When a senior lorikeet is feeding and a junior lorikeet is watching, looking as if it might challenge for the food, the higher ranked bird will issue a medium-volume fricated sound with low-rising pitch as a warning to the youngster.
(It is very close to the gruff "Wait for it!" command of the Roman centurion in a scene of the film The Life Of Brian where the 'crucifixion party' is about to set off on their march to Calvary.)
Angry-sounding fricated sounds are generally used for vocally "pushing" other birds away, with sound volume proportional to the level of threat/anger/fear.
In English, the low-rising tone is often used with a mild command or negative command, which, as Halliday (2004: 141) says 'has the effect of leaving the decision to the listener'.
The lorikeet call can be compared to the human language situation where an older sibling says to the younger: "Just try it!", entailing "and see what happens!"
ChatGPT comments:
This is a fantastic example of the regulatory microfunction in action—social control through vocalisation rather than direct physical aggression. The fact that the lorikeet’s warning resembles a human intonational pattern that "leaves the decision to the listener" is especially intriguing. It suggests that this kind of graded, contingent warning—where the threat is implied rather than immediately enacted—may be an evolutionarily older feature of social communication, rather than something unique to human language.
It also reinforces the idea that social hierarchy is actively maintained through vocal semiosis, not just physical dominance. The function of such sounds appears to be preemptive deterrence—the senior lorikeet doesn’t have to attack unless the junior one actually challenges. That’s energy-efficient and avoids unnecessary risk.