• iqwertyasdf@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    Cats just meow to get our attention. Fun fact do you know that meowing is them mimicking the sounds of a baby?

    • MuchPineapples@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      Not a human baby (how could they, most cats have never seen a human baby), but as a kitten they meow to their parents to get food etc. So we’re their parents now and I guess they never really grew up and became independent.

      • joel_feila@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        Well adult cats raised around humans figure out what meows work the best and that is one that sounds like baby

      • dragonflyteaparty@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        Cats meow in the same register that human babies cry. They aren’t saying that cats are specifically trying to cry like a human baby, but that cats as a species have grown over thousands of years to meow in the same pitches as human babies.

    • Chaotic Entropy@feddit.uk
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      10 months ago

      Human: “Hello mister mittens! Kiss kiss kiss!”

      Cat: “Coochie coo, idiot human, don’t forget to feed me.”

      They’re baby talking right back at us.

    • Katana314@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      While I’m still not sure if this is true, there was a very interesting clip I saw to support the evidence, where a tiger enclosure was somehow across the street from a farm’s cow enclosure. The tigers had started “mooing” along their edge of the fence in an effort to make the juicy, meat-filled cows feel safe around them.

      • ArtieShaw@kbin.social
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        10 months ago

        I’ve also heard that cats try to mimic birds. It’s one of the theories behind that weird clacking noise they make when they see prey that’s out of reach.

  • dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    10 months ago

    Well, if you were speaking actual jargon to your cat, if your cat was knowledgeable about the niche topic of discussion, surely they would respond.

    • Captain Aggravated@sh.itjust.works
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      10 months ago

      I read a headline on the internet once (in other words: What I’m about to say is almost certainly bullshit) that cat owners can understand THEIR OWN cats.

      Anecdotally as a cat owner, it seems we train each other, cat makes a noise to get attention, human gives a kind of attention when hearing that noise, cat starts making that noise to get that specific attention. My cat has a food meow, an attention meow, a bath water meow (my cat likes to drink from the tub faucet) and a “it’s 3 AM and my brain can’t handle it” meow, and I can definitely tell them apart. There’s also a difference between the “enjoying a shoulder rub” purr and the “make me breakfast make me breakfast make me breakfast make me breakfast” purr. Hand me a different cat and that cat speaks mandarin Swahili.