Despite being by our side for more than 12,000 years, cats are still a mystery to man, perhaps due to their particular nature.
A human who lives with a cat is no longer an ordinary human, but one bewitched by the animal and its sparse displays of affection, its indolence, its intelligence, its stubbornness and, of course, its beauty.
This spell perhaps has to do with the antagonistic nature of the two coexisting animals: the human and the cat.
“While cats live by their nature, humans live by suppressing theirs,” writes philosopher and theorist John Gray in his essay
Feline Philosophy.
.
Often, those who live with these animals wonder what they would say if they could express themselves in our language.
They may even question whether they could say "I love you" to them.
Interestingly, the 21st century has found some answers to this question: a company that creates boards with buttons that express words, the pandemic and TikTok have given the world an army of talking cats.
To the surprise of no one and the charm of all those humans bewitched by their cats, there is a cat whose favorite phrase is "I'm pissed off".
Steve
is a 13-year-old black and white cat with over 28,000 followers on Instagram.
On TikTok it's quite a sensation: the account in which Kristiina Wilson, its owner and expert in animal behavior, training and psychology, uploads her adventures accumulates more than 238,000 followers and has more than nine million
likes
.
The internet's obsession with cats surprises no one, but what has millions of people peeking into Steve's day-to-day
life
is that
Steve
talks.
Or rather, he communicates through a board with buttons that tell Wilson what her immediate needs are.
Steve
was one of the pioneers in the use of this type of board and continues to generate interest and curiosity around learning from him.
Steve
presses 'exit outside' and Kristiina lets him out.
Steve
presses 'thirst' and Kristiina gives him water.
Steve
presses 'food' and Kristiina feeds him.
But there is more: in one of the videos, Kristiina says that she and her wife have left the city for the weekend, so the cat suddenly runs into the caretaker who stops by to feed him and the rest of the cats. cats of the house (there are a total of 11, some of them own and others foster until they find a home) and check that they are all well.
Steve
hits the button that says 'no'.
He walks around the sitter and claims her attention, soon pressing a button that says 'ma'am'.
"Yeah, that's me," she replies.
'Steve', press
Steve
, 'Ma'am', press
Steve
, 'Cuddles'.
Steve
needs cuddles.
The caregiver takes him in her arms.
“He has always been a very communicative and intelligent cat: for example, if he wanted to go out into the yard, he would go to the patio door and meow.
If we didn't have the key on, he would open the door himself.
If he wanted to play, he would bring you his toys, like a dog.
If he wanted to eat, he meowed in the kitchen, "Wilson, who adopted
Steve
when he was still a baby in an animal shelter, tells EL PAÍS.
Steve
training by association was already working, which are the basis of button boards with sound: kitchen equals food, door equals exit.
“During the pandemic, spending so much time at home, I started seeing all these cats with boards on TikTok and thought I could teach her a few tricks.”
She was a quick learner, she currently has nine buttons that she uses to communicate with Kristiina like food, play, go outside, yes, no, ma'am or cuddles.
She recognizes that she has made her life easier: now, her communication with her cat is much more direct.
Leo Trottier is the founder and CEO of FluentPet, which creates these button boards that have become a trend on social networks like TikTok.
The company was born in 2013, previously it was called CleverPet and the embryonic idea was a game for animals that spent a lot of time at home alone.
Later, it was transformed into something that served at the same time as animal training and allowed humans to learn and better understand their pets.
While the project was in the development phase, Trottier was introduced to the work of Christina Hunger, a specialist in speech and language pathology, who, after adopting a dog named
Stella
, found that it displayed some of the prelinguistic communication skills that babies have before they start talking.
Hunger decided to test
Stella
with an Augmentative and Alternative Communication device, a system used to express thoughts, needs, wants and ideas for people with severe speech or language problems.
It worked.
"The system is very simple," explains Trottier via video call, "you have a button associated with a word and that word results in an action."
A woman teaching her cat to talk with one of FluentPet's tablets.@victoriadimaano (Courtesy of FluentPet)
The only rule for teaching a cat or dog to communicate through an Augmentative and Alternative Communication system is simple: don't start with the food button.
“You have to look for something that is very motivating for them, in
Steve
's case it was going outside, but not related to food...because then he will only be interested in food and he has to learn that each button has a reaction different on our part”, points out Kristiina Wilson.
"People really want to understand their dogs and cats," explains Trottier.
In the spring of 2020, FluentPet began shipping prototypes of their product and by June they had already launched the product.
The pandemic and time at home favored the business.
“Many people tell us: 'Why do I need those buttons, if I already understand my pet?'
We see it as an advance in this communication: the buttons allow you to have an instant recognition of their needs and give you the ability to be very specific with those needs”, details Trottier.
After the
boom
during confinement, social networks did the rest.
The most viral videos were of those animals that seemed to express complex feelings:
Billi
, the cat who pressed 'I'm pissed off' is an internet celebrity, others constantly pressed 'I love you', some even expressed sadness or fear.
Which shows that, deep down, human beings do not simply seek to have an easier communication with animals, but a deeper communication.
View this post on Instagram
A post shared by Billi (@billispeaks)
In that sense, it is possible that this communication system can disappoint more than one.
Beyond the fact that they learn responses by conditioning, at the moment it seems unlikely that they are expressing more complex feelings: "We are still taking baby steps," explains Trottier, "we have found curious cases, dogs, especially, could communicate to warn of a danger outside the house if they see a strange presence or indicate to the owner that they are feeling pain in a paw”.
“I am completely sure that animals have feelings and are capable of recognizing them”, says Kristiina Wilson, “however, from my scientific experience, I would tell you that this is learning by association, an action like the button leads to a reaction like opening them the door.
So all these animals that seem to be expressing their feelings, with words like 'I love you' or 'I'm pissed', what they are really doing is demanding our attention.
With an 'I love you' they receive the attention they seek, which in their case may be that you look at them, pay attention to them, go to where they are or pick them up, but I doubt that they are really saying 'I love you', even if they love you ”.
In the end, feline love is very unconditional: it is loving without expecting an 'I love you' in return.
And perhaps receiving it could break the spell.
