The way animal communication has been presented by academics had started to feel very fishy for me. Initially I was excited about gorillas talking to humans with sign language. As I grew up, I started thinking there was something problematic about the subtitles. It was prepositions that started giving me red flags. I realized that the subtitles were not direct translations. Over time I learned about more research and things that have been put under the rugs.

Teaching a Monkey to Play Minecraft

Scientists are not researching communication in animals IMHO. They are researching human communication in animals. Various animals have different organs and bodies. Simply playing with them alone could go a long way in measuring what they can achieve.

Hans Was Indeed Very Clever

If I may spoil the story, Hans was a horse that was very clever at reading people. He was clever to a point where he could fake his way into solving math problems. He managed to fool humans into thinking he had high IQ (similar to a human child) by having a high EQ.

Neurotypical Human Communication is Not The Only Form of Communication

This is the most important lesson academics overlook. They are forcing their worldviews as the only correct one and things they value as the only valuable things and miss out on many things that are on plain sight. I will end with a video to keep you thinking. Games could be a very good way to establish better communications with animals that forcing them to use human speech.