sonneillonv:

theplushfrog:

commanderflowers:

kinkshamer69:

i wonder if my pets have like a proper language and when i try to speak back to them im just speaking jargon

like for example my cat always speaks to me when I come home and i meow back to her and she’ll meow again & even though i don’t think twice about it to her it’s probably a situation where it’s like

her, meowing: “im glad you’re home”

me, meowing back: “tax benefits”

her, meowing: “why do u always do this”

me

cats actually have a human-specific language. cats don’t often meow at each other and seem to use subvocal communications that humans can’t hear to chat cat-to-cat. however, cats seem to use what humans would call “shout-until-you’re-understood” to speak to humans. so basically, it’s more like:

“I’M GLAD YOU’RE HOME!”

“tax benefits”

“NO, I’M GLAD YOU ARE HOME”

“waffle iron”

“IT’S OKAY. I LOVE YOU TOO, MY DUMB HUMAN”

It’s fucking amazing the way cats have adapted to life with humans okay

like they domesticated THEMSELVES because us storing grain created a habitat for rats and they were like ‘why hunt in the wild when I can hunt in one place?” and then it turned out we had these fireplaces with nice warm hearths AND that we were willing to put rugs on floors and cushions on chairs and surrender our body heat if we were properly mollified and cats were like ‘hell fucking yeah’ and just moved the fuck in.

But the above poster is right, cats don’t meow at each other very much.  Feral cats rarely vocalize in our hearing range at all, and when they do it’s because they’re about to do violence.  Not only did cats adopt us, and not the other way around, they developed a method of communicating especially FOR living with us.  They observed that humans make mouth sounds in a specific range and started making their own mouth sounds in that same range in the hopes of communicating their needs to us and if you don’t think that’s the most awesome shit get out.

But it gets cooler.  Obviously cats have variable intelligence - I have met very bright cats and I have met truly stupid ones.  But the species as a whole has the ability to make somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 distinct vocalizations that humans can perceive.  Which means cats can CHOOSE A MOUTH SOUND that means ONE THING and have it consistently mean that one thing.  And humans who bother to pay attention can actually learn what the cat is saying and respond to it properly.

Mine is one of the bright cats who does that.  So far, her vocabulary of distinct and identifiable sounds include: 

• I want food
  
• I want WET food
  
• I want water
  
• clean my litter box
  
• there’s something outside and you should look at it immediately
  
• there is an insect somewhere and I intend to murder it
  
• Play with me
  
• Can I come sit with you/are you willing to pet me
  
• Hello Mama (she has a special sound for me)
  
• Hello other human
  
• Stop making that noise or I will literally bite your face (she hates people whistling)
  
• Who are you/What are you doing? (this one can be used with varying levels of suspicion and/or hostility, I’ve noticed)
  
• Bird! (or other out-of-reach prey object… this is paired with that teeth-chattering thing they do)
  
• And the most amusing one: Mama, it’s time for bed.  She developed this one within the last few years when she started sleeping on my pillow.  Obviously that’s no fun unless my head is also on the pillow, so when she wants to go to bed, she comes and tells me it’s time for ME to go to bed so she can sleep on my face.

And the thing is, I don’t actually think I listed all of them.  We joke constantly about how Sephie bosses my husband around because she can make herself understood very well but the truth is, her vocabulary makes her about as easy to understand as your average toddler who can say ‘milk’ when she wants milk.  Cats are cool as shit and brilliant when they want to be and I will never get over it.

pretty space words

hyungwonns-deactivated20160817:

aphelion - the point in the orbit of a planet, asteroid, or comet at which it is farthest from the Sun.
astral - relating to or resembling the stars.
caldera - a large volcanic crater, especially one formed by a major eruption leading to the collapse of the mouth of the volcano.
celestial - positioned in or relating to the sky, or outer space as observed in astronomy.
constellation - a group of stars forming a recognizable pattern.
cosmos - the universe seen as a well-ordered whole.
equinox - the time or date at which the sun crosses the celestial equator, when day and night are of equal length.
faculae - bright patches that are visible on the Sun’s surface.
lunation - the interval of a complete lunar cycle, between one new Moon and the next.
interstellar - occurring or situated between stars.
nebula - a cloud of gas and dust in outer space, visible in the night sky either as an indistinct bright patch or as a dark silhouette against other luminous matter.
perihelion - the point in the orbit of a planet, asteroid, or comet at which it is closest to the Sun.
synodic - relating to or involving the conjunction of stars, planets, or other celestial objects.

andimprouvaire:

do you ever share a tumblr joke with your mom only you need to like, cut the curse words and complete the sentences and by the time you do that it’s a completely different syntactical structure and possibly a separate language 

I’ve noticed that my mom is completely flummoxed by jokes that exist only in predicate—eg., “when you put a spoon under the tap and it does the thing”

like she’ll just sit there waiting for the rest of the sentence

and it’s interesting because jokes like that are generally paired with reaction pics or gifs, but now it’s not always necessary because just the structure of the sentence—like a stand-up snapshot—triggers the association, and the ambiance of universal camaraderie cultivated therein.  

but like my mom doesn’t even understand reaction images and having to explain the whole concept actually forced me to think about how memes function linguistically and culturally in the first place—“the image represents you, and your reaction.” “to the post?” “no, to the situation described by the post.”—and I think it’s actually a complex system of representation that is only able to function in the networked culture of instant symbolic formation and self-reflexivity 

idk that’s fuckin cool shit 

quazza:

i am reminded that english is a flawed language every time I am forced to use “that that” in a sentence

aconfusedbird:

let’s bring back the term “cats” when referring to a group of people (i.e. “see you cats later”)

pros:

1. it’s gender neutral
2. you get the chance to look like a cool jazz musician
3. you can compare all your friends to cats (always good)

cons:

1. ????

seananmcguire:

lizawithazed:

roachpatrol:

kiddthemaniac:

when-the-reindeer-comes-home:

bolto:

white dude in this horror movie : *translates old arabic text* *somehow it rhymes perfectly in english* 

Now I really wanna see a horrible faltering translation from one of these movies, like “Whomsoever enters this room, they shall… well, this word is like… literally it means ‘unbecome,’ but it was used as a euphemism for death, pooping, and—wait, when was this carved?  was it 15th century? Cuz it was a euphemism for sex too in the 15th century.  This is either a cursed crypt, a bathroom, or a royal bedroom. Who wants to roll the dice?”

“You guys, I’ve gotta be honest, okay? This thing’s written in some kind of weird localized dialect, and I’ve only ever studied the standard form of the language. I mean, this part right here…I can’t even tell if it’s some kind of error, or an obscure slang phrase…whatever it is, I have no idea what the fuck it means.”

‘this is written in ancient sumerian. it’s about… uh… well that word is… uh. okay this is either a poem about farming, or straight-up a nasty sex guide. it might be both. i want a shower.’

"okay see the thing is in one dialect this word is the name of a terrifying Demon but in a completely different language from the same area that has the same writing system and gave a lot of loan words to the first, it means ‘horse’ - and the context is really not helping”

“You know what?  This thing is bound in human skin and the walls are bleeding let’s just leave.”