A Dog's World

Imagining the Lives of Dogs in a World Without Humans

By: Jessica Pierce, Marc Bekoff

Narrated by: Karen White

Length: 6 hrs and 19 mins

Publisher's summary

From two of the world's leading authorities on dogs, an imaginative journey into a future of dogs without people.

What would happen to dogs if humans simply disappeared? Would dogs be able to survive on their own without us? A Dog's World imagines a posthuman future for dogs, revealing how dogs would survive - and possibly even thrive - and explaining how this new and revolutionary perspective can guide how we interact with dogs now.

Drawing on biology, ecology, and the latest findings on the lives and behavior of dogs and their wild relatives, Jessica Pierce and Marc Bekoff - two of today's most innovative thinkers about dogs - explore who dogs might become without direct human intervention into breeding, arranged playdates at the dog park, regular feedings, and veterinary care. Pierce and Bekoff show how dogs are quick learners who are highly adaptable and opportunistic, and they offer compelling evidence that dogs already do survive on their own - and could do so in a world without us.

Challenging the notion that dogs would be helpless without their human counterparts, A Dog's World enables us to understand these independent and remarkably intelligent animals on their own terms.

©2021 Princeton University Press (P)2021 Tantor

Alas, A Dark Dive Into Speculative Biology

This was my first encounter with speculative biology. The book imagines how dogs would survive in a world without humans. I appreciated the authors focus on dogs as individuals and dogs as independent beings. I'm a fan of these author's other works. However, I found a lot of this particular imagining horrific: My dogs cast out on the streets struggling to survive. And then there was the doomsday prepping chapter: preparing my dogs to survive without me. Although, again, I appreciate the authors' points about getting rid of maladaptive breeding practices and letting dogs be dogs (chew, dig, forage, explore, sniff). I would also add that many dogs survive cases of severe neglect for longer than one would expect, proving their toughness and ingenuity. Dogs without us are remarkable. Still, this was the stuff of nightmares. Not my beloveds struggling to survive. Please give them a solarpunk future with freedom and care. The narration of this book was robotic (same cadence over and over again like a newscaster). It was distracting and unpleasant.