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Message: <blockquote data-quote="gepetto" data-source="post: 7929191" data-attributes="member: 6990165">Of course its about whether you can communicate. Thats all language is, communication. If they want food and they found a way to make a noise or sign something to express that then its language. Thats all we're doing with each other. Grunting rhythmically, and using body language, both subtle and overt to communicate our thoughts and desires. Thats language. And yes it is about interpretation. Your saying that because the chimps teacher is interpreting then it doesnt count because any random signer should be able sit down and understand just as well as the teacher, if I understand you correctly. But thats nonsense. I have a friend whose husband is learning english, its really broken and he still mixes a lot of japanese in with his sentences. In order for us to understand anything complicated from him she still has to help interpret a lot of what he's saying. Because she knows what he knows of english and what he doesnt and knows him well enough to fill in the blanks. I'm a native english speaker. I cannot sit down and have a conversation with him with full understanding without her to interpret japanese and bridge the gap. Just like the chimps need someone who can sit down and understand chimp, and bridge that gap. It doesnt mean my friends husband doesnt understand the english he can say anymore then it means the chimp isnt understanding sign language it is using. And in the same way both also need a go between to express a full understanding in the non native language. But doesnt mean they arent using language. Their understanding is incomplete, and their mastery is small, but its still deliberately used and understood language.Travel a bit more. Theres plenty of native english speakers, whether they be fluent in Australian english or the latest version of ebonics where its actually a hell of a struggle to understand just what they are trying to communicate. Facebook comments are another excellent source of the unintelligible gibberish that passes for english among an unfortunate percentage of our population now. Yet they arguably still have language, no matter how primitive it may be. Yes theres a big difference. You can definitely tell why he wants to go out. And I talk to my dog about politics all the time, usually during the nightly news. He doesnt usually do much but stare at me quietly and try to distract me into doing something else, but I assume thats because he's smarter then me and knows to just avoid the whole thing as a bad use of his time and energy.</blockquote>

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