Richard Dawkins

It's just much more difficult.

If I were to go into a Glasgow pub...

and say, , I would probably get thumped.

But if I were to go into an Amsterdam pub and attempt to speak Dutch, they would be all over me.

They love you, right.

And that's the difference in a dialect and a language.

Well, there are two species of frog in North America, Microhyla carolinensis on the east side and Microhyla olivacea on the west side.

And olivacea has a higher-pitched call.

So that's olivacea with a high-pitched call and carolinensis has a lower-pitched call.

There's not much difference between them.

Now, you might expect that if it was like, you might expect a climb that you would gradually get as you look from, these are very closely related species.

As you go from west to east, the call will get gradually deeper and deeper and deeper.

That's what you might expect.

The reverse happens.

It's a reverse climb.

As you get into a zone of overlap,

the Olivacea call goes up and the Pteranensis call goes down, so that these creatures are exaggerating the difference between them.

So in the zone of overlap, the difference between them is exaggerated compared to where they don't overlap.

This is equivalent to migrating into the Glasgow pub and attempting to do a Scott's dialect and being

And being hit.