Ape communication studies have a bad track record of ableism, grift, junk science and harm to the poor gorillas and other apes pulled into the sideshow. Dog communication buttons have utility but they are greatly exaggerated. Birds will rule over us all soon, beware. - ThreadSky

moviessilently.bsky.social • 83 days ago

Ape communication studies have a bad track record of ableism, grift, junk science and harm to the poor gorillas and other apes pulled into the sideshow.

Dog communication buttons have utility but they are greatly exaggerated.

Birds will rule over us all soon, beware.

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pseudandry.bsky.social•83 days ago

And as a bird intelligence enthusiast I still find a lot of the more complex language people are attempting with birds not as successful as they claim. I'm not fully convinced african grays can understand material categories, for example.

pseudandry.bsky.social•83 days ago

...it's still leaps above dogs, though, bless their wagging hearts

moviessilently.bsky.social•83 days ago

Yes, all of them have some amount of showmanship if they are performed for a YouTube audience and not in a lab. And birds have a devilish capacity for mimicry, so it's hard to tell where that ends and where real language acquisition begins.

moviessilently.bsky.social•83 days ago

But the dog ones are so completely blatant, as bad as the Koko books and videos they breathlessly fed us in school.

That said, bird studies are much cleaner and better documented than the ones involving apes. I think there's more there there.

pseudandry.bsky.social•83 days ago

I agree on both accounts!

pseudandry.bsky.social•83 days ago

I think even show-grays show a clear capacity to gather and use a vocabulary, my nitpicking is just that

pseudandry.bsky.social•83 days ago

It's more interesting to me watching the failures that a few of the channels show, because since there is a showmanship aspect for youtube/tiktok, I have to assume we're shown the best results and they're still often haphazard in aspects

moviessilently.bsky.social•83 days ago

Yes, definitely. One of the big tip offs for me about fakery is the animal is never wrong, never makes a mistake. It's always a joke or a pun or an existential question. Never "the animal made an error or didn't know"

jasontoon.bsky.social•81 days ago

They’re getting close to it in Australia, where that sulphur-crested cockatoo photo was probably taken, and where cyclists have to wear anti-swooping helmets, and where a flock of corellas in the street can stop traffic. If the corvids and cockatoos ever join forces with the cassowaries, it’s over.

teamsmithy.bsky.social•83 days ago

HAIL BIRDS

ciw.bsky.social•83 days ago

Was voicing my skepticism about dogs expressing complex idea with buttons videos only yesterday with friends at a bar. They are convinced “Bunny Speaks” videos are legit. I felt like the kid who debunks Santa Claus to friends in grammar school must do. (They still believe in the dog, though.)

moviessilently.bsky.social•83 days ago

Yes, I do believe Bunny knows "Cat" "Dad" "Walk" and can combine them but expecting her to understand the concept of "what" and "later" and multiple types of "home" is just ridiculous. The owner is clearly leading the viewer. It's harmless enough, assuming they aren't doing more than selling a book

moviessilently.bsky.social•83 days ago

But that illustrates the allure of the ape junk science. People are itching to believe in these things and it's easy to create the illusion with people who don't think about grammar or language or the way animals process information all that much

ciw.bsky.social•83 days ago

Exactly. People’s imagination will fill in the gaps to substantiate the illusion they want to believe in.

moviessilently.bsky.social•83 days ago

I like to use the "love you" button as an example.

Are they sure Bunny comprehends the concept of familial love... or is she pushing the button she knows is guaranteed to give her positive attention?

And that's SMART but it's not language.

But you can't tell that to people who want to believe.

ciw.bsky.social•83 days ago

Right, it’s operant conditioning, not thought. I love dogs, know they have a grasp of certain concepts, and yet understand the limits of their capacity for language per se (as distinct from communication). People get similarly mixed up about what LLMs are doing.

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