system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why are birds the only animals that can talk or mimic humans voices?

Is there an evalutional advantage?
gpt
They aren't.  There are lots of cases of other animals trying to mimic what they hear a human say.  You can easily youtube dogs trying to talk or mimic a noise they hear.  Goats too are a good example.

As for why certain birds do it so often.  Well birds rely on sound to locate each other, remember they are some of the most agile and small creatures so they need help finding each other, so its no wonder they make so much noise.  Some birds mimic not just human noises but other birds or random noises of urban life, like car alarms.  It has to do with the way that their syrinx (the avian version of the humans larynx or 'voice box') is set up.  It isn't to different from humans so it isn't difficult to imitate noises.