> How do we know they aren't communicating concepts as complicated as "Be careful there is a human approaching and it looks dangerous." with one syllable?
You can look at the number of different calls an animal makes. If each different call stands alone as a meaning (i.e. no multi-syllable words) then that gives an idea of how specific the meaning of a call is.
> I don't know any animal, other than humans, that will kill another animal just for the sheer pleasure of it.
You haven't met my cat. He loves killing mice and birds.
> Even when fighting for mates, the loser of a battle is allowed to escape with its life. Sometimes accidents happen and the animals die of injuries, but death is not the intent.
Nonsense. You have too romantic a conception of the niceness of nature. Nature isn't nice, it's red in tooth and claw. For example, when male lions take over a pride, they routinely kill offspring by other males.
Intraspecific killing is the cause of maybe 4% of human deaths (average over the 20th century), which I imagine is higher than most mammalian species, but I expect there are species where the number is higher.
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> How do we know they aren't communicating concepts as complicated as "Be careful there is a human approaching and it looks dangerous." with one syllable?
You can look at the number of different calls an animal makes. If each different call stands alone as a meaning (i.e. no multi-syllable words) then that gives an idea of how specific the meaning of a call is.
> I don't know any animal, other than humans, that will kill another animal just for the sheer pleasure of it.
You haven't met my cat. He loves killing mice and birds.
> Even when fighting for mates, the loser of a battle is allowed to escape with its life. Sometimes accidents happen and the animals die of injuries, but death is not the intent.
Nonsense. You have too romantic a conception of the niceness of nature. Nature isn't nice, it's red in tooth and claw. For example, when male lions take over a pride, they routinely kill offspring by other males.
Intraspecific killing is the cause of maybe 4% of human deaths (average over the 20th century), which I imagine is higher than most mammalian species, but I expect there are species where the number is higher.