animals and human language ANIMALS AND HUMAN LANGUAGE | Page 11

Displacement
When your pet cat comes home and stands at your feet calling meow, you are likely
to
understand this message as relating to that immediate time and place. If you ask
your
Animals and human language 11cat where it has been and what it was up to, you’ll
probably get the same meow
response. Animal communication seems to be designed exclusively for this moment,
here and now. It cannot effectively be used to relate events that are far removed in
time
and place.