• hansolo@lemmy.today
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    2 days ago

    Cats can understand about 50-100 words in the primary language of the house.

    Your cat knows when you bullshit them.

      • naeap@sopuli.xyz
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        1 day ago

        My now sadly deceased cat was a fucking genius
        But I’m not…he tried to tell me stories, but I never really understood what he meant

        Single moews were easier to interpret, as he had a range of “hell yes” to “fuck off”

        From young age I always tried to use the same words for things, and when this was established, I started combining them.

        He was very much aware of what I was saying, when I sticked to our vocabulary and would act accordingly - sometimes by complaining, that he didn’t do anything and I’m in the wrong.

        Was (and still is) a fucking hard time losing him …

      • hansolo@lemmy.today
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        24 hours ago

        There’s research. Theres a link to a 2022 paper in this article.

        https://www.petmd.com/dog/general-health/how-many-words-does-a-dog-know

        One more

        https://www.forbes.com/sites/scotttravers/2024/03/29/dogs-understand-our-words-more-than-they-let-on-science-reveals/

        There’s also a whole mess of people who have taught dogs and cats to use buttons that say a word to have 2-way communication. So the dog will go press the button that says “outside” when they want to go out. Some get an active vocabulary of dozens of words.

        What I love from these people is that dogs say exactly like what you think dogs would say. Outside, food, hi!, love, play and the like. Cats get bitchy. There’s a few instances where multiple cats will have a button for “litter box” or similar. When you tell the cat something it didn’t like, it goes over and presses “litterbox” as a kind of F you.

      • filcuk@lemmy.zip
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        1 day ago

        I know my cat ‘understands’ 5-10 words based on his reactions, by which I mean he knows what hearing the word leads to.
        A hundred words? I’d also like to see what methodology was used to determine that.