You are walking through the woods in Spring. Bluebells on the ground, new leaves on the trees, and the branches loud with birdsong. Then you open a translation app on your phone and you can hear every word the birds are saying.

Perhaps this sounds unlikely. But scientists are now using computer technology to understand how animals communicate.

For example, greylag geese have at least 10 different calls. Moustached warbler chicks will jump or duck depending on different kinds of warning cry. Superb fairywren mothers sing to their eggs, producing a distinctive sound for hatching chicks.¹

Birds' calls enable them to distinguish family members, friends and enemies. They even allow them to communicate what kind of predators are around and how best to respond.

Scientists have started using machine learningA field of artificial intelligence that aims to use data to teach machines to "learn" for themselves without the need for specific programming. to recognise different types of birdsong. The result is the Merlin app, which can identify 1,400 different species of bird. Animal-communication expert Mike Webster, who helped develop the app, claims "a lot of people have dreams of using AI to allow us to decipher what animals are saying."²

But most scientists draw a line between language and communication. Birds, dogs, cows - they make sounds to communicate. Language is related to thought, self-expression, even self-consciousness.

According to the language researcher Robert Berwick, it is best to think of language "not as speech but as a cognitive ability in the mind that sometimes leads to speech".³ And public intellectual Noam Chomsky argues that the idea animals - even close relatives like chimps - could learn language is "totally meaningless".⁴

Even if we could translate all the sounds animals make, that does not mean we could speak with them. The 20th-century Austrian philosopherA thinker who comes up with ideas about big questions in life. Ludwig Wittgenstein said, "If a lion could talk, we could not understand him."⁵

To understand a language, we also need to understand the context behind it. The problem is not the different sounds humans and animals make, but the different worlds we live in.

Thanks to apps such as Merlin, more and more people are learning to identify birds. Even if we never learn to speak with the animals, it is still worth listening to what they say.

Do animals have language?

Yes: Computer analysis is starting to show the complex ways that animals communicate. People only refuse to call this language because they want to make humans seem special.

No: Language does not simply require communication, but also complex thought and self-expression. The instinctive calls made by birds cannot be compared to human speech.

Or... Even if we could translate animal speech, we will never share the worldview that it expresses. But animal communication is worth studying for its own sake.

Machine learning - A field of artificial intelligence that aims to use data to teach machines to "learn" for themselves without the need for specific programming.

Philosopher - A thinker who comes up with ideas about big questions in life.