I've come across these videos on TikTok many times - Stella has a much larger apparent vocabulary than "I need attention" and "food". From memory, there's another video out there somewhere of her pressing "Stella" "want" "walk". Her owner says "But Stella, we just went for a walk." The dog's response is "Stella" "want" "walk" "again" <delay, looks at owner> "now".
Well it is communication (would be really bad if animals could not communicate, especially animals that hunt in a pack). But yeah that button pushing is the opposite of extending communication.
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So she gets attention when she touches the buttons and gets food when she pushes "eat".
I like the idea but I don't think you can conclude it's communication any more than a rat pressing a lever to get his brain stimulated was.
I've come across these videos on TikTok many times - Stella has a much larger apparent vocabulary than "I need attention" and "food". From memory, there's another video out there somewhere of her pressing "Stella" "want" "walk". Her owner says "But Stella, we just went for a walk." The dog's response is "Stella" "want" "walk" "again" <delay, looks at owner> "now".
Well it is communication (would be really bad if animals could not communicate, especially animals that hunt in a pack). But yeah that button pushing is the opposite of extending communication.