Deafness
Deaf dogs can learn to hear and the Blind to see, for Living with Humans
Jan, 2011; Dr Eisenbart
Summary
Before they met humans, dogs developed ways to detect light and sound-vibrations[1] in their environments, understand and act on what they observed. Unless a dog was in a coma or dead, it could potentially use capabilities normally not used by humans, to detect vibrations for “useful hearing” (perhaps good enough to satisfy the American Kennel Club (AKC)), and some abilities to detect thermal light waves.
Since the 1990s, scientific research increasingly indicated that there was much ability of dogs to adapt to loss of their ordinary primary hearing and seeing biology bits. Further, correlations of enhanced vision sharpness with deafness in some breeds were recognized and genetic markers were identified.
Evolution aspects were mentioned. Synesthesia as an automatic process, especially for blind and deaf, that in the brain cross links senses such as touch to hearing and hearing to "sight" was reported to exist for about five (5) percent of humans, and probably existed in dogs. Suggestions were proposed to maximize dog useful adaptation to loss of ordinary hearing and vision, for living with humans. Illustrations from a deaf Border Collie were included for clarity.
Introduction
What can dogs do to survive if something goes wrong and they lose their ordinary versatile mechanisms of hearing, and eye-sight? When does each dog learn to rely heavily on ordinary (inner-ear) hearing and eyes (iris-cornea-retinas)? Public reports and our research suggest that dog survival was expedited by their “startle-reflex alerting” biology, so that a dog can focus its attention on adapting its many (at least 8) physics-biological ways of detecting light and vibrations and interpreting the information.
For dogs, sight and hearing are ways to communicate, map their surroundings, navigate, understand events important to them and make decisions. Dr S. Coren’s 2004, book “How Dogs Think” (reference 1), reported “bits” from scientific research on hearing and seeing dogs that confirmed their ability to use perhaps as many as eight or nine varied mechanisms to detect, analyze, and make routine deliberate use of the information about mechanical wave motion (hearing) and radiant energy (seeing) in their environments.
As mentioned by S. Coren and by Dr Strain, dogs can use body elements adaptively to aid or partially replace sensing functions of their eyes and inner ear mechanisms, for example whiskers, to detect sound-vibrations carried by air, liquids, or solids. Mechanical pressure and density waves (sound) are always associated with local motion of the media.
The origin of dogs living in pack-groups permitted and might have occasionally benefitted from genes for a few genetically deaf dogs with enhanced sharper vision (but occasional blindness) and unusual coat coloration. Miklosi (reference 2, p.68): Pleistocene events included rapid changes in climate, and migration while wolves were hunting across Northern mixed terrain of tundra, forests and savanna. In recent years adaptive coloration traits (called “flashy” coats) attracted fashion oriented humans, and led to a rapid increase in the numbers of deaf and blind dogs in Western society. Adaptive abilities of modern deaf and blind dogs living with humans were importantly related, and dealt with together.
Discussion
I. How and Why dogs adapt to loss of conventional vision and hearing
Detection and Navigation by “Invisible” (infrared) Light: Puppies at birth have an ability with elements of their noses to detect, interpret and act on information from red-color light that are NOT visible to humans, as mentioned by S. Coren, (p 94.) These colors invisible to humans are usually called “infra-red” or heat-radiation waves[2].
Smells (olfactory) mapping and navigation: Anyone who walked a dog along a path new to the dog has probably seen the dog show special interest in the smells of certain posts and places along the path, and add samples of its own odors for other dogs to find, to understand and map their living spaces. Especially in darkness or blind, navigation by using a mental map of the relative locations and distances of objects could be based on sensing and remembering where (and on what) the smells were.
Detection of gross motions by body contact, i.e. “velcroing”: In the community of deaf and blind dogs-people, the tendency is well known of newly adopted dogs to keep very close physical contact (velcroing) with their people. Physical contact permits them to sense the vibrations of sounds that are carried through floor, wall, and other things.
Many other modes of Perceptions for “Mapping and Navigation
II. Training for Adaptive Development of Useful hearing and Navigation
The reality of adaptive improvements of hearing and navigation was demonstrated and reported in literature. More extensive discussions of adaptive training were posted in other places; see S. Coren p.207. Experience of many people who adopted deaf, and blind, dogs was summarized in crucial recommendations:
1. Develop bonding and mutual trust because the startle-reflex is the Key to activating and expediting their adapting.
2. Use gradual consistent continuing mutual education - Exposure and habituation to diverse versions of vibration (sound) and electromagnetic (light) thermal stimulation
3. Using positive applause and rewards is vital
4. Provide physical exercise and mental learning for lifetime
5. Consider teaching the dog to deliberately gesture to humans to signal its needs and wants (ref. Sean Senechal)
III. Social Interactions: Dog with Dog and Dog with Humans
Contrary to superstitions and myths, there is no basis for expecting that socialized and trained blind and deaf dogs will be unable to get along peacefully with other socialized and trained dogs (and children.)
IV. Mechanical Wave Motion (Sound) and Radiant Energy (Light)
Experience reported on the Internet, and earlier among owners of deaf and/or blind dogs indicated that many dogs learned over weeks to years a collection of ways to detect sound and light, and make effective use of the information to survive and often closely approximate the behaviors of ordinary hearing and seeing dogs. Dr Strain, as early as 2004 (ref. 7), commented in briefings that dogs could learn to use alternative “sensorium modalities.” Two scientific flaws in some published discussions were:
1) Dogs senses and nerve systems were assumed to be "are" identical to those of ordinary humans, and the mental abilities of dogs are also identical with humans except for being less powerful;
2) Dogs were assumed to be incapable of independent learning and actions about their environments.
V. Learning from Deaf and Blind Old Dogs and Puppies
Many dog biological abilities exist that can less accurately serve most of the needs of dogs that were otherwise served by the ordinary functioning of their sight and hearing. Redundancy against disaster typically was important for survival of all sorts of mammals. Most mammals have many redundant organs – two ears, eyes, kidneys, lungs, etc. Further, various animal species have different versions of the mechanisms for hearing and seeing – with differing sensitivity and accuracy.
A superstition exists among poorly informed people that “you can’t teach old dogs new tricks.” In fact, modern science has confirmed that old dogs can and will for themselves continue to learn, even into the advanced ages when they get a kind of “old-timers” disease, sometimes in humans called dementia. S. Coren (P. 271-273) described his observations of his spaniel while it was gradually losing its mental capacities.
Until the official sanctioned breeding of deaf and blind dogs became routine in the US in the search for ever more exotic and highly sellable coats to meet consumer demands for special, often “flashy” colors, adult deaf dogs and blind dogs were comparatively rare excepting those deaf from advanced old age, injured in accidents, or while working (“gun-dogs.”)
To reiterate: the linkage was of exotic coat colors, deaf dogs and blind dogs and the finances of persons and organizations at the expense of the well being of dogs and their owners. Chronic pain and misery seems to often be the main causes of difficult behavior of old dogs, who more or less tended to become deaf and [3]blind at nearly the same time.
Brain Adapting (reorganization): Experiments with other species (ref 9), reported in 2010, demonstrated that if an animal were deprived of a particular sense, a collateral sense could expand its use of the animal’s brain. So-called folk wisdom asserted that among humans when one or another sense was damaged or lost, others automatically usually become more effective. [See Synesthesia on Wikipedia, etc.]
Dog-senses (additional to ordinary human-like eye-seeing and inner-ear hearing) that were identified and briefly described by S. Coren, p.145, were occasional observed developing and at work from the moment of puppies’ births. Exploitation by a specific dog of its abilities depends on at least:
1) a canid sense of a “need(s)”,
2) recognition of a possibility to meet the need(s),
3) encouragement and stimulation (such as modeling, training, or observation of others). and
4) time, space and resources to develop and apply its ordinarily less important sensing abilities.
Natural Experiments: Over 8,000 people with deaf, blind and blind-deaf dogs in 2010 networked on the Internet. In general the behaviors described of their adapted dogs who had learned during weeks to months and years to make their best use of their natural abilities, were indistinguishable from the behaviors of ordinary hearing dogs. The deaf-dogs community probably had over 15,000 cumulative observation-years of deaf dogs living with humans.
The deaf dogs that owners reported to exhibit adaptation to use of additional ways of sensing vibration (hearing) were among the breeds reported by S. Coren, p. 196-197 to typically learn quickly compared to the average of nearly 200 breeds.
VI. Approach and Basis of this Text
Observations and conclusions compared to reports by authorities such as Adam Miklosi, S. Coren, and others[4], also checked by hands-on study of dogs, and comparisons of dog-data with NASA, DOD, and medical human research reports.
Research about dogs (and research about humans for the NASA space program) demonstrated that animals have many auxiliary (called “redundant”) physical and mental processes that work together with the primary processes and that can “take-over more work” if the primary processes don’t work well. [5] .
World-wide reports indicate that most domestic dogs with their people have far greater diversity of genetic adaptive abilities than most people thought possible 20 years ago. [i]
In 2011, a contributor suggested that a "link" to coparable apparently intended to artificially by electronics provide for some humans a rough sensory equivalent of the sensory abilities that deaf dogs were evidently exploiting for perhaps as much as 10,000 years to overcome genetic and accidntal dog-deafness at least partially, see reference below #11. Search via Google on the key-word "Vibrotactile" was recommended for persons interested in research and aids for deaf humans.
Acronyms and a Definition
AKC American Kennel Club
BC Border Collie
BAER Brain stem auditory evoked response
DOD Department of Defense (US)
NASA National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Vibro-Tactile (VT) Mainly the use of electonics to create for humans sensory information from airborne sounds
Biological “sonar” : Dogs, bats humans can use short sharp sounds to triangulate the sources by “time difference of arrival” of sounds directly and after reflection, and relative loudness (sound shadows) on opposite sides of their anatomy - - also used in radar imaging of earth terrain from satellites.
References (recommended reading)
10. Diamond, J; Guns, Germs and Steel, 1997, Norton & Company LTD publ {Research approach for history-science}.
11. PRanjibar, D Stranneby, E Borg; "Vibrotactile identification of signal processed sounds from enviromental events" , Sweden; Journal of Rehabilitation Research & Development, V46, No8, 2009, p1021-1036.
Footnotes
[1] Definitions
Sound Mechanical Pressure-Density waves (vibrations) in gas, liquid or solids
Hearing Detection and use of mechanical vibrations (sound)
Light Electromagnetic wave-particles
Seeing Detection and use of electromagnetic vibrations (light) and/or hearing of mechanical waves for mapping, etc.
[2] Heat energy also can be transferred by bulk processes called convection and drafts. When thermal energy is transmitted as light the energy units are called photons, and when transferred in solids or in bulk are usually called phonons.
[3] See Dr J. Serpell [ref.8], regarding misinformation (lies?) told by people dumping unwanted dogs at shelters and rescues.
[4] “People who are very aware that they have more knowledge than the average person are often very unaware that they do not have one-tenth of the knowledge of all of the average persons put together. In this situation, for the intelligentsia to impose their notions on ordinary people is essentially to impose ignorance on knowledge.” -Thomas Sowell
[5] Coren, p 130, described modern wolves silently hunting deer by means of what I call WSL (wolf sign language) – during which deafness of one or another of the wolves would have been no handicap. Herding of prey by wolves, during which many wolves vocalize, was reported, and in which deaf wolves could participate routinely (as domestic deaf dogs can companionably bark and growl with their hearing colleagues.)
[i] In science and engineering terminology, puppies exhibit training of neural networks and actions as state-space control systems; circa 2000. Wikipedia.org described State Space as “In control engineering, a state space representation is a mathematical model of a physical system as a set of input, output and state variables related by first-order differential equations. To abstract from the number of inputs, outputs and states, the variables are expressed as vectors, and the differential and algebraic equations are written in matrix form (the last one can be done when the dynamical system is linear and time invariant). The state space representation (also known as a "time-domain approach") provides a convenient and compact way to model and analyze systems with multiple inputs and outputs. …. Unlike the frequency domain approach, the use of the state space representation is not limited to systems with linear components and zero initial conditions. "State space" refers to the space whose axes are the state variables. The state of the system can be represented as a vector within that space.
[ii] TECHNICAL ANALOGS: Some people desired a commonplace domestic alternative example of how dogs can shift their primary ways of hearing from their inner-ears and cillia, to other from birth present dog-biological detectors of vibrations of sounds, and similarly for vision potentially shifted to depend upon exploitation of natural auxiliary modes of detecting vibrations as an aid to mapping and coarse "seeing."
A simples domestic analogy is the working of a television set that is connected at the same instant to cable, outdoors Yagi rooftop antenna, and a simple set of "rabbit ears." If the cable-TV failed or was shut off for non-payment, the TV automatically begins to use the strongest available signals - from the rooftop antenna, unles (or until) that antenna perhaps gets blown away in a hurricane, when automatically the TV then does the best possible with the rabbit ears with perhaps a few tweaks of aid by a teenager.
[In 2010 a few computers were connected to both wideband, and telephone modems, and the Internet could be "heard" (less well) over the telephone line modem if the fiber-optic wideband went down (died.) As discussed by S Coren, dogs were at birth usually equipped with many ways to detect, for their brains to analyse vibrations of sounds, which could be coarse partial substitutes for their primary biological mechanisms.]
Before they met humans, dogs developed ways to detect light and sound-vibrations[1] in their environments, understand and act on what they observed. Unless a dog was in a coma or dead, it could potentially use capabilities normally not used by humans, to detect vibrations for “useful hearing” (perhaps good enough to satisfy the American Kennel Club (AKC)), and some abilities to detect thermal light waves.
Since the 1990s, scientific research increasingly indicated that there was much ability of dogs to adapt to loss of their ordinary primary hearing and seeing biology bits. Further, correlations of enhanced vision sharpness with deafness in some breeds were recognized and genetic markers were identified.
Evolution aspects were mentioned. Synesthesia as an automatic process, especially for blind and deaf, that in the brain cross links senses such as touch to hearing and hearing to "sight" was reported to exist for about five (5) percent of humans, and probably existed in dogs. Suggestions were proposed to maximize dog useful adaptation to loss of ordinary hearing and vision, for living with humans. Illustrations from a deaf Border Collie were included for clarity.
Introduction
What can dogs do to survive if something goes wrong and they lose their ordinary versatile mechanisms of hearing, and eye-sight? When does each dog learn to rely heavily on ordinary (inner-ear) hearing and eyes (iris-cornea-retinas)? Public reports and our research suggest that dog survival was expedited by their “startle-reflex alerting” biology, so that a dog can focus its attention on adapting its many (at least 8) physics-biological ways of detecting light and vibrations and interpreting the information.
For dogs, sight and hearing are ways to communicate, map their surroundings, navigate, understand events important to them and make decisions. Dr S. Coren’s 2004, book “How Dogs Think” (reference 1), reported “bits” from scientific research on hearing and seeing dogs that confirmed their ability to use perhaps as many as eight or nine varied mechanisms to detect, analyze, and make routine deliberate use of the information about mechanical wave motion (hearing) and radiant energy (seeing) in their environments.
As mentioned by S. Coren and by Dr Strain, dogs can use body elements adaptively to aid or partially replace sensing functions of their eyes and inner ear mechanisms, for example whiskers, to detect sound-vibrations carried by air, liquids, or solids. Mechanical pressure and density waves (sound) are always associated with local motion of the media.
The origin of dogs living in pack-groups permitted and might have occasionally benefitted from genes for a few genetically deaf dogs with enhanced sharper vision (but occasional blindness) and unusual coat coloration. Miklosi (reference 2, p.68): Pleistocene events included rapid changes in climate, and migration while wolves were hunting across Northern mixed terrain of tundra, forests and savanna. In recent years adaptive coloration traits (called “flashy” coats) attracted fashion oriented humans, and led to a rapid increase in the numbers of deaf and blind dogs in Western society. Adaptive abilities of modern deaf and blind dogs living with humans were importantly related, and dealt with together.
Discussion
I. How and Why dogs adapt to loss of conventional vision and hearing
Detection and Navigation by “Invisible” (infrared) Light: Puppies at birth have an ability with elements of their noses to detect, interpret and act on information from red-color light that are NOT visible to humans, as mentioned by S. Coren, (p 94.) These colors invisible to humans are usually called “infra-red” or heat-radiation waves[2].
Smells (olfactory) mapping and navigation: Anyone who walked a dog along a path new to the dog has probably seen the dog show special interest in the smells of certain posts and places along the path, and add samples of its own odors for other dogs to find, to understand and map their living spaces. Especially in darkness or blind, navigation by using a mental map of the relative locations and distances of objects could be based on sensing and remembering where (and on what) the smells were.
Detection of gross motions by body contact, i.e. “velcroing”: In the community of deaf and blind dogs-people, the tendency is well known of newly adopted dogs to keep very close physical contact (velcroing) with their people. Physical contact permits them to sense the vibrations of sounds that are carried through floor, wall, and other things.
Many other modes of Perceptions for “Mapping and Navigation
II. Training for Adaptive Development of Useful hearing and Navigation
The reality of adaptive improvements of hearing and navigation was demonstrated and reported in literature. More extensive discussions of adaptive training were posted in other places; see S. Coren p.207. Experience of many people who adopted deaf, and blind, dogs was summarized in crucial recommendations:
1. Develop bonding and mutual trust because the startle-reflex is the Key to activating and expediting their adapting.
2. Use gradual consistent continuing mutual education - Exposure and habituation to diverse versions of vibration (sound) and electromagnetic (light) thermal stimulation
3. Using positive applause and rewards is vital
4. Provide physical exercise and mental learning for lifetime
5. Consider teaching the dog to deliberately gesture to humans to signal its needs and wants (ref. Sean Senechal)
III. Social Interactions: Dog with Dog and Dog with Humans
Contrary to superstitions and myths, there is no basis for expecting that socialized and trained blind and deaf dogs will be unable to get along peacefully with other socialized and trained dogs (and children.)
IV. Mechanical Wave Motion (Sound) and Radiant Energy (Light)
Experience reported on the Internet, and earlier among owners of deaf and/or blind dogs indicated that many dogs learned over weeks to years a collection of ways to detect sound and light, and make effective use of the information to survive and often closely approximate the behaviors of ordinary hearing and seeing dogs. Dr Strain, as early as 2004 (ref. 7), commented in briefings that dogs could learn to use alternative “sensorium modalities.” Two scientific flaws in some published discussions were:
1) Dogs senses and nerve systems were assumed to be "are" identical to those of ordinary humans, and the mental abilities of dogs are also identical with humans except for being less powerful;
2) Dogs were assumed to be incapable of independent learning and actions about their environments.
V. Learning from Deaf and Blind Old Dogs and Puppies
Many dog biological abilities exist that can less accurately serve most of the needs of dogs that were otherwise served by the ordinary functioning of their sight and hearing. Redundancy against disaster typically was important for survival of all sorts of mammals. Most mammals have many redundant organs – two ears, eyes, kidneys, lungs, etc. Further, various animal species have different versions of the mechanisms for hearing and seeing – with differing sensitivity and accuracy.
A superstition exists among poorly informed people that “you can’t teach old dogs new tricks.” In fact, modern science has confirmed that old dogs can and will for themselves continue to learn, even into the advanced ages when they get a kind of “old-timers” disease, sometimes in humans called dementia. S. Coren (P. 271-273) described his observations of his spaniel while it was gradually losing its mental capacities.
Until the official sanctioned breeding of deaf and blind dogs became routine in the US in the search for ever more exotic and highly sellable coats to meet consumer demands for special, often “flashy” colors, adult deaf dogs and blind dogs were comparatively rare excepting those deaf from advanced old age, injured in accidents, or while working (“gun-dogs.”)
To reiterate: the linkage was of exotic coat colors, deaf dogs and blind dogs and the finances of persons and organizations at the expense of the well being of dogs and their owners. Chronic pain and misery seems to often be the main causes of difficult behavior of old dogs, who more or less tended to become deaf and [3]blind at nearly the same time.
Brain Adapting (reorganization): Experiments with other species (ref 9), reported in 2010, demonstrated that if an animal were deprived of a particular sense, a collateral sense could expand its use of the animal’s brain. So-called folk wisdom asserted that among humans when one or another sense was damaged or lost, others automatically usually become more effective. [See Synesthesia on Wikipedia, etc.]
Dog-senses (additional to ordinary human-like eye-seeing and inner-ear hearing) that were identified and briefly described by S. Coren, p.145, were occasional observed developing and at work from the moment of puppies’ births. Exploitation by a specific dog of its abilities depends on at least:
1) a canid sense of a “need(s)”,
2) recognition of a possibility to meet the need(s),
3) encouragement and stimulation (such as modeling, training, or observation of others). and
4) time, space and resources to develop and apply its ordinarily less important sensing abilities.
Natural Experiments: Over 8,000 people with deaf, blind and blind-deaf dogs in 2010 networked on the Internet. In general the behaviors described of their adapted dogs who had learned during weeks to months and years to make their best use of their natural abilities, were indistinguishable from the behaviors of ordinary hearing dogs. The deaf-dogs community probably had over 15,000 cumulative observation-years of deaf dogs living with humans.
The deaf dogs that owners reported to exhibit adaptation to use of additional ways of sensing vibration (hearing) were among the breeds reported by S. Coren, p. 196-197 to typically learn quickly compared to the average of nearly 200 breeds.
VI. Approach and Basis of this Text
Observations and conclusions compared to reports by authorities such as Adam Miklosi, S. Coren, and others[4], also checked by hands-on study of dogs, and comparisons of dog-data with NASA, DOD, and medical human research reports.
Research about dogs (and research about humans for the NASA space program) demonstrated that animals have many auxiliary (called “redundant”) physical and mental processes that work together with the primary processes and that can “take-over more work” if the primary processes don’t work well. [5] .
World-wide reports indicate that most domestic dogs with their people have far greater diversity of genetic adaptive abilities than most people thought possible 20 years ago. [i]
In 2011, a contributor suggested that a "link" to coparable apparently intended to artificially by electronics provide for some humans a rough sensory equivalent of the sensory abilities that deaf dogs were evidently exploiting for perhaps as much as 10,000 years to overcome genetic and accidntal dog-deafness at least partially, see reference below #11. Search via Google on the key-word "Vibrotactile" was recommended for persons interested in research and aids for deaf humans.
Acronyms and a Definition
AKC American Kennel Club
BC Border Collie
BAER Brain stem auditory evoked response
DOD Department of Defense (US)
NASA National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Vibro-Tactile (VT) Mainly the use of electonics to create for humans sensory information from airborne sounds
Biological “sonar” : Dogs, bats humans can use short sharp sounds to triangulate the sources by “time difference of arrival” of sounds directly and after reflection, and relative loudness (sound shadows) on opposite sides of their anatomy - - also used in radar imaging of earth terrain from satellites.
References (recommended reading)
- Coren, S; How Dogs Think, 2004, Free Press publ.
- Miklosi, A; Dog Behaviour; evolution, and cognition, 2007, Oxford University Press
- Becker, S; Living with a Deaf Dog, 1997, Susan Cope Becker publ.
- Bekoff, M; Emotional Lives of Animals, 2007, The New World Library publ.
- Semyonova, A; The 100 Silliest Things People say about Dogs, 2009, Hasting Press
- Senechal, Sean; Dogs Can Sign, Too: A Breakthrough Method for Teaching Your Dog to Communicate , 2009
- Strain; Presentation to Australian Cattle Dog Club, 2004
- Serpell, J, et al; “Evaluation of behavior assessment questionnaire for use in the characterization of behavior problems of dogs relinquished to Animals shelters”, J Am Vet Med Assc, 2005:227:1755.
10. Diamond, J; Guns, Germs and Steel, 1997, Norton & Company LTD publ {Research approach for history-science}.
11. PRanjibar, D Stranneby, E Borg; "Vibrotactile identification of signal processed sounds from enviromental events" , Sweden; Journal of Rehabilitation Research & Development, V46, No8, 2009, p1021-1036.
Footnotes
[1] Definitions
Sound Mechanical Pressure-Density waves (vibrations) in gas, liquid or solids
Hearing Detection and use of mechanical vibrations (sound)
Light Electromagnetic wave-particles
Seeing Detection and use of electromagnetic vibrations (light) and/or hearing of mechanical waves for mapping, etc.
[2] Heat energy also can be transferred by bulk processes called convection and drafts. When thermal energy is transmitted as light the energy units are called photons, and when transferred in solids or in bulk are usually called phonons.
[3] See Dr J. Serpell [ref.8], regarding misinformation (lies?) told by people dumping unwanted dogs at shelters and rescues.
[4] “People who are very aware that they have more knowledge than the average person are often very unaware that they do not have one-tenth of the knowledge of all of the average persons put together. In this situation, for the intelligentsia to impose their notions on ordinary people is essentially to impose ignorance on knowledge.” -Thomas Sowell
[5] Coren, p 130, described modern wolves silently hunting deer by means of what I call WSL (wolf sign language) – during which deafness of one or another of the wolves would have been no handicap. Herding of prey by wolves, during which many wolves vocalize, was reported, and in which deaf wolves could participate routinely (as domestic deaf dogs can companionably bark and growl with their hearing colleagues.)
[i] In science and engineering terminology, puppies exhibit training of neural networks and actions as state-space control systems; circa 2000. Wikipedia.org described State Space as “In control engineering, a state space representation is a mathematical model of a physical system as a set of input, output and state variables related by first-order differential equations. To abstract from the number of inputs, outputs and states, the variables are expressed as vectors, and the differential and algebraic equations are written in matrix form (the last one can be done when the dynamical system is linear and time invariant). The state space representation (also known as a "time-domain approach") provides a convenient and compact way to model and analyze systems with multiple inputs and outputs. …. Unlike the frequency domain approach, the use of the state space representation is not limited to systems with linear components and zero initial conditions. "State space" refers to the space whose axes are the state variables. The state of the system can be represented as a vector within that space.
[ii] TECHNICAL ANALOGS: Some people desired a commonplace domestic alternative example of how dogs can shift their primary ways of hearing from their inner-ears and cillia, to other from birth present dog-biological detectors of vibrations of sounds, and similarly for vision potentially shifted to depend upon exploitation of natural auxiliary modes of detecting vibrations as an aid to mapping and coarse "seeing."
A simples domestic analogy is the working of a television set that is connected at the same instant to cable, outdoors Yagi rooftop antenna, and a simple set of "rabbit ears." If the cable-TV failed or was shut off for non-payment, the TV automatically begins to use the strongest available signals - from the rooftop antenna, unles (or until) that antenna perhaps gets blown away in a hurricane, when automatically the TV then does the best possible with the rabbit ears with perhaps a few tweaks of aid by a teenager.
[In 2010 a few computers were connected to both wideband, and telephone modems, and the Internet could be "heard" (less well) over the telephone line modem if the fiber-optic wideband went down (died.) As discussed by S Coren, dogs were at birth usually equipped with many ways to detect, for their brains to analyse vibrations of sounds, which could be coarse partial substitutes for their primary biological mechanisms.]