3 ms·

Old videos of chimpanzees suggest they are capable of speech

• deleted 2y ago
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• lukevp 2y ago
  These aren’t very good words to show that they can speak. Mama and papa are just lip based, they don’t involve the tongue at all, and don’t require varying tonality from vocal cords. Even cats can make sounds that sound like speech. Also this provides no evidence that he understands language just because he says a word. Parrots can speak much better than this but they do not understand language. I think the fact that they can learn sign language is much more significant.
  • tivert 2y ago
    > Parrots can speak much better than this but they do not understand language. Isn't that untrue, and there are parrots that have been trained to understand and follow simple instructions (e.g. move a specific object from a collection to a specific destination out of several)?
    • MattPalmer1086 2y ago
      The most famous was Alex the Parrot: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_(parrot) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_(parrot)
    • deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
• meristohm 2y ago
  They are certainly capable of communicating with each other. What's the point of quibbling over whether or not it is OUR way of communicating (or of being intelligent)? What do cats and dogs think of us and our fumbling attempts to communicate with them?