My beagle falls into the "Guilty, tail tucked, head down look" because he got caught chewing or destroying something. Happy go lucky until he reads your body language or you start yelling. Then he slinks to the corner to hide.

The golden-collie I had for 13yrs was almost human. Once she had an upset stomach and figured out how to open the door to the garage so she would not mess in the house. She met me at the door with her head down, lead me out to the garage to show me what she did and started licking my hand like she was apologizing. She'd never done this before and never did it again, but I know she knew what she did, was showing responsibility for her action, and really felt bad about it. Almost like she was trying to lessen the mess for me to clean up so she knew to at least go out to the garage and keep it out of the house.

My beagle is clueless and sounds like what a lot of you describe as dogs that don't show remorse or make those type of connections. My golden would astonish everyone that met her with how in-tune she was with me...what I said, asked for, expected of her. The nay-sayers out there can believe what they want...my Abbey was one brilliant and amazing girl.

Could she also do cart wheels and drive a car.
Dogs are dogs - While they are trainable they have very limited intelligence compared to humans - well some anyway. If you beleive your dog is the next lassie and that makes you happy then great.
Beleive me your dog didnt lick your hand in the way of an apology for messing up your garage with her sick, you probably had some tomato sauce on there from dinner and she wanted to get rid of the sick taste in her mouth. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

If what you say is true why did your dog think she had done a bad thing by being sick in the garage, didnt she perform these feats to please you by not being sick in the house?. If she thought shed done you a favour wouldnt she have come to you tail wagging, proud of what she did? why would she feel the need to be sorrowful and beg for your forgiveness for these amazing actions.
But then how did she even know it was wrong to be sick in house? unless you punished her for it in the past she would not know - have you punished your dog for being sick in the past?

She had the RUNS Tim, and no I did not feed her any tomato sauce so the attempt at getting a laugh didn't make it, nor did the rest of your sarcasm. She'd never crapped in the house before or since that time, and I was at work when it happened. I read her reaction as "I know I'm not supposed to do this but really had to go so I at least tried to be good about it and go as close to outside as I could".

Another Lassie, no, but I never once had to scold her in all the years I had her. I feel that if you invest the time to teach your dogs in the beginning, you will reap the rewards for years to come.

As I stated in my original post, people can believe what they want (or don't) about dogs - only their owners know, understand, appreciate and respect each individual relationship - whether it be a working one or domesticated.

There have been many folks on this message board that have posted respectful, admirable comments about their dogs...one of the main reasons I was drawn to this group in the first place. As for dog's having limited intelligence...some have more than many humans I know...