Former Slashdot Contributor Jon Katz Believes He Can Talk To Animals (amazon.com) 171
Long-time Slashdot reader destinyland got a surprise when he visited his local bookstore:
Jon Katz turns 70 this August, and he's published a new book called Talking to Animals: How You Can Understand Animals and They Can Understand You. Katz was a former newspaper reporter (and a contributing editor to Rolling Stone) who wrote for HotWired, the first online presence for Wired magazine in the mid-1990s, before becoming a controversial contributor to Slashdot during the site's early days. Katz left Manhattan in the 1990s to live on a farm "surrounded by dogs, cats, sheep, horses, cows, goats, and chickens," according to the book's description, an experience he writes about on his blog. His new book promises that Katz now "marshals his experience to offer us a deeper insight into animals and the tools needed for effectively communicating with them."
Meh... (Score:3, Insightful)
People have been talking to animals since time began... it's easy to train them to specific commands and to recognize their body language to know when they're hungry or playful... but I have yet to find anybody able to have a stimulating conversation with one. Even dogs, the animals most adapted to life with humans, aren't capable of that...
Now if he said he had been working with apes and teaching them to sign I might be more willing to believe... but as things stand now I'm pretty sure he's fucking nuts.
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Dogs understand quite a bit, even if they don't understand more than a handful of words. In the years since wolves domesticated themselves, evolution has rewarded those who understood more of what we meant, and could express more of what they wanted. If you've ever seen a herding dog working, there's no way to doubt that there's communication.
But attempting to strike a deep conversation with a dog is as futile as trying to have one with a teenager. The difference is that when you tell the dog "don't fuck
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Birth control car: Four banger, many windows/benches, FWD automatic trans, minivan. With a diaper full of green shit hidden behind an interior panel and a GPS tracker.
Just as with the dog, the only solution is to chase the bitch away. Far away.
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Next time, please engage humour detection before posting.
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I have seen some humans that fall into that category as well
Appropriate link (Score:2)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Not particularly surprising (Score:5, Funny)
See, this is the type of shit that happens when you hang around this place too long..
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On this site, I've seen worse.
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See, this is the type of shit that happens when you hang around this place too long..
My dog's been telling me that for years.
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Not a stupid question. And the answer is: there is no reason you shouldn't be able to talk to animals.
I speak English to my dogs all the time. I used to have a German Shepherd, and sometimes I spoke to him with a few words of German (platz, sitz, steh, bleib, hier, etc.) Just like with young children, sometimes I have to spell-talk certain words to keep them from understanding.
Dogs and other animals are perfectly capable of understanding many words of a human natural language. A quick google search reveals
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There's a difference between understanding language and associating sounds with activities.
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The former grows from the latter.
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I'm not so sure.
If I say "ball", is your understanding of the concept going to be fundamentally different than a dogs? Deeper maybe, more subtle and abstract perhaps, but not fundamentally different.
All language is simply random sounds that we've agreed to use as placeholders for objects or activities. As our culture and consciousness has evolved we've added increasingly abstract concepts to the mix, concepts that a dog is unlikely to have any grasp of, but so long as we limit ourselves to concrete concep
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Stupid question: Why shouldn't you be able to talk to animals?
Because they don't know humans are animals, they think we're "different" because we were created special order by Diety, and because we're so Special we're not allowed to understand what is going on around us.
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That's nothin', my father knew the difference between a lamp post and a chicken.
shhh, I know I know..... (Score:2, Redundant)
Next Book: Meows from the Hellmouth (Score:2)
Man, it's been a while.
WAIT FOR IT! (Score:2)
I sense a musical a'comin...
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Damn. Ninja'ed.
Oh, Jon Katz (Score:5, Insightful)
I remember when everyone hated him for not actually knowing anything and writing heavily-slanted pieces on whatever bullshit stories people told him that flattered his politics. Little did we know then that the future of blogging was a world of Jon Katzes.
Re:Oh, Jon Katz (Score:5, Informative)
Hey, now - this was back when /. was being actively developed. We have Katz to thank for the "no stories by this submitter" filter. It's come in every so handy in the subsequent years.
Re:Oh, Jon Katz (Score:4, Interesting)
In all my time on slashdot I only ever used the filter to block Katz.
level-10 wool porn (Score:2)
Me, too. There was some kind of willful fuzziness going on with Katz that was simply incomprehensible.
I saw once piece at large by Katz in subsequent years that wasn't half bad, from his early days of animal farm, IIRC.
A tiny piece of the same mind fungus can be sometimes found in the writings of Clifford Stoll.
Theodore Dalrymple would figure prominently on any list of the same mind fungus manifesting sporadically on the other side of the
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Wait, you mean you knew about the filter and *didn't* use it to block Roland Piquepaille?
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Nope. Piquepaille was a shitty blogger, but at least his submitted stories resulted in interesting discussions. And besides, he's long dead anyway.
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Or.. the presidency.
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We would not have believed the way the world has gone since /. started.
Who would have thought that the Clinton Years would be the most prosperous ones since the 60's to Now.
And who would have thought that getting your dick sucked by an intern while talking to Yasser Arafat on the phone ISN'T the worst thing a President would do in office. :facepalm:
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I'll never forget his article about the villagers who dug up their commodore 64s after the Taliban left and started watching DiVX movies from 5.25 inch floppies.
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--That actually made me LOL. Thanks :^)
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Little did we know then that the future of blogging was a world of Jon Katzes.
Sad, but true.
I was expecting more early UIDs to comment on this article. Oh well.
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They looked out the window and realized he wasn't so bad after all, but you can't expect them to admit it any more than you can expect them to trim the lower portion of that thing on their neck they call a goatee.
If the internet gets any worse I'm going to start reading Joel On Software again and convert my websites to use Matt's Scripts.
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I remember complaining about his articles until the Hellmouth stuff happened (the Columbine shooting and the following hysteria from mass media). He seemed to really listen to what younger people were saying at the time instead of telling us what we were saying.
He seemed to "get it" and quick to translate was school administrators and lawyers were proposing into something that the younger people understood.
I also read his book Geeks and found it really interesting. The view of someone from outside of the sm
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I felt like this at the time.
Sure, Katz was melodramatic, and often let his greed for a good story get in the way of some facts, but overall he was an interesting writer, capable of showing a lot of empathy with his subjects (witness the Hellmouth series). That empathy led him astray when fed a story occasionally. His 'Afghan friend' a case in point.
Overall, I've read a lot worse.
Re:Oh, Jon Katz (Score:4, Informative)
Not that I read many blogs, but my memory of him is that he was worst than most bloggers. Heck, Slashdot itself was (is) basically a blog. The other contributors back then were far, far better.
Katz always seemed to be some guy from the outside of a subculture who tried to be seen as an expert in it by declaring strongly held opinions. Bad enough, but the opinions were usually ingratiating, patronizing, and/or wrong.
Even Michael Sims wasn't as bad!
His book's title needs modification, I'm afraid (Score:5, Interesting)
The title, "How You Can Understand Animals and They Can Understand You" needs an edit to:
How You Can Understand "domesticated" Animals and They Can Understand You.
This is because he's only dealt with such animals and none from the wild. If he's up to the challenge, I welcome him to the Sahara, where coming face to face with some of its four legged inhabitants [without protection], immediately invokes the question, "Could you be my next meal?" in the animal's mind.
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As I understand it, his track record with the domesticated ones is pretty bad.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
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Certainly, even with perfect communication it's important to have something worth saying that's more valuable than your caloric content. I wouldn't particularly want to encounter a band of human cannibals without some really valuable information to share either, no matter how well we could communicate.
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I spend a lot of time in the woods, and wild animals can communicate just fine. They communicate across species as part of their daily routine, so once you realize that you're also an animal species and get over the "Me Humaan, Me Special, Me Special, Me Not Understand Because Too Special" nonsense then you can understand most of it just fine.
And just a hint, that chipmunk is not saying hello, he is not welcoming you to the forest. "Get out of my yard you ugly giant!" is the nicest thing any chipmunk ever s
Re:His book's title needs modification, I'm afraid (Score:4, Funny)
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Desmond Morris wrote some very good and easy to read books on this topic (and some TV series as well).
Here's what they say (Score:3)
Sad cat diary [youtube.com]
Sad dog diary [youtube.com]
I talk to animals too (Score:2)
I just don't expect them to talk back, except for the human ones (and sometimes not those ones).
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I would venture that cats tend to understand at least as much, if not more, language than dogs - they just usually don't deign to respond. Start talking about something likely to result in a particularly good or bad outcome for them though, and you'll tend to suddenly find them immediately at hand, or nowhere to be found, respectively.
Dogs on the other hand seem to be generally less language-oriented, but have near-telepathic ability to pick up on moods and decisions, sometimes before we're event conscious
Not impressive (Score:2)
Anyone can talk to animals. Now getting them to talk back, and understanding them... that is the tough part.
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I can talk to animals too (Score:2)
They just don't answer.
If the open paragraph doesn't start with... (Score:3)
everybody can talk to animals (Score:2)
I saw it on the Far Side [sandiegoreader.com]
Rabbit (Score:2)
When I make my nose go up and down a bit my rabbit answers me by doing the same. Very cute.
Anyone can talk to animals (Score:2)
Perfectly Reasonable. (Score:4, Interesting)
This is a perfectly reasonable statement. I talk _with_ animals. I farm and have a large pack of livestock guardian herding dogs. We communicate with about 300 words and phrases. It is two way communications. Some of it is vocal. Some of it is body language. Some of it is sign language. I can tell the dogs things and they can tell me things and they talk to each other - no surprises there. People have been doing it for thousands of years.
What is unfortunate is that urban people have lost this connection to the natural world. Dogs raised as singles don't typically get the cultural knowledge passed down generation to generation like dogs in a farming pack. Pet dogs typically are all alone much of the day and when you get home you greet them and then ignore them in all too many cases. This results in both you and the dog losing the ability to communicate with each other.
Oh, and it isn't just dogs. Pigs have about 30 words they use, sheep use about ten words and chickens use about six words. Learn their words and you can understand what they're talking about as well as talking to them. When we're herding livestock we typically use a couple of the target animal's words to help with the herding. I say we as in both we humans and the dogs. The dogs are multilingual. They pickup the words we use to tell pigs to move forward and they use them too to get the pigs to do the same thing.
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Pigs and dogs do seem to be able to either speak each others' languages, or are at least mutually intelligible to each other. I've had friends with pot-bellied pigs, and one of them also had three dogs. The pig (literally) ran with their pack all the time. We were both in agreement that it believed it was a dog, right up to wagging its tail. This story makes me wonder if it wasn't confused at all, but rather was simply speaking the common language -- dog.
I miss Jon Katz (Score:3, Insightful)
And here goes years and years of good Karma. Does Karma still matter on /. ?
His Hellmouth piece was great and brought some geek issues to the forefront and got some issues talked about in normal non-geek circles.
I joined /. because of Jon Katz and the Hellmouth piece.
Not all of his work was good. In fact some was quite awful but it always inspired conversation rather that what we now have here.
Talking dog (Score:4, Funny)
A man and his dog walk into a bar. The man says, "I'll bet you a round of drinks that my dog can talk."
Bartender: "Yeah! Sure...go ahead."
Man: "What covers a house?"
Dog: "Roof!"
Man: "How does sandpaper feel?"
Dog: "Rough!"
Man: "Who was the greatest ball player of all time?"
Dog: "Ruth!"
Man: "Pay up. I told you he could talk."
The bartender, annoyed at this point, throws both of them out the door. Sitting on the sidewalk, the dog looks at the guy and asks, "DiMaggio?"
Oh He's Still Alive? (Score:2)
Re:Well Duh. (Score:5, Funny)
I just asked my dog if he wanted a hug. He gives awesome hugs.
mine gives me awesome tongue kisses.....deep deep tongue kisses.....
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"tech jocks"
FTFY - See example, Uber.
Re:Lol (Score:4, Informative)
Shit nerd is batshit crazy haha.
Once again, the headline is totally misleading. Anyone capable of talking can talk to animals.
Thinking that they understand english and are talking back to you, that may call for a check-up, an MRI, and maybe some meds.
BTW, The bats told me they have nothing to do with this and they resent your assertion about their feces being involved in any way. You will hear from their lawyer as soon as they find one that speaks bat.
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LOL I have chickens and a dog. The neighbor has a farm that's got lots of animals.
I talk to the chickens, all the time. They're my miniature dinosaurs. (They are foul beasts and I didn't actually invite them - they just marched their way here from the neighboring farm, quite a feat but not unheard of.)
The chickens talk back.
The dog does not talk back.
Now, at the farm next door, those animals talk back all the time. I moo at the cows and they moo back. The piglets squeal at me. The chickens are mouthy. They
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I don't have any idea what they're saying, and I'm pretty sure they don't actually understand me, but they do actually vocalize back to you. I'm not sure if I can call it talking, but they do make noises back.
Yep, that pretty much sums it up for the situation at my post-cubicle e-workplace innovative paradigm disruption customer client design center where I am supposed to actually "work" . . .
"surrounded by dogs, cats, sheep, horses, cows, goats, and chickens,"
. . . indeed . . . but we collectively call them "management" . . .
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I'd also add that there are times when they respond with behavior that can be interpreted as understanding and, perhaps, communicating. The horse will approach and nuzzle you, for example. Not chickens, though. No, they're just assholes.
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Rabbits almost never vocalise but their body language is fairly sophisticated.
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The great thing about rabbits is that you don't even need a knife to skin them. Also, they are tasty.
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These were French Lops, definitely not for eating.
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Ah... I have wild rabbits. Most of my food actually comes from this area - either hunted, fished, or from the farm. It's delicious.
I'm also pretty sure this thread is now derailed beyond belief.
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Rabbits almost never vocalise but their body language is fairly sophisticated.
There is a good reason they try to keep their heads down...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Djoikxw_BdA [youtube.com]
With people like that running around, you can't take any chances...
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I already knew this about chickens, thanks to my uncle's chicken house.
One thing not mentioned is that roosters either hate children or consider them to be a large hen that needed to be serviced. I dunno which, I always managed to outrun them.
I had to run the rooster gauntlet everytime to visit my granny and grampa because they lived in on the other side.
My older relatives would yell "don't let him catch you!" and "For heavens sake, don't trip!". There may have been laughter.
Here's the facts:
http://www.crac [cracked.com]
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That is amazingly accurate.
Wanna hear a chicken story?
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That is amazingly accurate.
Wanna hear a chicken story?
Why yes I do.
I'll refill my glass right now.
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Sorry for my delay.
So, as I've said, I didn't actually invite the chickens. They marched their way over here and, I presume, the reasons are political. Chickens have a pecking order and this implies some sort of governance. Politics is the only logical reason for which we'd have chicken refugees on our lawn.
When the chickens, just three, first arrived - they were on the lawn when we woke up that morning. Curious, we went outside and investigated the arrival of unexpected chickens. It's a good half mile, thr
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I talk to the chickens, all the time. ... They are foul beasts ...
They are fowl beasts.
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I'd never stoop so low as to use a pun. Never.
If you're curious, there was a coup at the coop (I'm pretty sure) which is when the chickens marched their way to freedom and decided to live on my lawn. They didn't all come at once, it was over a period of months. That's a good half mile of chicken hiking. I have no idea how they even knew my lawn existed.
I tried to give them back but couldn't catch them and their owner told me to keep them - that they'd be good for me. Well, they're dirty rotten liars, is wha
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I used to live on a short/isolated street with about 8 houses on it that ended in some woods. In the woods lived about 20 chickens--I was told by neighbours that someone who'd lived there had them, and just left them where they there when they moved away.
The chickens made a circuit of all the yards in the neighbourhood every 3 or 4 days, and were welcomed by all. After enjoying 2 nearly bug-free summers there, I understood why.
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Chickens will eat anything - even other chickens. They love cooked eggs.
Re:Lol (Score:5, Informative)
The chickens I live next to talk to me all the time. Idiots on slashdot are free to call me names, but I do understand much of what they say. There isn't much to understand, really, they're rather simple-minded.
Usually they say, "I see you, I'm right here. I see you, I'm right here. I see you, I'm right here." That sounds like, "bok. bok bok. bok."
Sometimes they say, "I just laid the most wonderful egg, I'm so happy I laid this egg, it is the best egg ever because I laid it." That sounds like "bok bok baGOK, bok bok baGOK, bok bok baGOK."
Rarely they're having a crisis, like malfunctioning water source, and they'll say, "bagokbagokbagok? bagok? bagokbagok?"
If they're free range they also have a bunch of phrases relating to food, which mostly translate to, "dibs! dibs! hey, I called dibs you jerk! dibs! dibs!" They also have descriptive terms for the quality of food, but I doubt a human is going to translate that as easily as the above. But it is often obvious what the topic and general thrust of conversation is.
Re:Lol (Score:5, Funny)
Mine are perverts.
If you listen carefully, they're saying, "Suck suck suck suck my cock."
They're hens! They don't have a cock. Sheesh.
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Sometimes they say, "I just laid the most wonderful egg, I'm so happy I laid this egg, it is the best egg ever because I laid it."
When I had chickens that was pretty much the gist of the daily conversation. "I will use the greatest rooster. I know the best roosters", "This will be the greatest egg ever. Ever." , "We will make great nests, we will save feed, we will come up with barnyard care plans that will be phenomenal — phenomenal,". "We’re going to get rid of those turkey gangs so fast your head will spin,”, "I will be the greatest bird pooper that God ever created".
The whole flock hit the road a couple ye
Re:Lol (Score:5, Interesting)
My cat understands a great deal more English than that - she'll meow at the window to come in, and will wait until I tell her to "got to the door" - no other statement will send her off to the door. Similarly she has a distinctive "yes" and "no" meows, and we can play a belabored 20 questions when she wants something. Her vocabulary is limited, and it's usually easier to just tell her to "show me" and follow her, but that doesn't work for everything.
Just like with dogs, the trick is to use a limited and consistent vocabulary of words and phrases (and intonations - they're usually a lot more sensitive to pitch for recognition than English normally is) to communicate ideas so that they can understand you, and to take the time to learn at least their basic communications (and to clearly and immediately indicate your understanding, especially when starting out, so that they learn what noises/motions to use to communicate with you)
These are social animals after all, and you need only watch them for a while to see that they communicate at least basic concepts amongst themselves, and even between species. There's absolutely no reason we can't do the same with them. Well, except for the lack of a tail - that does give us a pretty severe speech impediment.
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I have similar experiences with the cat who lives with us now, in spite of her being even less verbal than the average cat in that she had her throat ripped out by some kind of vermin some years ago and now most of the time when she tries to say meow she says meh. She definitely understands us when we tell her what to do. I figure out what she wants from context.
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I really wish they hadn't filtered that. You should be able to call me any name you want to.
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Huh, I didnt think slashdot filtered. Kinda wish they didn't if only to make it easier to spot the garbage individuals.
It's like people who drive intentionally loud cars. "Cool... and now I know you're a douche bag"
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The new owners did it. I am not impressed. For the record, I am part black. I just don't give random people the right to control my emotions. I don't actually care if they call me names. Hell, I hope it makes them feel better. I ain't scared.
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Anyone capable of talking can talk to animals.
Sure but in Katz' case they know he's lying to them, especially if he talks about Information Technology...
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You will hear from their lawyer as soon as they find one that speaks bat.
What you talkin' about, son? All lawyers speak rat.
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You will hear from their lawyer as soon as they find one that speaks bat.
What you talkin' about, son? All lawyers speak rat.
Let me change over to chicken speak*:
Bat, I say BAT son!!!
<southern-mumble>That boy is thicker than home sliced bacon...</southern-mumble>
*any resemblance to Foghorn Leghorn is allegedly unintentional.
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I think that usually, there's some meds involved _before_ believing that the animals are talking back, at least in normal conversational form.
Now, if, by "talking" you mean that my cat standing at the kitchen door meowing and scratching the window means "get your ass out here and give me food NOW." Then, sure, they do that.
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Some (I think most) dogs understand words -- often quite a few of them. We talk to ours all the time. We didn't realize how much we depended on verbal communication with our dogs until our old terrier went deaf. The German Shepard that preceded the terrier understood perfectly well that words prefixed with "Do" were commands/suggestions directed to her.
The terrier is gone now and has been replaced by a six year old terrier from the animal shelter who clearly is not used to verbal communication. But she'
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What do you mean by "very limited"?
I have a small dog, Chihuahua/Papillon cross that understands in excess of 60 words that I have taught him to understand, although he often responds to conversations between my wife and I in ways that shows he understands exactly what we are talking about, and I know I haven't been using the words I have specifically taught him to understand. There are also phrases that he understands such as, "let's go to bed", "do you want to go for a ride", "do you want a piece of chic
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Just curious... do you think that some of that understanding is based on contextual clues? For instance, "let's go to bed" would tend to come at night, and "do you want a piece of chicken" may come when it's already available for him to smell and associate with your words. I've heard dogs are very social animals, attuned to obeying a pack leader (you), so when you order him out of your chair, he may be responding to other non-verbal cues you give him as well, and then perhaps later associated the phrase.
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I have a lot of health problems, and as a result need to nap during the day. I can say, "let's go to bed" at any time of the day and he understands the meaning. As to the context of asking him if he wants some chicken, if I say "chicken" all by itself just out of the blue he comes alert. His ears stand up and he looks at me with obvious intensity. But if I say, "do you want some chicken", or "do you want some roast beef" he will get right in front of me and start begging and dancing around. It doesn't
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Interesting, sounds like he's gotten pretty attuned to some of those specific words and phrases. Like I said, I had a cat, so I don't have any first-hand experience with a dog's capacity to understand speech. You'll forgive my initial skepticism though, I hope, as I've noticed that people tend to anthropomorphize their pets to a pretty significant degree, but obviously you see his responses every day and know him best.
I did a quick search on the subject, and found this article you might find interesting:
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It's no surprise at all to me about how dogs process speech.
I have other stories about my dog that will amaze you at how much he understands. I'll tell you one of them here.
When he eats his dry dog food he normally gets a mouthful of food and then trots off to a chair, jumps up on it, drops the kibbles out of his mouth onto the chair and then eats them one at a time. He'll do that until he's no longer hungry. ( He only weighs 5 lbs so a kibble at a time is enough for him.) One day he was actually standin
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"The problem is that animals cannot talk to us. We are too stupid to understand them."
A point that our dogs have made to us (non-verbally) on numerous occasions. But their feeling seems to be that even though the average human ranks somewhere between cats and carrots on the native intelligence scale, it is sometimes possible to convey a few basic thoughts to us by repeating the same actions over and over ... and over..
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Some animals, especially dogs, most certainly talk back. Some need to get the last word in, whether it's a growl or a huff.
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Some animals, especially dogs, most certainly talk back. Some need to get the last word in, whether it's a growl or a huff.
I swear that my sister's dog (purebred Samoyed), who was a talker as far as dogs go, picked up her grumbling from my Dad. If you told her to do something that she didn't want to do, she would do it but all the while making grumbling sounds sounding like she was telling you off.
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But do they understand what he's saying?
And if they do, how the hell does he know? Do they talk back?
You beat me to it: that's exactly what I was wondering about our new Dr Doolittle
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Mr. Ed.