We’re close to translating animal languages – what happens then?

AI may soon be able to decode whalespeak, among other forms of communication - but what nature has to say may not be a surprise

Charles Darwin suggested that humans learned to speak by mimicking birdsong: our ancestors' first words may have been a kind of interspecies exchange. Perhaps it won't be long before we join the conversation once again.

The race to translate what animals are saying is heating up, with riches as well as a place in history at stake. The Jeremy Coller Foundation has promised $10mto whichever researchers can crack the code. This is a race fuelled by generative AI; large language models can sort through millions of recorded animal vocalisations to find their hidden grammars. Most projects focus on cetaceans because, like us, they learn through vocal imitation and, also like us, they communicate via complex arrangements of sound that appear to have structure and hierarchy.