Oddbean new post about login | logout @Christmassy Merry Dude @b8ed4588 @Electric Pants :prince_dance: But they don't have the communication genes. Any society with bears would ultimately boil down to them being trained, domestic animals in the best case scenario. They are fundamentally different than humans, and so direct comparisons must maintain an extremely specific scope. Too broad or too much extrapolation and you run into the issue of comparing apples to freight trains.
@Pensive Weeb @b8ed4588 @Electric Pants :prince_dance: >But they don't have the communication genes. But bears *do* communicate with each other! I don't see why they couldn't be trained to communicate with humans. >Any society with bears would ultimately boil down to them being trained, domestic animals in the best case scenario. In the 1800s we trained niggers to do farmwork. I don't see why we couldn't do something similar with bears, which are far more intelligent and sociable.
@Christmassy Merry Dude @b8ed4588 @Electric Pants :prince_dance: Language would probably have been a better word than communication. Do bears 'talk' or do they 'communicate'? Dogs communicate, crows communicate, dolphins communicate, and yet none of them talk. Without language there can be no integration into human society.
@Pensive Weeb @b8ed4588 @Electric Pants :prince_dance: This is a little deeper. Black bears have near-universal body language, but their tongues didn't evolve for spoken language like humans. Some sort of sign language may be possible. I don't think anyone's tried to do it with bears yet, but I don't see any reason why we couldn't.