Disclaimer: this material contains only the author's subjective opinion, filled with stereotypes and fabrications. The facts in the material are presented in the form of metaphors, which may be distorted, exaggerated, embellished, or entirely fabricated.
ASM
There are still debates about who started all this. Yes, I'm talking about how people transitioned from regular communication with each other in human languages to communicating⊠with animals đ
Some will say it started back in the 19th century when one scientist described the basic principles of such potential communication. Others will argue it began during World War II when researchers explored methods of communication and began using animals to intercept enemy messages or simply to play chess with their pets (even though Bobik always lost to his owner, the process was still exciting for both). It's not so important how it all began; what's more important is how far we've come, but more on that in due time.
Initially, there weren't many people who could communicate with animals, and it wasn't a very popular endeavor. It's clear â it's not like learning a human language. The approach to speech is entirely different, our intelligence levels vary, and our perception of the world is not the same. Many things simply can't be conveyed: how do you explain to a cow what red is, if it can't differentiate colors? And many animal sounds are not only hard for us to produce but even difficult to hear. Nonetheless, for the sake of science and progress, many brave souls took up the study and, over many years, mastered this skill. Truly: nothing is impossible for mankind!
However, progress did not stop there. As always, people tend to simplify their tasks. And there were plenty of challenges to overcome, especially considering that mastering the language of one animal didn't make it much easier to learn the next. Some principles could be applied, of course, but far from all (new sounds, new ways of thinking in different animals, etc.).
Thus was born the Automatic Morpheme Synthesizer, or for simplicity, AMS. It's a small device that can fit in your pocket. And how useful it is! You set it up to work with a specific type of animal, press the buttons for the right morphemes... and it synthesizes the necessary sounds by itself! No more need to learn pronunciation and strain your tongue. Of course, understanding the differences in mentality among various animals is still essential. For instance, itâs advisable not to mention mice in front of an elephant, as it may frighten them. But in terms of pronunciation, everything has become much simpler. And the best part is that experts from all over the world can connect and contribute knowledge about the languages of other animals to this device, allowing everyone to use it for communication with new animals. The learning process has become significantly easier and faster, with the number of people eager to master this science increasing.
AMS
Some time later, everyone was solely using the new invention, and almost forgot about direct sound pronunciation. The new generation began to learn how to communicate through AMS right from the start. Yes, they sometimes made frustrating mistakes, and by pressing the wrong button on the synthesizer, they would embarrass an animal or even make it angry. Sometimes, they were bitten or head-butted in response. But what can you do? It happens.
Overall, things were going quite well; this breakthrough expanded the possibilities of interspecies communication. However, calling this communication convenient was still a challenge. Just think about it: first, you have to learn how to work with AMS, then understand the thought processes of different animals, during which you will make plenty of mistakes and, perhaps, unintentionally cause a couple of animals to suffer a heart attack by pressing the wrong button.
People understood this problem and came up with a smarter synthesizer, or as they called it, the Intelligent Synthesizer. The device was a bit larger, but still fit easily in a backpack. Just look at how many new possibilities it opened up! You could already type text in human language. Well... almost. The language was still somewhat awkward, and you had to give commands. For instance, instead of simply saying, "go fetch the slippers," you had to write, "turn around, take 3 steps forward, if you see the slippers â grab them, if not â continue..." and so on. However, after describing it once, you could call it simply "fetch the slippers," and next time just write it clearly and concisely. In short, you could name terms however you liked, describe processes... it was just a sea of opportunities! And there were also many protections: carelessly leading an animal to death or mere aggression became much harder. But most importantly â the language was already understandable to almost any person. That is, you not only didn't need to study pronunciation but could also not know how it all translated into animal language. Often, you didn't even need to know the details of how a specific animal thinks, as the device would handle many of these things for you.
It seemed that soon all children would learn how to use the IS right from school, and it would become a universal tool for everyone!
A new phase
In the following years, many different new devices emerged, each with its own additional features. Just look at Synthesizer ++, which allowed you to do many things in different, more convenient ways for you. For example, you could type to a raccoon, "fetch the beer," or you could say, "bring the beer," and all of this would translate into the same speech understandable to the raccoon or lemur. You could clarify the relationship between objects. For example, "the beer in the fridge," or describe "cider" as "beer, but made from apples." Even context-dependent meanings of words could change: you could tell a cat, "clean up the room," or you could say, "get out of here." The words were the same, but the meaning was different.
There are more possibilities, it takes a bit longer to learn, but once you do, communicating becomes quick and convenient. One issue is that the new generation rarely learns how everything works and how communication with animals actually happens. It's clear that they have other priorities; the benefit from this is not as significant as learning new devices for communication. Why teach the old when something new comes every day?
All these new devices have greatly expanded the circle of people communicating with animals. Moreover, this has long gone beyond the scientific realm. Now, communication with animals is used in production (itâs quite handy to use foxes to protect crops from harmful moles), and in livestock farming (cows can now graze by themselves), and even just for entertainment (who said you canât play soccer with horses?).
And then someone thought, "Why are we only writing⊠let's talk!" The existing devices worked well enough, so they were used to create new ones. Essentially, a microphone and a speech analyzer were placed in front of the old text synthesizer. It stays on all the time, listening and⊠typing the necessary text on the synthesizer for you. Yes, it works much slower since it always needs to recognize speech in real-time, even when working with a recording⊠but it's so much easier! You sit back, put your hands behind your head, and just communicate.
One such device was called Python. It's unclear whether the creator loved these snakes, tested the tool on them for the first time, or had recently watched a movie about them⊠But thatâs not important. The main thing is â Progress!!! The younger generation is actively learning how to use the new tools, completely rejecting the "old-school methods." Except where speed is essential, where they have to work with printed texts. Can you imagine a soccer game where the opponent kicks the ball a minute after it hits their head?
JS
However, progress did not stand still, and over time someone decided that communication should be made so simple to learn that anyone could just pick it up and speak. Why stress your brain pondering simple things like 'how to break this down into simple and understandable steps for an animal,' when that time could be dedicated to solving more important pressing issues!
So he came up with a device called Just Speak! (in English, 'Just Speak!'). He thought of it and even created a prototype in 10 days. But for his idea to work as he wanted â it took years. Many companies saw economic potential in this device: staff working with animals could be trained faster and cheaper! They helped by developing many different devices based on the Just Speak principle.
The devices are large, about the size of a car. But they have wheels! And the dream came true â anyone could communicate with any animals in a language that felt familiar to them. You speak into the device, it analyzes and translates this into a set of text commands, then into a long set of sounds, morphemes, etc., understandable for the animal. At first, it was a bit slow, so the device was improved, and many versions were released to enhance its performance. By the 8th version, a device was capable enough for most tasks. People were overjoyed: everyone started communicating with animals, asking them to do something, teaching them new and new things. Often without a specific goal, just to try and play around.
Companies embraced this technology, and in most cases, they increasingly relied on this device for all their tasks. By this time, many simply couldn't find or train enough required staff. And the most remarkable thing â it was now impossible to harm an animal! Humane and economical! Even if you mentioned something incorrectly â the device would ignore it and not say anything dangerous to the animal. Yes, sometimes this leads to the dog first tearing up the slippers and then bringing them back instead of just fetching them. And sometimes it simply takes half a day to ponder what was said. But so what? At least the dog didnât refuse to follow the command, wasnât scared, and didnât bite anyone!
A turn not taken
Communicating in such a language has become easier and more enjoyable, especially in the early stages of learning. Almost immediately, you could see how the animal understands you and does something in response. It's like magic!
However, the ambiguities in behavior caused many problems for both businesses and employees. It wasn't possible to significantly redesign the device because the whole world works with it; everyone knows how to communicate with it... and why create complexities? So, the decision was made to simply add convenient auxiliary devices on top of it. There are devices that cleanse your speech of curses, devices that signal when your speech may be interpreted ambiguously, and devices that test your aggressiveness towards the animal. Yes, they are massive, the size of a house or a multi-story building. But, Just Speak itself isn't small either.
The most significant push for progress was that almost all of these devices were built on the basis of Just Speak. That is, a device would analyze speech on the go, pass it to another device via speech synthesis, which in turn would relay it to a third device... and so everything could work. Yes, slowly. Yes, it didn't always work flawlessly in conjunction with other devices. But for this, craftsmen produced their own versions to fix the errors of previous devices. You can find and match the right device for your specific case. The main thing is that everything works and saves money for corporations.
And progress doesn't stand still: now you can even add an additional device on top of JS, and this device allows you to communicate in a more structured language, essentially using convenient commands. This means the likelihood of ambiguous statements has drastically decreased. And if you say something wrongâthe device gets startled and halts the process, issuing a corresponding warning.
In a wordâProgress!!!
Source: habr.com
