• sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    20 days ago

    Another element that could be at play here:

    He thought it was a dog.

    Dogs, because we domesticated them, have muscles around their eyes, that allow them to make eye/eyebrow expressions.

    Wolves do not have these. Because they’re the ones we did not domesticate for millenia.

    So, if he was expecting dog expressions… wolves literally cannot make the same facial expressions.

    They essentially always look like they have RBF, in comparison to a dog.

      • sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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        19 days ago

        Huh! You’re right, I did not know that.

        Huskies are… much closer to being actual wolves though, genetically speaking.

        Seems like this applies to malamutes and samoyeds as well…?

          • sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            18 days ago

            My, ahem, blind guess would be probably not, as they’ve… not been widely and thoroughly domesticated for 20,000+ years?

              • sp3ctr4l@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                18 days ago

                No idea what the more precise timeline is, for when and where dogs started having eyebrow muscles.

                Maybe if we did something comparable to the Human Genome Project, but for dogs, we could figure it out, lol?

    • ikidd@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      18 days ago

      It’s thought the species we domesticated was distinct from wolves of today. That species went extinct in the wild.