Baby chicks pass the bouba-kiki test, challenging a theory of language evolution

Front page two days ago, 62 comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47105198

https://archive.ph/QX0Oo

Maybe it goes to show that animals just have some of the same brain structures associated with language that we do. Parrots are capable of rather sophisticated language use, and the informal word-button experiments suggest that non-avian animals like cats and dogs display some linguistic ability. So the bouba-kiki effect in animals shouldn't be terribly surprising. Certain mammals and birds perhaps may best be thought of as prelinguistic.

I don't really see how it challenges any theory of language evolution. The bouba kiki effect is hardly necessary nor important for having language.

which came first: the chicken or the egg? language.

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