Was watching this StarTalk episode about deciphering whale language and I wondered how the adults teach the calves? Do they actually teach them or do calves have some instinctive capability to understand and “speak”? For example, a very specific sound will always mean “danger” even if the calf was never taught that. It could just instinctively feel it means danger.
Same with bees. They can actually communicate the exact location of flowers miles away by dancing. How did they learn?????
In: Biology
Not all audible human communication is language. While not all people will understand “LOOK OUT, DANGER!” explicitly there will normally be context clues that mean they understand the spirit if not the letter. And everyone can understand a scream or a baby’s cry.
Most animals have an instinctive understanding of certain noise cues they make.
For animals learning to communicate, it’s no different to humans – observe, listen, imitate, feedback, refine. It’s just that the end point for a human language is a lot more complex.
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