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Hi Wendy,

Latin as a dead language was one of my great childhood myths.  Thanks for
your comments.

Thinking about it, though I like the analogy, the metaphor doesn't quite
work.  True enough, birds are derived from dinosaurs and modern day bird
songs are probably derived from ancient "dinosaur languages."  I suspect no
bird likely speaks dinosaur anymore (though we don't have those dinosaur
recordings), and bird is in use today, variable and changing and a living
collection of songs, dialects and languages.  How they might trace back to
dinosaur is an intriguing question.

In some species of birds, parrots most notably the convergent evolutionary
pressures have results in remarkable similarities to human speech as best we
can tell––as well as corresponding neural and behavioral flexibility, or *vice
versa*.

All the best,
Charlie
-- 
Charles Carlson
Senior Scientist
Exploratorium
3601 Lyon St.
San Francisco, CA 94123

(415) 561-0319

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