And then he uses the term "neuroflaming" which in, spite of a heavy influence by WJF III in my work, I'm scratching my head and hoping it's a typo.

Thanks, found the same explainer blog via a reddit post today.

I miss reading to adults.

Not actually read yet but in my collection:

The Others: How Animals Made Us Human Paul Shepard
The Other End of the Leash: Why We Do What We Do Around Dogs, Patricia McConnell

I've enjoyed Stanley Coren's books on canine intelligence. Fun fact: dogs can recognize you from a great distance by your movement signature. (He's also a visual psychology and illusions guy)

“Outside of a dog, a book is man’s best friend. Inside of a dog it’s too dark to read.” Groucho Marx

Thanks for sharing your tribute and feelings with us. Remembering all my goodbye days, and remembering the occasional joy of being reunited in dreams (where occasionally I am a dog, or at least crawl under the porch).

I'm trying to interpret the "but" in your statement. Is it implying an error in their argument by not recognizing that fact, or that it's not really top down because an aggregate state doesn't justify the term top down? Something else?