Why monkeys do not speak

From the point of view of the anatomy of the throat and mouth of the monkey could speak like human beings, but to master at least the rudiments of speech, it is likely hampered by the imperfection of the brain.

Recently, more and more studies have appeared, according to which the bird's brain is much more complicated than previously thought, so do not be too surprised that some birds - the same parrots - may well master "speech tricks". However, we have a similar example of very highly developed animals, which are also our closest relatives, but who can not utter a single word.

Speech, of course, is about primates. Why the monkeys can not speak, the great Darwin was still thinking, and according to his hypothesis the whole thing is in the brain: he is still different from the human primates, and one of the differences is his inability to speak. But then another explanation came to the fore: that the voice apparatus of primates is unfit for human sounds (primarily for vowels), that's why they do not speak.

That is, the body's structure allows the macaques to learn the sounds of speech. We emphasize that the 99 states of the throat, the tongue of the lips, etc. manipulated by the researchers are not some artificial freaks, they are quite real, compatible with the anatomy of the configuration of the vocal apparatus, which is similarly arranged in other monkeys, including anthropic apes . Why do they then do not work? Probably because primates, with the exception of humans, can not control their own voice - their brains are simply not tuned for that.