Hey I know plenty of folk with the ability to talk, but I wouldn't class them as intelligent! :-)

Joking aside, I think you are basing that logical reasoning on an invalid assumption of what intelligence is strictly defined as. It is also misleading to suggest that the only possible intelligent lingual construct is the one we humans use based collectively on our fragmented and objective perception of reality.

In spite of that, I think the odds are birds aren't having conversations on some dimension outwith our own comprehension. I'm more with your theory that many species have the potential to develop communicative skills in the form of an exhange of objective information, and that in the early days when humans started to talk they were probably high on mushrooms and rolling around on the grass making strange noises and laughing at themselves, but not quite realising why yet.
Staurm Reviewed by Staurm on . humankind's search for origin i am curious as to some people's opinions on this question. why are humanbeings so curious to find their origins? Rating: 5