When I was in college, I had an anthropology professor who would frequently ask the class what it was that differentiated humans from animals. He broke the silence after a few minutes of it by announcing that it was tools. Tools are what set us apart from other animals in terms of our ability to devise and implement novel solutions to challenges.
However, there is no guarantee that this will always be the case. In one video, a dog demonstrated a surprising level of intelligence by employing tools to solve an issue. Maybe there isn’t all that much that differentiates us from animals after all.
Abby, the Labrador, was pulled from a shelter where she was being held. She had been subjected to horrendous cruelty and neglect before being adopted by her current owners, who gave her a second chance at life. When she was originally adopted, the only toy she had was a bear tennis ball. She did not have any other toys.
She was allowed to live happily ever after in a house that had a pool after being adopted by the family. The dog has come a long way since the days when she was abused as a puppy and spent her time in the shelter, but there is one thing that she still keeps very near to her heart, and that is a tennis ball.
Abby’s pursuit of the tennis ball in the water is shown in the video, but she goes about it in a manner that is far different from what one might anticipate. Abby takes a more delicate and careful approach than most other dogs, who would just charge forward headfirst. This bright young lady used a surfboard to get to the middle of the pool, where she found the ball and then rode it back to the edge of the water to retrieve it.
It is very clear that this dog and humans share many similarities: