt. This stuff is 'self-rewarding'. Also dogs learn from each other, and pick up cues from owners, eg if owners treat human passers-by politely, dogs are more likely to.

Secondly, owners are told to teach dogs that actions have consequences. Like shut door gently if dog tries to push past you, or take dogs home if they pull. As any parent knows, taking something nice away to stop unwanted behaviour, eg taking away TV in child's room, is a form of punishment. Negative punishment. It can result in aggression from child (shouting, even hitting if child is very confrontational) and from dog (even biting if dog is very confrontational). Loss hurts. It can be very painful, and trying negative punishment can be cruel if dog or child is clueless about why they are being punished. This needs to be spelled out.

Thirdly, we are told on page 37 that punishment is oldfashioned, inefficient, risky, can be cruel etc. Well, yes, so why recommend negative punishment so glibly?

There is no definition of punishment, but it appears that this lady sees doing something that dogs don't like, in order to stop unwanted behaviour as a Bad Thing. And somehow crueller than taking away something nice. Positive punishment is Bad, Negative Punishment is Good. Now does this 'fit the facts'?

Say you have two dogs fighting, and there is a risk that they may be seriously hurt. Please can someone come up with a negative punishment or positive reinforcement action here ... I would hose the little darlings down. That in my experience, takes the fight out of them. They say 'oh gosh, what was that?' Hitting them is a dumb move because it gets them more wound up and aggressive, they can bite you, and they can lose trust in you. After that I would scold them seriously, because it tells them something important, ie 'Fighting is Banned'. The rhino excrement would hit the fan.

Sometimes doing stuff dogs don't like is the only way to stop them doing something that could harm them, something the dogs like doing repeatedly because it is 'self-rewarding', like trying to bite car wheels when cars are moving.

Now I dote on my dogs, and because of this, if something the current intellectually bankrupt training orthodoxy condemns, because it sees 'adding something' (like a bucket of water) as positive punishment (so a Bad Thing) would save their lives, I would do it in a flash.

Sarah, why are you treating us pet owners as though we were complete morons? Do you think we don't know that taking something nice away is punishment? Why not just spell out that some actions, like hitting dogs, are not sensible, because of the risk of massive loss of trust, but other actions may, under some circumstances, be helpful.

Behaviourism is in itself a very incomplete way of understanding what makes dogs tick. When you get the sort of 'Complete Moron's Version of Behaviourism' that some trainers preach, it is unscientific and downright dangerous. Of course you get in there quick with an action if it means saving a dog's life. If you have a good relationship with your dog, the dog can handle the occasional scolding.

Why is it that ordinary people find Cesar so appealing? Because he looks at what is actually happening, rather than trying to stuff reality into an intellectually impoverished straitjacket. So, his ethology is cobblers. So he used to be too confrontational. But he has learnt. And how? From positive punishment ...

Why is Adam Miklosi gaining such a devoted following? Because he really is interested in what makes dogs tick. It's time people who preach the 'Complete Moron's Version of Behaviourism' pulled their heads from out of their lower body sphincters and had a look at the dogs in front of them.

Please Sarah, do not insult our intelligence with this stuff. I'll recommend the book for the good training ideas, but really ... think I will go and bang my head against a wall and weep for the future of professional dog training.