Comments on: Animals As Intelligent Beings http://intothevoid.us/2010/01/animals-intelligent/ Back off, man, I'm co-creating my reality. Mon, 15 Aug 2011 02:10:46 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: <img class="identicon" src="http://www.gravatar.com/avatar.php?gravatar_id=e660715d8e7f00a4e1df374b7ab304e8&size=35&default=http://intothevoid.us/wp-content/plugins/wp-identicon/identicon/c771ec048ad3298.png" alt="badger Identicon Icon" height="35" width="35" /> badger http://intothevoid.us/2010/01/animals-intelligent/#comment-184 badger Identicon Icon badger Sat, 22 May 2010 19:31:39 +0000 http://www.bipolarplanet.com/~void/?p=1836#comment-184 I had the fascinating experience of acquiring an entirely un-trained but very teachable dog around the same time a young friend of mine, aged three and a half, began really mastering English. It was absolutely amazing to watch them built vocabulary at the same rate for several months (in a lot of cases, the kid was learning to issue commands as the dog was learning to follow them), and then plateaued together. Of course, the kid's plateau was a mere breather before the next big language spurt. The dog learned 150 or 200 words during that time, and has more or less hit capacity. She's picked up a few new words in the intervening three years, but it seems to be at the expense of ones she hasn't used. I had the fascinating experience of acquiring an entirely un-trained but very teachable dog around the same time a young friend of mine, aged three and a half, began really mastering English. It was absolutely amazing to watch them built vocabulary at the same rate for several months (in a lot of cases, the kid was learning to issue commands as the dog was learning to follow them), and then plateaued together.

Of course, the kid’s plateau was a mere breather before the next big language spurt. The dog learned 150 or 200 words during that time, and has more or less hit capacity. She’s picked up a few new words in the intervening three years, but it seems to be at the expense of ones she hasn’t used.

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