Human Conversations With Animals

Human Conversations With Animals

A conversation with a non-human animal occurs when the animal understands both its own communication and that of the human. For example, a dog can be taught by repetition to respond to a command by barking twice to get a treat. This conditioned response does not entail the dog's understanding of the meaning of the command, "bark twice"; the dog simply associates its response with a treat.

Koko
A female lowland gorilla named Koko just died at age 46. Koko's ability to communicate with humans using a modified version of sign language including, her own signing creations, is unmatched among non-human animals. She knew more than 2000 English words and more than 1000 hand signals. Koko's ability to communicate about past and present events objects not present, and her ability to improvise with language demonstrated she likely understood the meaning of her communications. For example, Koko had not been taught the word for a ring. Upon seeing a ring on a finger she signed "finger bracelet". Although a few skeptical experts claim this event and others like it might be due to the carer's anthropomorphic biases, most conclude Koko understood what she intended to communicate most of the time.

Koko With Her Kitten

 Koko became especially attracted to kittens; her fascination with them began with books. When she was young her favorite two books were The Three Little Kittens and Puss 'n' Boots. Knowing her affinity for kittens, she was given a toy kitten but rejected it signing "sad". On her next birthday, Koko was delighted to pick a kitten out of an abandoned litter. She named the little furball "All Ball" and treated it as if it were her own baby. One day Koko's carer discovered a sink torn from the wall. When confronted about it, Koko signed "kitten bad" and "cat did it" pointing to All Ball and to the sink.

Considering a large number of examples like these, I personally side with the majority of experts who believe Koko engaged in two-way human conversations.

Kanzi
Another primate, a bonobo named Kanzi, became famous for his ability to communicate with lexigrams (symbols associated with specific words).  Kanzi's mother regularly was being coaxed to use symbols to communicate but failed to learn. Kanzi playing in the background was seemingly oblivious to the lessons until one day he spontaneously began using the language; he was the first non-human primate to learn a language naturally rather than through training. He also was the first bonobo to learn to methodically communicate with humans.

Kanzi

In addition to communicating with 348 lexigrams, Kanzi learned to respond to spoken English. In one experiment, Kanzi was matched with a two-year-old human named Alia. Each was given 660 spoken instructions to interact in specific ways with familiar objects. Kanzi's success rate was 74%, Alia's was 65%.

Kanzi groups two or more words to express himself. During an outdoor excursion, Kanzi touched symbols for "marshmallow” and "fire.“ He then broke sticks, used matches to start a fire, and roasted marshmallows. Kanzi learned about 3000 spoken words, a third more than Koko. He also understood more spoken words than the symbols he used. Kanzi could comprehend and act on complex combinations of words spoken like"take the TV outdoors."

While doing research for this article, I was most impressed by the fact that Kanzi demonstrated that bonobos could converse with one another in their own language. In one experiment Kanzi and his sister were placed in separate rooms where they could hear, but could not see, each other. Kanzi was told that he could have yogurt if he informed his sister. Kanzi made a specific bonobo sound. His sister vocally responded with the same sound and selected the yogurt lexicon.  

Apes clearly are capable of communicating much more than we once believed. But their communications are largely self-centered. For example, many (if not most) experts claim no ape (or another non-human) has ever spontaneously asked a question or expressed an unsolicited opinion. If this is true (and I am skeptical of the claim after studying Alex the parrot discussed below), I believe this limitation would be more a product of the way they think than of their ability to master a language.

Alex
Alex, an African grey parrot, is said to have asked existential questions including "what color" upon seeing himself in the mirror. Skeptics explain this by stating he was just lucky to ask an irrational question at the right time. Alex had a vocabulary of over 100 words. But he was more famous for his understanding of the words. For example, Alex knew small numbers. Dr. Irene Pepperberg, Alex's teacher, and handler were testing the ability of another parrot named Griffin to vocalize numbers while Alex watched. She sounded two clicks and asked how many. Griffin remained silent. She repeated the two clicks; Griffin again remained silent and Alex said "four". Pepperberg clicked two more times and Alex said "six." Subsequent tests revealed Alex could add numbers up to six and could count beyond that.

Alex

Alex could correctly select groups of objects based on complex descriptions including: bigger and smaller, same as, different than. He knew seven shapes and seven colors, and numbers of objects up to six. When asked the difference between two identical objects, he would answer "none".  Alex made a surprising leap of logic and language one day when he was shown groups of two, three, and six blocks of different colors. He was then asked which color had five blocks. Alex answered "none". This was the first time Alex used the word none to mean the quantity "zero" rather than "no difference". The first record of humans recognizing a symbol for the quantity zero was in the third century B.C.

Conversations between humans and Alex have been thoroughly tested and carefully documented.

Wild Dolphin Project
Dolphins not only use a sophisticated language to communicate among themselves but mimic human vocalizations and postures.  Denise Herzing and her team spend five months a year studying a pod of dolphins as part of their Wild Dolphin Project. The team members developed an underwater keyboard with four symbols representing a sound and an associated toy. The dolphins learned to request their chosen toy.


The next step in the project employed an interspecies translator for humans and dolphins that is designed to facilitate two-way conversations using sounds familiar to dolphins. Herzing conducts experimental research to create an artificial language that dolphins and humans can learn using underwater equipment called "Cetacean Hearing and Telemetry" (CHAT). A 20 minute TED presentation discusses progress (as of 2013) towards interspecies communication with these animals and others using the Interspecies Internet concept.