the future can't be real

A spotted hyena cub (Crocuta crocuta) is cleaned by its mother in Kruger National Park, South Africa

a professional trainer i love and respect once talked about how when he was new to training he thought he had successfully trained his dogs to sit and down with only a verbal cue, no physical prompt (this is notoriously difficult for a lot of dogs because dogs respond better to hand signals and gestures than verbal commands). on a whim, he filmed himself and realized that his dogs were actually responding to his head movements. without realizing it, he would raise his head slightly when he said "sit" and lower it slightly when he said "down". when he made an effort to keep his head still while giving the verbal cue, his dogs didn't know what he was asking for.

Rhyton in the form of a griffin, Greek Southern Italy, 350-300 BC