> Anders Sandberg wrote:
>
> > None of these reasons hold water (pun not intended); brain size
> > doesn't correlate well with intelligence (ratio brain size / skin area
> > seems to work better, but it is still crude) and certainly not with
> > speech abilities (elephants vs some birds).
>
> It may not correlate well, but can you possible say it does not correlate at all? Ants
> are less intelligent than rats which are corresponding less intelligence than dogs which
> are less intelligent than gorillas. There is definitely *some* correlation. Speech
> modality is distinct from language. Elephants don't have the laryngeal design to
> variate sound waves, birds do. Besides, dolphins do produce immense variation in
> sound.
And who said speech had to involve only sound?
Watch a cat.
Or ask an Italian to speak while sitting on his hands. :-)
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