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African elephants have a special alarm sound, as if it is the "bee" in their language. When they hear the buzzing of bees, they run away, shaking their heads as they run. Even when they hear a recording of elephants running to avoid bees, they will shake their heads and run away. Shaking their heads is a characteristic behavior when they avoid bees to avoid letting angry bees get into their ears or noses while running away. But elephants in American zoos have never encountered East African bees, and they do not respond to the sound of bees.

In Africa, older elephants react, and young individuals observe and imitate the reactions of their elders, which is a way for them to learn.

The "language" of monkeys in 1967, people realized that the sounds of green monkeys have different meanings.

If a dangerous cat is found, the cry of the green monkey will make everyone run to the tree. When a fierce eagle or African crown eagle flies by, the double-syllable call from the vigilant monkey will make the other monkeys look into the sky or get into a thicker ground shelter (instead of climbing a tree). They are keen birdwatchers, but they do not respond to black-breasted short-toed eagles and African white-backed vultures because neither preys on green-bellied green monkeys. If a dangerous snake is found, the green monkey will make a vibrato sound, and the other monkeys will stand up on their hind legs and scan the ground.

Green-bellied green monkeys in Amboseli (a border city between Kenya and Tanzania) include "leopards", "eagles", "snakes", "baboons", "other carnivorous mammals", "unfamiliar people", "leader monkeys", "subordinate monkeys", "surveillance of other monkeys" and "detection of hostile tribes". Between 6 and 11 months old, green-bellied green monkeys may mistakenly respond to alarm calls, such as jumping into trees when they hear an eagle alarm. Until the age of two, green-bellied green monkeys may sound an "eagle" alert to unthreatened birds and a "leopard" alert to small cats. In the process of growing up, only gradually master the correct pronunciation, which is somewhat similar to human beings.

Other monkeys also have different alarm calls for specific threats. Monkeys such as Ling monkey, big white-nosed long-tailed monkey and colobus monkey not only have songs with different components, but also convey additional information through the order of calls. (some small birds do the same, such as golden-winged warblers and Eurasian robins. )

The long-tailed monkey indicates whether it saw or just heard the predator by changing the order of its calls, which is a bit like grammar, and the word order changes the semantics. If the danger is far away, the long-tailed monkey will call the police with a call similar to an adjective modifier, which is a low-frequency "knock" sound to the effect: "I see a leopard in the distance, be careful!" If there is no such thump, it means that the situation is urgent, "Leopard-- over there!" Kan's long-tailed monkey said there were three kinds of alarm calls from leopards and four species of crowned eagles.

The Diana macaque responds to the alarm call of the Kan's macaque-they can't afford to lose the language barrier when they are at risk.

Gibbons combine at least seven different songs that repel attacking gibbons, attract mates and warn predators.

There are nearly 90 different combinations of chimpanzees and, in some cases, tapping on tree trunks. The "pant-hoot" sound of a familiar female chimpanzee may announce her arrival to the entire group, but when she finally approaches the leader male, her voice becomes "pant-grunt". It might actually say, "Hello, everyone!-- here's what I'm going to do now."

The "grammar" baby elephant used in animal communication has two very special "words" to express satisfaction or anger. They make a "ah, oh, oh Sometimes, a mother's loud cry can bring a wandering baby elephant back to its side at once. The cry seems to be translated as "come here".

Elephants understand what each other is saying, whether it's a specific message or just an expression of emotion, which may be the tone we understand, such as "I can't wait! let's go!" . Semantics usually depend on context. Because listeners understand context, they can understand information.

Sometimes the same is true in human language, saying "Hey!" in a friendly or harsh voice. You will see whether I am trying to convey a greeting or a warning.

To an elephant, a roaring elephant may sound like a man shouting "Hey!" The sender adds a more subtle meaning to it and can be understood by the receiver.

The two elephants let out a soft, brief greeting rumble as they approached each other. When the keeper calls the name of an orphan elephant, the one who is called will also respond with a greeting call. (the keeper speaks English, the elephant uses elephant language), the meaning of this cry is similar to "Hello, nice to see you again", or it may be "you are important to me".

In human language, the meaning of "you are You are important to me to me" and "are you important to me?" (Are you important to me?) is different. The word order changes the semantics, which is grammar. Many experts who study communication believe that grammar is the decisive feature of true "language".

Dolphin researcher Louis Herman, who studies captive dolphins in Hawaii, found that dolphins can understand the difference between "get the ring from John" and "hand the ring to John".

What most animals don't have is actually complex grammar. Dolphins may use some of their own simple syntax in the wild. Some apes can learn to use some human grammar, especially bonobos.

This makes sense and means that these species have the ability to use certain parts of human grammar and respond correctly. Trainers train this ability to express it in a form that humans can observe.

It doesn't make sense if another animal can use grammar on humans, but not on its own or on its own. The real problem is that humans may not fully understand this.

It is possible that animals use grammar in a slightly different way. Many animals can quietly gather information to understand each other's intentions, such as the difference between "if I attack you, I can win" and "if you attack me, I will lose".

For complex social animals, social status largely depends on age and experience, and there may be some grammar for comparison, such as "I can beat her, but he can beat me." Hundreds of social interactions depend on the ability to correctly evaluate these relationships.

Imagine that both elephants and apes have to assess the risks and benefits of social and strategic decisions, not only to think twice, but also to know their chances of winning. They must be mentally capable of switching roles and judging the outcome in possible different scenarios. In a sense, does the act of selecting, choosing and distinguishing reflect a grammar of survival? Is it for this reason that their minds can understand the change in the order of words and change the relationship between them, just like humans? Maybe it does.

One might conclude that people can speak in sentences while other animals use phrases. "I want to go for a walk by the pond, and we have to meet other dogs" can easily be reduced to the adult word "walk, pond, dog". If it's an animal, it's enough to point your nose at the door and wag your tail. Either way, the ideas expressed are basically the same and lead to the same expected results. Thousands of creatures indicate their intention without using an adverb or gerund.

Humans are lazy in terms of dealing with other animals. We only say that dogs "bark" or "whimper". In fact, you can easily tell the bark of a dog standing in front of the door asking to go out, and when a stranger appears at the door. In fact, the pitch, timbre and volume of a dog's barking are all different, so it is easy to distinguish them. We are almost "deaf" to the words of other animals.

Figure source pexels, for example, see how two elephants talk to each other. An elephant began to send out a "contact calls": "here I am, where are you?" The other elephant heard it, and in response, it let out a burst of rumbling, meaning: "I am here."

Then, the posture of the elephant who initially signaled relaxed, as if thinking, "well, there you are." It may respond as if acknowledging that a reply has been received. The next family member may cut in and sing a tune. Such greetings can last for hours when elephants get close to each other.

When the two sides met, the dialogue went to the best part, and their vocabulary turned into a series of strong, overlapping greetings. Then the conversation turns again into a softer rumble, with a very different structure from the former. This part usually lasts for many minutes.

Even if elephants don't have complex grammar, they still have vocabulary. Their communication kits are equipped with dozens of movements, sounds and a combination of the two.

Why don't humans understand them better now? The first time humans tried to study how other animals communicate was only a few decades ago, and the time was so short that pioneers in the study of elephant communication were still working.

The anecdotes of elephant communication elephants can communicate over long distances, and no one knows how they do it.

The low-and middle-frequency parts of an elephant's rumble are much lower than the range of perception of the human ear, but the volume of these calls is very loud (115 decibels, comparable to the scene of a rock concert, which is about 120 decibels). In theory, with such a loud volume, an elephant can hear such a sound from six miles away. Elephants have special receivers on their feet called paciniancorpuscles, which can catch the rumble of elephants that travel through the ground. Are there any other ways in which they can sense calls from farther away? Will they relay, just like humans play drumming and spreading flowers?

About 80 elephants live in a private wildlife shelter in Zimbabwe, often loitering near a tourist shelter. In Wanji National Park (Hwange National Park), about 90 miles from here, workers decided to "deal with" hundreds of elephants and reduce the density of elephants in the park. The way is to use a helicopter to drive the elephant to the ambushed gunman and kill the entire herd.

After the slaughter began in the distance, the wandering elephant suddenly disappeared. They were found gathering in a corner of Wangji Park, away from the shelter. "Elephants can hear painful cries from far away, and they realize that their kind is being killed," the researchers said. " But how do you do that?

Similarly, shortly after the death of "Elephant Whisperer" Lawrence Anthony (Lawrence Anthony), more than 20 elephants he rescued and lived in his large shelter were divided into two groups and gathered at his home within two days and wandered there for two days. They haven't been there for a year before. We know that elephants will mourn, but mourn for humans? How do these elephants 12 hours away know that someone's heart has stopped? No one knows.

Lawrence Anthony Tu Source: orphan elephants rescued by the David Shelderick Wildlife Foundation (David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust) receive artificial breast-feeding in a nursery in Nairobi National Park (Nairobi National Park) and then sent to Tsavo National Park (Tsavo National Park) to live with other previously rescued elephants that are now in the wild. They will start a new life in a more normal and widely distributed elephant community.

Julius Shivegha, a keeper at the nursery, said: "when they first arrived in Tsavo, they would come to us and ask, 'where am I? why did you bring us here?' they don't use our language, but they follow us wherever we go. Later, after communicating with other baby elephants in their own language, they understand everything."

If the older elephants do remember the experience of the orphanage and how they got to Tsavo, they understand what happened to the new baby elephant, which means they remember their own experience and know they can remember it. After seeing orphans meeting in Tsavo, skeptics tend to believe that they have witnessed something inexplicable. The people who work for these orphan elephants have no doubt about it.

Daphne Shelderick, who has decades of experience with elephants, insists that Tsavo elephants can detect when a new herd of orphan elephants is brought here by truck. She said that the adult elephant will welcome the new orphan elephant. She called it "telepathy".

Humans seem to generally believe in the assumption that each species has only one set of calls, unlike human language, which has different dialects and languages. There seems to be another assumption that their phonetic systems are innate and do not need to be mastered through learning. But individuals who are taken away from the wild from an early age, such as apes in zoos, elephants in circuses and orcas, may never be able to learn how to communicate naturally in their way depending on sound, movement, context, and other nuances.

Many birds have regional dialects. Orcas also have some words that are widely used in some groups but are not mastered by others. Distinctions like this are everywhere around us, and humans are still classifying such behaviors and describing the sounds of animals. Still, translating and understanding animal communication may be like trying to tickle an unreachable itch. So far, what animals say and think is more complicated than we understand.

The wordless call: the perception, thinking and expression of Animals, slightly modified by Karl. Carl Safina translator: Qi translator Tsinghua University Press some pictures come from the Internet copyright belongs to the original author brief introduction to ★ author ★

Carl Safina has won the MacArthur, Pew and Guggenheim awards, and his works have won the Orion Book Award, the Lannan Literature Award, and the National College knowledge transfer Award. As well as the John Burroughs Nature Writing Award, the James Beard Foundation Book Award, and the George Rabb Foundation Award. Safina, who holds a doctorate in ecology from Rutgers University, is the first professor of nature and humanities at Stony Brook University, co-chair of the steering committee of the Allen Alda Center for Science Communication, and the founding chairman of the not-for-profit Safina Center. He has hosted the 10-episode PBS television program "protecting the Ocean with Carl Safenner." His works have appeared in newspapers such as the New York Times, National Geographic, Audubon and Orion Magazine, and have been published in online channels such as the Huffington Post and CNN. A brief introduction to ★ translator ★

Qi Yingyin, translator of popular science works, translated the Story of insects and won the annual edition award of the Dapeng Natural good Book Award in 2018. At present, he is the editor of Global Science, engaged in the editing and reporting of cutting-edge science and technology. Introduction to ★ 's works ★

This non-fiction work shows how animals perceive, think and express through the wonderful stories of several typical wild animals-wolves, elephants and whales. The use of tools, the formulation of plans and the transmission of complex messages by these animals show us the extremely intelligent side of animals, and the emotional expressions of joys and sorrows, joys and sorrows among animals are all the reappearance of human emotions. In particular, their perception of human empathy and empathy seems to be a dignified voice call to human beings, which is enough to bring strong emotional impact and enlightening thinking to any reader. This work not only gives us a deeper understanding of the animals that accompany us, but also helps human beings to re-recognize themselves and help us while helping those wild animals. This article comes from the official account of Wechat: Origin Reading (ID:tupydread), author: Carl Safenner, Editor: Zhang Runxin

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