thus the hedge "trained" ;)
There’s good reason to think that emoji are more like gesture than
language. When you crunch the numbers (and I have), the face, hand,
and heart emoji are by far the most popular — not the emoji that
represent noun-like items. Furthermore, the vast majority of emoji are
used beside words, not all by themselves in extended emoji-only
stories. People aren’t using emojis as a substitute for language,
they’re using it as an addition to it, just like you wouldn’t want to
talk in person with your hands tied behind your back and a paper bag
over your head.
[…]
Emoji are a universal language the same way that pointing at stuff and
grunting is a universal language. Useful, under a certain set of
circumstances! But what makes language really powerful is its ability
to talk about stuff beyond the here and now, beyond the easily
visualizable. In other words, abstraction.
[…]
For example, look at the tremendous difficulty that scientists have
had in communicating the fairly simple concept DANGER THERE IS NUCLEAR
WASTE HERE STAY AWAY in a way that will continue to make sense to
humans for the next 10,000 years. Circle with a slash? Nope, could be
a sideways hamburger. Skull and crossbones? Nope, could refer to the
Day of the Dead and/or pirates.