{"id":254,"date":"2025-09-08T18:30:00","date_gmt":"2025-09-08T18:30:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/good-worldwide.go-vip.net\/upworthy\/2025\/09\/08\/dog-uses-talk-buttons-to-warn-family-ex1\/"},"modified":"2025-09-08T18:30:00","modified_gmt":"2025-09-08T18:30:00","slug":"dog-uses-talk-buttons-to-warn-family-ex1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/goodinc.com\/qa-upworthy\/2025\/09\/08\/dog-uses-talk-buttons-to-warn-family-ex1\/","title":{"rendered":"Australian Shepherd gets creative with ‘talk buttons’ to warn family of impending disaster"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dogs seem to intuitively understand human emotions<\/a>, and they can be trained to understand and respond to a nearly unlimited number of words, phrases, or commands. Some experts say smarter breeds can learn hundreds of different prompts! It makes you wonder how far off they really are from being able to truly communicate with us using something resembling language.<\/p>

People have been wondering and experimenting with the idea for a long time. Speech-language pathologist Christina Hunger <\/u><\/a>and her dog<\/a> Stella were the first to experiment with talking buttons<\/u><\/a> in 2019, where Stella could press a button with her nose to activate a word sound, thereby speaking, in a sense. Since then there has been a surge of online content showing other pet parents<\/u><\/a> using similar kits to communicate with their own pups.<\/p>

The most fascinating aspect of this phenomenon is the question of whether or not canines<\/a> are able to understand full-blown complicated sentences beyond \u201ctreat\u201d and \u201coutside.\u201d<\/p>

While the overall jury is still out on that, scientifically speaking, dogs like Ripley \u2014 a 2-year-old Australian Shepherd \u2014 seem to make an incredibly compelling case for believing the hype.<\/strong><\/p>


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An Australian Shepherd like Ripley. Photo by Ilona Frey on Unsplash<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure> <\/p>

Ripley has an entire TikTok account<\/a> documenting his impressive talk button journey, along with 85,000 followers. But a video posted on March 28, 2024, feels next-level.<\/p>

In the clip, Ripley presses the \u201csmell\u201d button as his parents eat lunch. When that doesn\u2019t get their attention, he begins to bark.<\/p>

\u201cWhat do you smell?\u201d a voice finally asks. To which Ripley replies \u201coutside,\u201d followed by \u201cgardens.\u201d<\/p>

Confused, someone asks, \u201cIt smells like the gardens outside?\u201d<\/p>

Ripley\u2019s parents had apparently just started a load of laundry before making lunch, and the detergent had been spilling all over the floor from the washing machine. Ripley had been smelling the detergent, which was reminiscent of the gardens outside.<\/p>

Unfortunately, they didn\u2019t put two and two together until after they went back to the laundry room and saw the rapidly worsening mess. <\/p>

Hence the moral of the story: \u201cYou should always listen to your dog.\u201d<\/p>


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@letsgoripley<\/a>

He\u2019s so freakin\u2019 smart! #Talkingdog<\/a> #letsgoripley<\/a> #ripleytalks<\/a> #fluentpet<\/a> #australianshepherd<\/a> #dogs<\/a> <\/p> \u266c original sound – Ripley the Australian Shepherd<\/a> <\/section> <\/blockquote>