> We trousered apes are so primitive and utterly dim when it comes to interspecies communication

I know this is a common and cute framing. But it's escapist.

We're the planet's apex species using our unrivaled control to make it uninhabitable for other complex life. The Earth may not care about the damage we're doing, but the species that are dying would prefer not to. There isn't a rebellion they can mount against us. Their entire survival depends on our giving a shit.

It's also completely wrong when you consider the number of domesticated animals that need to be communicated with by humans on a daily basis. My wife's a horse trainer: she just finished doing exactly that a few minutes ago.

We think we are the apex species but at some point we'll meet a fungi or bacteria strain that's way more apex than we are.

I don't know about that, it seems like many have tried and humans beat all of them

this is the crux of the matter. as a species we’re so careless that if this is a warning or revenge for something, we don’t know what because there are too many options to choose from. this whole thread is an illustration of that. "could it be noise pollution?". "has an influential orca been hit by a rudder?”. "perhaps it's overfishing?", etc. even if it’s none of those things, and this is just a fad, it’s a sorry state of affairs

What other animals excel at interspecies communication?

Birds I bet. Parrots can kind of, sort of, talk to humans. And besides that, I bet many species of birds can effectively communicate with others. There are dozens of species of crow, I bet many if not all of them can understand at least some of what the others are saying.