IEEE Spectrum July, 2012 - 42

BaBY talk: two-yearold teco, shown with
the author [left] and
researcher Susannah
Maisel, uses a simplified
25-lexigram app. His
first lexigram was grape.

brother, understands several thousand
words. These match-to-sample experiments are enabling us to determine the
exact number and should also help dispel criticisms that the bonobos are simply
displaying the "Clever Hans effect." Clever
Hans was a horse that became renowned
at the turn of the last century for solving
arithmetic problems, telling time, and reading and understanding German. Later it was revealed that his trainer was
subconsciously nodding whenever the horse tapped out the
correct answer. Hans was indeed clever-clever at reading subtle cues from his trainer, not at adding and subtracting.
To avoid the Clever Hans effect, the bonobos aren't encouraged
to use sign language, because it leaves too much open to interpretation. Instead they "talk" to us almost exclusively with lexigrams;
the computer helps remove any ambiguity. One day, for instance,
Savage-Rumbaugh was using the match-to-sample program to
42

NA * IEEE SpEctrum * july 2012

familiarize Panbanisha with new words.
The computer's synthesized voice spoke the
word "carrot" and then its screen displayed
the lexigrams for carrot, carry, and potato.
Panbanisha was about to hit the lexigram
for carrot, but Savage-Rumbaugh, who'd
misheard the word as "carry," told the ape
she was mistaken. The ape, though, knew
better and selected the carrot lexigram anyway.
For more free-form communication, the apes can use
their lexigram program, which displays up to 600 symbols
on screen [for examples, see the image "True Meaning"].
The bonobos can tap multiple keys to construct a sentence,
and each sentence they write is time-stamped and recorded
for further analysis.
In 1971 a primatologist named Duane Rumbaugh (SavageRumbaugh's ex-husband) came up with the idea of teaching
language to apes by displaying abstract geometrical symbols
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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Spectrum July, 2012

IEEE Spectrum July, 2012 - Cover1
IEEE Spectrum July, 2012 - Cover2
IEEE Spectrum July, 2012 - 1
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IEEE Spectrum July, 2012 - Cover3
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