Pets

decode people language a little, at least for some nouns and verbs. Some smart cats can understand a couple words put together and distinguish when one word changes. I did not know that cats were capable of that until my current one.

Example: Ember understands that when I say, "Ember play?" it means some interactive time with me and a toy. She perks up and looks at me, waiting to see what the game will be. Her two favorite toys are the laser light, which she knows as "red light," and a wand toy with a feather on the end. If I say, "Ember play red light?" she starts looking around the floor to see where it will light up. She does that before I even touch the laser light, so she is responding to the word.

If I say, "Ember play feather?" she looks at the feather wand toy.

But spoken language is so limited that it's easier to communicate with body language, like eye blinks or finger pointing.

And any pet that learns its name seems to be pre wired for recognizing a sound that specifically means them. My guess is that the animal's mother might use a sound that gets its baby's attention, and the baby animal transfers being addressed by a sound from its mother to being addressed by a sound from people. It makes sense to me that responding to a sound from the mother would have an evolutionary advantage. The mother can call the baby away from danger, or toward herself to give it food, or to check on where it is if it wanders.