Think your dog can understand words? This scientist says you might be right
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Re: Think your dog can understand words? This scientist says you might be right
#2So where are all the people who apparently think that pets can't understand basic vocabulary? It's treated like some wild revelation when it comes up in articles like this, but anyone who's ever had a dog or cat knows what the reactions are like when words like "walk" or "bath" or "tuna" get mentioned. For particularly attentive dogs you can even end up with the euphemism treadmill from "walk" to "W-A-L-K" to substituting other phrases to keep them from realizing what you're talking about.
Re: Think your dog can understand words? This scientist says you might be right
#3So where are all the people who apparently think that pets can't understand basic vocabulary? It's treated like some wild revelation when it comes up in articles like this, but anyone who's ever had a dog or cat knows what the reactions are like when words like "walk" or "bath" or "tuna" get mentioned. For particularly attentive dogs you can even end up with the euphemism treadmill from "walk" to "W-A-L-K" to substit…
The article talks about having dogs talk back by pressing buttons for various words.
Re: Think your dog can understand words? This scientist says you might be right
#4So where are all the people who apparently think that pets can't understand basic vocabulary? It's treated like some wild revelation when it comes up in articles like this, but anyone who's ever had a dog or cat knows what the reactions are like when words like "walk" or "bath" or "tuna" get mentioned. For particularly attentive dogs you can even end up with the euphemism treadmill from "walk" to "W-A-L-K" to substit…
The article talks about having dogs talk back by pressing buttons for various words.
Maybe buttons are necessary when humans don't understand dog words?
Or to put it another way, buttons demonstrate dogs being multilingual across species...
Re: Think your dog can understand words? This scientist says you might be right
#5The author Mary Robinette Kowal has a cat, Elsie, who uses a button board. I’m reluctant to call it language exactly, but it is definitely a kind of communication.
An example is here: https://www.instagram.com/p/C48uKZ8veql/
It’s interesting how words shift in meaning with the cat, so litterbox, for example, has come to be a word for anything unpleasant. Elsie also will come up with nicknames for people she encounters relatively frequently, not always complimentary.
Re: Think your dog can understand words? This scientist says you might be right
#6Echoing others, everyone knew this but we do need to actually test and prove it.
My cat knows speak, sit, 360, shake, nose kiss, and up as far as tricks go. Originally, we paired both a hand motion and the word. Now, either works. I can make the sit gesture, she’ll sit. Or just saying sit works too. She’s observed how we open our doors and now is capable of leaping up and pulling the handle herself, including a little wiggle to pull the door open enough to wedge her face through for final entry.
Cats seem to use tone in their meows to tell you a lot, and while I can’t say I understand really, it’s clear when there’s a hello chirp or an upset, lower tone yowl.
Re: Think your dog can understand words? This scientist says you might be right
#7See also the Canadian satirical news show that claimed that dogs in Montreal would have to be bilingual. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/no-dogs-don-t-have-t...
Re: Think your dog can understand words? This scientist says you might be right
#8The author Mary Robinette Kowal has a cat, Elsie, who uses a button board. I’m reluctant to call it language exactly, but it is definitely a kind of communication. An example is here: https://www.instagram.com/p/C48uKZ8veql/ It’s interesting how words shift in meaning with the cat, so litterbox, for example, has come to be a word for anything unpleasant. Elsie also will come up with nicknames for people she encounter…
> so litterbox, for example, has come to be a word for anything unpleasant.
That's rich. It exactly mirrors how we have come to use gastronomical words such as "disgusting" for moral opprobrium. The same parts of the limbic system are used to process both concepts.
Anything that's bad could be described as 'shitty' which is about as close as we can get to the same usage.
Re: Think your dog can understand words? This scientist says you might be right
#9There really are all the ingredients out there for the creation of an animal-human communication model. Except maybe money and will.
Re: Think your dog can understand words? This scientist says you might be right
#10Hmm, I'm not that sure.
I did a month of quiet Yoga (no talking whatsoever) and brought my dog with me for the ride. I came to realize that the words are mostly there to help me, she doesn't care. If I switch the word and say it with the same energy/body language, the result is the same.
I don't even need words anymore, body language is more effective with my dog.