I was listening to a podcast recently and they were talking about how having the ability to talk to animals sounds so cool, but if you think about it your pets would probably just be constantly going “FOOD, FOOD, FOOD, FOOD, FOOD” and you’d walk outside and instead of beautiful birdsong you’d just hear “Fuck me!” “Fuck me!” “FUCK ME!”
That’s not the case for most social birds. Tits have been proven to have grammar (compositional syntax) and vocabulary, not being emotion-related vocalizations, which puts them above most animals.
I was listening to a podcast recently and they were talking about how having the ability to talk to animals sounds so cool, but if you think about it your pets would probably just be constantly going “FOOD, FOOD, FOOD, FOOD, FOOD” and you’d walk outside and instead of beautiful birdsong you’d just hear “Fuck me!” “Fuck me!” “FUCK ME!”
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/QyBhlvAAQDo
If this is to be believed, then animals can actually communicate quite complex thoughts.
That’s not the case for most social birds. Tits have been proven to have grammar (compositional syntax) and vocabulary, not being emotion-related vocalizations, which puts them above most animals.
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms10986 https://sites.psu.edu/lisablogcorner/2023/01/25/what-did-the-bird-say-japanese-tits-language-like-capability/ https://www.science.org/content/article/these-highly-social-birds-can-make-sentences-just-humans https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327046588_Call_combinations_in_birds_and_the_evolution_of_compositional_syntax
This is a bit of a nascent field so we might identify more species with this trait in the oncoming years.
Our cats would be going, “sit the fuck down so I can nap on your lap”, but the dogs would definitely be food and throw the ball.
So like talking to teenagers?