Here is a recent article on the BBC Sci/Tech page at:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_403000/403756.stm
which casts doubt on claims that apes can really use language like
a human. Here is an excerpt:
"Dr Sambrook quoted an earlier researcher's verdict: `Were a four-year-old
child to use language in the way a chimpanzee uses it, we would consider
that child disturbed.'"
And it also raises disturbing questions about the ethics of using
animals this way.
Steve
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Monday, July 26, 1999 Published at 17:10 GMT 18:10 UK
[...]
Chimps' language skills in doubt
Kanzi is reputed to be one of the LRC's brightest pupils
By Environment Correspondent Alex Kirby Reports that apes have an
innate linguistic ability and can be taught to communicate with humans
have been questioned by several authorities on primates.
The BBC's Pallab Ghosh: "Many other scientists don't think the chimps are
communicating" The reports say that chimpanzees and other apes at
Georgia State University's Language Research Center (LRC), using a
computer system attached to a voice synthesiser, have learnt enough words
to make simple sentences.
The computer is a flat panel with hundreds of touch-sensitive squares, each
bearing a symbol or image corresponding to a word in the animal's
vocabulary.
Listen to Kanzi the chimp 'speaking' Touching the square makes the
synthesiser produce the appropriate word.
One bonobo (pygmy chimpanzee), Kanzi, can use the system to say: "I
want a cup of coffee, please".
Another, Panbanisha, is said to know around 3,000 words.
Kanzi on his 'keyboard' But Dr Tom Sambrook, of the Scottish Primate
Research Group, told BBC television of his doubts that the apes'
achievements signified all they appeared to.
"They can use language effectively to make requests", he said.
"But whether they're understanding what they're doing is a much more
difficult mystery to disentangle."
Dr Sambrook was asked whether the LRC's work did not at least show that
humans and great apes were closer than many people believed.
"I personally have no problem with being as close as possible to the
chimpanzees.
"But if you look at their production of language, you'll find it's vastly
different from the manner in which, for example, a child uses language.
Dr Sambrook quoted an earlier researcher's verdict: "Were a four-year-old
child to use language in the way a chimpanzee uses it, we would consider
that child disturbed."
Jim Cronin is director of the Monkeyworld ape rescue centre in Dorset.
Some chimps are said to "know" as many as 3,000 words He believes that
primates do have a rudimentary language ability, but is concerned the
research at LRC does not offer much to the animals themselves.
Mr Cronin, speaking on BBC Radio Five Live, said: "What do the
chimpanzees or orangutans ever get out of all this?"
"I look at all this research, and everybody says: 'Should the chimps have
human rights?'
"They don't have any rights here at all. I would get a 400-pound pygmy
chimp - three times overweight - who's been isolated, and wonder 'Is that
cruel?'
"I hear about a gorilla who's been raised since 1972 on his own, in
isolation, because it would seem that isolation's the key to being taught
this.
"And I wonder who's barbaric here."
[...]
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"More than 30 years of experimentation on the origin of life in the fields of
chemical and molecular evolution have led to a better perception of the
immensity of the problem of the origin of life on Earth rather than to its
solution. At present all discussions on principal theories and experiments in
the field either end in stalemate or in a confession of ignorance. New lines
of thinking and experimentation must be tried." (Dose K., "The Origin of
Life: More Questions Than Answers", Interdisciplinary Science Reviews,
Vol. 13, No. 4, 1988, p348)
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