Letters to the Editor
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Primates, chimps, and monkeying around
If it's really so evident that chimps can learn language just like humans, why have I never read a coherent transcript of chimp-human communication?
Avery: While chimpanzees seem to be able to learn a smattering of human language (Nim learned more than 125 words), humans have never proved themselves capable of learning chimp language. Maybe we're just not smart enough.
Primates (and other animals) only respond to direct stimulus.
Trixtah: You're a primate, so I suppose I won't be asking you to find the bananas in the other room anytime soon. (Otherwise, good post.)
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animals and humans
I think Nim indeed WOULD have expected to grow up and 'become' human. I have read accounts of human-socialised chimps trying to shave at a certain point in order to rid themselves of their body hair. In humans it's not until a certain point in development that children with special needs and/or intellectual disabilities realise they are different and are not like 'normal' people - they have to grieve over this and come to a reconciliation with it. I imagine it woudl be this way for chimp. Indeed I imagine it's like this for any person in a group that has been in that group since infancy. A black child in a white family for example, or an only girl in a family of males. Why wouldn't you expect to become like those others of the group to whom you belong when from the beginning you had no perception of being different?
Nim's story is very sad and makes me shudder for the lack of emotional intelligence in humans. Obviously they aren't just htis way towards animals, but towards human children and adults also. Fortunately human adults are usually capable of looking out for their own interests.
Finally, anyone who has known and loved an animal knows what emotion and intelligence it is capable of. Not the same as our intelligence, but I can't tell when someone is about to have a seizure either (the way some dogs can) or tell when my husband is about to come home five minutes before he does (the way my cat can). The instances of various abilities various species have are vast, and all point to the fact that different species have different predilections and abilities, but we are all intelligent and emotional creatures. We just can't all comprehend one another and need to use our imagination to do so. Sorry this has rambled somewhat ...
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Chimps are dangerous
The one thing the article doesn't make clear is how incredibly powerful and dangerous chimpanzees are when they reach adult age. Especially the males. An animal that has evolved to climb and swing around on trees has incredibly strong arms and fingers. And adult chimps are extremely hostile and violent if they feel territorial or threatened. They fight dirty, going after eyes and genitals. You can't domesticate most animals, no matter how much you might like to. There are exceptions, like skunks (quite domesticatable), but animals that have evolved to live in jungles full of predators, with elaborate group hierarchies and so on, are nothing to play with.
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Most Americans can't even understand their own pet dogs, let alone chimps
We see folks every day who cannot even live harmoniously with their own pet dogs, even though dogs have supposedly been bred for hundreds of years to be "companions" to man. People with pet dogs experience ravaging of their houses, bites, and other issues because many people believe dogs should instinctively adopt a human lifestyle. Most people can't even understand a dog's instinctive species-related behaviour (ever get a clue about what signals come from sniffing another dog's rear...?) let alone understanding primate behaviour.
A more valid experiment regarding chimps, language and adaptation would include evacuating a small town (rural or urban) and then letting two-year-old chimps and human children try to survive for a year without any interaction or communication from any human beings.
If a group of human researchers were to revisit the town after a year, I believe the human researchers would have a heck of an easier time communicating with the chimps because the human children would likely be dead. Would that mean the human children were inferior communicators?
What is communication anyway? Is it something only our species can define? And, if so, then what is the 'official language' of our species: Farsi? French? Spanish? English? Pig Latin?
If you can't sniff the butt of the human in front of you in the grocery checkout lane and get a clue as to which way that human's wind blows, I believe you are probably somewhere below Nim on the communication level.
Yep, adult chimps can be dangerous and destructive. But adult humans have spent thousands of years killing each other and other species because adult humans are so communicatively illiterate they can only shout "ME, ME, ME!"
Ah, if only we were smart enough to speak with Nim...
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@sureok
sureok: "A more valid experiment regarding chimps, language and adaptation would include evacuating a small town (rural or urban) and then letting two-year-old chimps and human children try to survive for a year without any interaction or communication from any human beings."
This is brilliant. Are you a TV producer? You've got a talent.
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@ Avery in MN
?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koko_%28gorilla%29
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It is time to outlaw all experimentation on chimpanzees
Chimpanzees can communicate with us and each other. They recognize themselves in mirrors. They have complex family and social lives. They make and use tools. They are considered to have the I.Q. of a 5 year-old human child. Given all of this, it is as unconscionable to experiment upon them as it is to experiment upon their close cousins, Homo Sapiens.
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To learn more about how chimps communicate...
There is a TV series on Animal Planet called "Monkey Business," which deals with the apes and monkeys in a sanctuary, and it shows the chimps and other primates fighting, playing and loving. There are several different chimpanzee groups there, as chimps in the wild form family groups, and by watching the chimps in the various groups interacting you learn a lot about chimp politics. For instance, did you know that when a female chimp has a child, the entire group will get involved because they LOVE (chimpanzee) children? It's a great show, a reality show with chimps and other primates.