<p>From what I remember from the cartoon, Pikachu could only say certain permutations of its name, with any combination of vowels elongated.</p>

<pre><code>3 syllables   pikat͡ʃu   8 words
2 syllables   pika      4 words
1 syllables   pi        2 words 
</code></pre>

<p>Pikachu is also capable of producing at least 4 different tones:   </p>

<pre><code>Tone     IPA   Made when 
High     ˥     Excited
Mid      ˧     
Rising   ˧˥    Curious
Falling  ˧˩    Disappointed
</code></pre>

<p>So, knowing this, Ash's pikachu should be able to say at least 584 distinct "words", which is well above the toki pona threshold.</p>

<p>Sadly it's pretty much impossible for this system to match the lexicon size of a natural language. Using an 8 tone system and adding primary and secondary stress brings the number of distinct words up to 25104, which is significantly larger than the Esperanto lexicon but still far away from that of a natural language, which is around 200K words. </p>

<p>From here on you could introduce some questionable features like 8 more tones, 7 different vocal registers, or the ability to say different permutations of its name (which is probably not as dodgy but also imagining pikachu say /ka.chu.pi/ makes me extremely uncomfortable).
The best way in my opinion would be to introduce the <em>syllabic thunder shock</em> ⚡, which would require pikachu to release up to three thunder shocks whilst saying a word, all for the good cause of bringing the lexicon size of Pika-ese to a final 198688 words.</p>

<p>(No wonder Meowth learnt how to speak a human language, imagine being stuck with a one-syllable name.)</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-03-26T15:00:39.233Z
I would put forward that Meowth is a two syllable word as English doesn't realize "eow" as the triphthong /iaʊ/ but rather with a syllabic break /i.aʊ/.  That way, a standard Meowth could at least get away with 72 words (going with the simpler 4 tone and length model).
Pokemon like Jinx would still be stuck with 8 words.
... Why is this such a fascinating topic to try to puzzle out?
Tory
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-04-06T18:43:37.727Z
Pi-ka-CHUUUU!!!
Robert Columbia
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-05-02T17:47:54.297Z
Couldn't Pikachu designate one sound as a word-ender, one sound as a sentence-ender, and then use combinations of the rest of the sounds to form syllables which form words?
BallpointBen
CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-03-24T10:22:34.067Z
2018-03-24T10:22:34.067Z
as4s4hetic
<p>I know that like Star Wars' droid, Pikachu's language is just nonsense with emotionally appropriate intonation, that said...</p>

<p>Can suprasegmental features (accent, tone, etc) encode a single three syllable word in enough different ways to get the vocabulary up to toki pona size? (about 100-125) Or up to a natural language size lexicion (say 7000-15000)</p>

<p>The question occurred to me because Alexa has a "speak to pikachu" feature where it then pretends to let you converse with Pikachu in Pikachu-ese. </p>

<classification><phonetics>
Can Pokemon language encode enough information to be a language?
# Can Pokemon language encode enough information to be a language?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2018-03-23)

I know that like Star Wars' droid, Pikachu's language is just nonsense with emotionally appropriate intonation, that said...

Can suprasegmental features (accent, tone, etc) encode a single three syllable word in enough different ways to get the vocabulary up to toki pona size? (about 100-125) Or up to a natural language size lexicion (say 7000-15000)

The question occurred to me because Alexa has a "speak to pikachu" feature where it then pretends to let you converse with Pikachu in Pikachu-ese.

**Tags:** classification, phonetics


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2018-03-24. Score: 12 | Accepted answer

From what I remember from the cartoon, Pikachu could only say certain permutations of its name, with any combination of vowels elongated.
3 syllables   pikat͡ʃu   8 words
2 syllables   pika      4 words
1 syllables   pi        2 words 

Pikachu is also capable of producing at least 4 different tones:   
Tone     IPA   Made when 
High     ˥     Excited
Mid      ˧     
Rising   ˧˥    Curious
Falling  ˧˩    Disappointed

So, knowing this, Ash's pikachu should be able to say at least 584 distinct "words", which is well above the toki pona threshold.
Sadly it's pretty much impossible for this system to match the lexicon size of a natural language. Using an 8 tone system and adding primary and secondary stress brings the number of distinct words up to 25104, which is significantly larger than the Esperanto lexicon but still far away from that of a natural language, which is around 200K words. 
From here on you could introduce some questionable features like 8 more tones, 7 different vocal registers, or the ability to say different permutations of its name (which is probably not as dodgy but also imagining pikachu say /ka.chu.pi/ makes me extremely uncomfortable).
The best way in my opinion would be to introduce the syllabic thunder shock ⚡, which would require pikachu to release up to three thunder shocks whilst saying a word, all for the good cause of bringing the lexicon size of Pika-ese to a final 198688 words.
(No wonder Meowth learnt how to speak a human language, imagine being stuck with a one-syllable name.)

> **Comments:**
> **username_2**: I would put forward that Meowth is a two syllable word as English doesn't realize "eow" as the triphthong /iaʊ/ but rather with a syllabic break /i.aʊ/.  That way, a standard Meowth could at least get away with 72 words (going with the simpler 4 tone and length model). Pokemon like Jinx would still be stuck with 8 words. ... Why is this such a fascinating topic to try to puzzle out?  
> **username_3**: Pi-ka-CHUUUU!!!  
> **username_4**: Couldn't Pikachu designate one sound as a word-ender, one sound as a sentence-ender, and then use combinations of the rest of the sounds to form syllables which form words?  

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