Chimpanzee behavior: our relatives are botanists. The history of the Washoe or how smart chimpanzees can be

". Let me tell you how it really happened.

The honor of the “first contact” - a conversation between representatives different types- belongs to the chimpanzee Washoe and her caregivers, spouses Allen and Beatrice Gardner. By that time, it was already known that animals are capable of thinking: they can solve problems “in their minds,” that is, not only by trial and error, but also by inventing new behavior options.

This was proven by the German psychologist Wolfgang Köhler, who conducted his famous studies chimpanzee intelligence at the beginning of the twentieth century. In one of his experiments, a monkey after a series unsuccessful attempts knock down a high-hanging banana with a stick or get it by climbing on a box, sit down, “think,” and then get up, put the boxes one on top of the other, climb on them with a stick and knock down the target.

These experiments inspired scientists to make their first attempts to “humanize” monkeys. In the 1930s, the psychologist couple Kellogg adopted a baby chimpanzee named Gua, who grew up with them. one-year-old son Donald. Parents tried not to make differences between “children” and communicate with them equally.

True, achieve special success They were unsuccessful in raising Gua, but Donald began to become an ape: the development of his speech slowed down, but he learned to perfectly imitate Gua’s cries and habits and even began to gnaw bark from trees after him. Frightened parents had to stop the experiment, Gua was sent to the zoo. Another pair of psychologists, the Hayes couple, who raised the chimpanzee Vicky, with great difficulty, managed to teach her to pronounce a few words: “mom”, “dad”, “cup”.

Only in 1966, ethologists Allen and Beatrice Gardner, watching films about Vicky, noticed that she wanted and could communicate using signs: for example, she really loved to ride in a car and, in order to communicate her desire to people, she came up with the idea of ​​​​bringing them images cars that I tore out of magazines. What made her incapable of speech was not a lack of intelligence, but the structure of her larynx. And then the Gardners came up with the idea of ​​teaching chimpanzees sign language, which is used by the deaf and dumb.

Thus began the Washoe Project.

Washoe and her family

The future first lady of the chimpanzee world was a 10-month-old baby caught in Africa: she was originally supposed to be used in space research - apparently, she was simply born for fame.

The Gardners raised Washoe as their own child. She didn't just remember the gestures with which she was addressed adoptive parents, but also asked questions, commented on her own actions and the actions of her teachers, and spoke to them herself.

Her first “word” was the sign “more!”: tickle more, hug, treat, or introduce new words. During the first year of living with the Gardners, Washoe mastered 30 Amslen word signs - American language deaf and dumb, in the first three years - 130 characters. Mastering language in the same sequence as the child, she learned to combine signs into simple sentences. For example, Washoe pesters one of the researchers to give her the cigarette that he was smoking: the signs “give me smoke”, “smoke Washoe”, “quickly give me smoke” follow. Finally the researcher said, “Ask nicely,” to which Washoe responded, “Please give me that hot smoke.” However, they never gave her a cigarette.

Chimpanzees also easily acquired such seemingly purely human skills as joking, deceiving, and even swearing. She called one of the servants, who did not let her drink for a long time, “dirty Jack.” But swearing is not at all such a primitive thing, since it speaks of Washoe’s ability to use words in figuratively, summarize their meanings. It is on this ability to generalize with the help of words that human intelligence is built.

It turned out that Washoe builds generalizations no worse than small children who are beginning to master a language do. For example, one of the first signs she learned was “open!” - she first used it when she wanted the door of a room to be opened for her, then she began to use it to open all doors, then for boxes, containers, bottles, and finally even to open the water tap.

The monkey correctly used personal pronouns, ideas about the past and future (in the future she was mainly interested in holidays, such as Christmas, which she loved very much), word order in sentences (for example, she perfectly understood the difference between “You tickle me” and “I tickle you”) "). Sometimes Washoe tried to “speak” not only to people, but also to other creatures. One day, when a dog was chasing the car in which she was traveling, barking, Washoe, who was deathly afraid of dogs, instead of hiding as usual, leaned out of the window and began to desperately gesticulate: “Dog, go away!”

Meanwhile, several other newly born chimpanzees were brought to the Gardner laboratory. They learned quickly and soon began communicating with each other in sign language. And when Washoe’s baby was born, he began to learn gestures, no longer watching people, but other monkeys. At the same time, researchers have more than once noticed how Washoe “puts his hand on him” - corrects the gesture-symbol.

In April 1967, Washoe used word compounds for the first time. She asked “give me something sweet” and “go open it.” At this time, the chimpanzee was at the age when human children first begin to use two-word combinations. Comparison of the abilities of humans and monkeys was the next direction of research. But this aspect also brought some trouble for the Gardners. The fact is that at first some of the scientists did not recognize Washoe’s ability to speak. Roger Brown, professor Harvard University, known for his research on language development in children in early age, believed that Washoe did not always strictly adhere to the correct word order and, therefore, did not understand the connections between different categories of words that give a certain meaning to a sentence. Jacob Bronowski and linguist Ursula Bellugi published a scathing article arguing that Washoe could not speak because she never asked questions or used negative sentences. Finally, linguist Nom Chomsky categorically stated that the chimpanzee's brain is not designed for an animal to speak.

Research, meanwhile, produced more and more new results, which the Gardners analyzed and carefully compared with existing data on speech development in children. And critics were soon forced to withdraw some of their objections

Roger Brown admitted that word order doesn't matter. decisive role. In some languages, such as Finnish, it is not as important as in English. The placement of words in a sentence does not matter big role and in sign language ASL. And children themselves often violate the order of words, but... they understand each other perfectly.

The Gardners concluded that children and monkeys are very similar when it comes to answering questions, constructing binary sentences, using nouns, verbs and adjectives, and word order in sentences. Unfamiliar with grammatical rules, children, like chimpanzees, tend to replace entire sentences with one or two words.

The test showed that Washoe freely asks questions and uses negative sentences. The monkey is able to use the signs “no,” “I can’t,” and “that’s enough.” Washoe eagerly leafed through illustrated magazines, asking people, “What is this?” Chomsky’s statements about the limited capabilities of the chimpanzee brain simply cannot be verified: there are still no methods that would allow us to clarify this issue. Only recently, the American scientist Norman Geschwind began experiments to determine whether there is an area in the chimpanzee brain similar to the one that regulates speech activity in humans.

When the Gardners finished their work with Washoe in 1970, she was in danger of going to one of the biomedical centers “for experiments” and, if not dying, then at least spending the rest of her days in a small solitary cell. She, and then other chimpanzees who were trained in the laboratory, were saved by the Gardners’ assistant Roger Fouts, who created the “Monkey Farm”, where the “Washoe family” now lives - a colony of “talking” monkeys.

Gorilla Professor

The results of research on the “Washoe family” seemed completely incredible, but in the 70s several groups of independent researchers working with different species great apes, confirmed and supplemented these data. Perhaps the most capable of all 25 “talking” monkeys was the gorilla Koko, who lives near San Francisco. Coco is a real professor: she uses, according to various estimates, from 500 to a thousand Amslen signs, and is able to understand about 2000 more signs and words English language and, when solving tests, shows an IQ that corresponds to the norm for an adult American.

However, like other “talking” monkeys, the main development of its speech and intelligence occurred in the first years of life (as a rule, talented monkeys reach the level of two in speech development year old child, and in some respects - three years old). Growing up, they remain in many ways similar to children, reacting childishly to life situations and prefer games to all other ways of spending time. Coco still plays with dolls and toy animals and talks to them, although she gets embarrassed when someone catches her doing this.

For example, Coco acts out an imaginary situation between two toy gorillas. Having placed the toys in front of him, the monkey gestures: “bad, bad” towards the pink gorilla, and then “kiss!” towards the blue one. And when her gorilla partner Michael tore the leg off her rag doll, Coco burst out with the most terrible curse ever heard from a monkey: “You dirty bad toilet!”

Coco loves cats very much (she had her own cat, which recently died), and loves to draw. Koko's drawings can be viewed on her website http://www.koko.org/index.php, where you can also find out latest news from the life of a gorilla, who is already approaching forty (chimpanzees and gorillas can live up to 45-50 years).

Now scientists want to bring the “humanization” of Coco to new level- they are going to teach her to read.

Trained animals or brothers in mind?

However, the conclusions from these studies turned out to be too scandalous and completely unacceptable for most of the scientific community. On the one hand, “talking” monkeys turned out to be the fly in the ointment of the reasoning of philosophers and psychologists about the gap between a person with consciousness and animals, like automata, controlled by reflexes and instincts.

On the other hand, linguists attacked: according to the dominant concept in American linguistic knowledge, Noam Chomskyan language- this is a manifestation of a genetic ability that is characteristic only of humans (by the way, in mockery one of the “talking” monkeys was called Nim Chimsky).

According to critics, the monkeys' gestures are not meaningful signs, but simple imitation of researchers, in best case scenario « conditioned reflexes", acquired as a result of training. Experimenters, when talking to monkeys, allegedly give them hints all the time, without realizing it themselves - with facial expressions, gaze, intonation, and the monkeys are guided not by their words, but by non-verbal information.

The “talking” monkeys were compared to Clever Hans, the Oryol trotter, whose owner “taught” the horse to count and answer questions. Then it turned out that Hans was simply reacting to the subtle movements of his trainer.

Among the skeptics was researcher Sue Savage-Rumbaugh. She decided to refute the idea of ​​“talking” monkeys. A series of studies began in which dwarf shim-pan-ze-bonobos communicated with scientists via a computer on a specially designed artificial language- yerkishe. Instead of gestures, he was taught to use a special computer keyboard with conventional keys-icons, which represented words. When you pressed a key, the word was displayed on the monitor as a picture. Thus, it is convenient to conduct a dialogue, correct or supplement remarks. But Kanzi besides this without special education recognized about 150 words. His guardian, Dr. Sue Savage-Rumbaugh, just talked to him like that.

One of Rambeau's goals was to reward the monkeys for correct answers as little as possible. The adult monkeys Savage-Rumbaugh worked with showed little talent and only deepened her skepticism. But at one fine moment, little Kanzi, the son of one of these monkeys, who was always hovering around his mother, suddenly began to own initiative be responsible for her. Until that moment, no one had taught him anything, the researchers did not pay much attention to him at all, but he answered brilliantly.

It soon became clear that he had just as spontaneously learned to understand English, and in addition showed considerable talent for computer games. Gradually, thanks to the successes of Kanzi and his sister Bonbonisha, Savage-Rumbaugh’s skepticism disappeared and she began to show scientific world evidence that her "talking" chimpanzees know three languages ​​(Yerkisch, Amslen and about 2000 English words), understand the meaning of words and the syntax of sentences, are capable of generalization and metaphor, talk to each other and learn from each other.

According to the scientist, monkeys often guess the intentions of the speaker, even without understanding the meaning of the words. It's like watching a soap opera with the TV muted. After all, the meaning will still be clear. Rambo confirmed this observation by conducting an experiment comparing the sentence comprehension of 8-year-old Kanzi and 2-year-old girl Ali. Testing lasted from May 1988 to February 1989. Out of 600 oral tasks, Kanzi completed 80%, and Ali completed 60%. For example, “put the plate in the microwave”, “take the bucket outside”, “pour lemonade into Coca-Cola”, “put pine needles in a bag”, etc. This amazing linguistic behavior of monkeys raises an obvious, albeit ambiguous question: Can we consider that the language of Washoe, Kanzi and Koko is close to the language of a two-year-old child, or is it a completely different “language”, only slightly similar to human?

It was very difficult to argue with the results of Savage-Rumbaugh's research. For those who value human exceptionalism, all that remains is to assert that, after all, the language that monkeys use is still very far from human. As in the joke: “A pig entered the circus arena and played a virtuoso piece on the violin. Everyone applauds enthusiastically, and only one spectator does not clap, looking indifferently at the stage. “Didn’t you like it?” - asks his neighbor. “No, not bad, but not Oistrakh.”

In the animal world: culture, education, emotions

"Animals are unconscious." This thesis is the last hope to establish the exclusive position of man among other living beings, giving us the moral right to keep them in cages, use them for experiments and build factories for the production of “living meat”.

But back in the middle of the twentieth century, ethology appeared - the science of animal behavior. And the observations of ethologists allowed us to take a completely different look at the mental abilities of animals.

It turns out that apes (like elephants and dolphins) are self-aware, at least on a bodily level: they recognize themselves in the mirror. The range of emotions they show is very rich. For example, according to the observations of ethologist Penny Patterson, gorillas love and hate, cry and laugh, they are familiar with pride and shame, sympathy and jealousy... One of latest research, carried out by British biologists from the University of St. Andrews, even showed that dolphins have a semblance of permanent names for each other.

Many apes use tools, which until recently was considered the exclusive privilege of humans. “Since about half a century ago Jane van Lawick-Goo-doll first saw chimpanzees using a thin twig to fish out its inhabitants from a hole in a termite mound, zoologists have discovered about forty more methods of purposeful use of all kinds of objects in the behavioral repertoire of these monkeys,” - says Evgeny Panov from the Institute of Problems of Ecology and Evolution of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

This is no longer an instinct, but a cultural skill that is passed on from generation to generation. IN recent years More and more research is emerging cultural traditions among monkeys, and the word “culture” is used there without quotation marks.

However, as Evgeny Panov states, “ high level development of tool activity in apes indicates their ability to rationally plan long sequences of actions. However, this does not lead to the emergence of a developing material culture.”

But maybe monkeys just don’t need it? Let us remember the aphorism of Douglas Adams: “Man has always believed that he is smarter than dolphins, because he has achieved a lot: he invented the wheel, New York, wars, and so on, while dolphins did nothing but have fun, tumbling in the water. Dolphins, for their part, have always believed that they are much more smarter than people- precisely for this reason."

Yes, the brain of an ape weighs three times less than ours, but this does not make us an exception among other living creatures: dolphins, whales, and elephants have much larger brains than ours. The researchers came up with the idea of ​​comparing not brain volume, but the ratio of brain weight to body weight. But bad luck - laboratory mice were ahead of us in terms of this coefficient.

The Gardners then worked with three chimpanzees. Moye (her name means “one” in Swahili) is six years old, Tatu (“three”) is in her fourth year, Nne (“four”) is a male and is two and a half years old. Washoe was removed from the experiment shortly before this phase began. All chimpanzees were brought to the farm no later than the fourth day after birth. From the very beginning they lived according to a strict, scientifically based regime. Each animal has its own living space - a bedroom, a place to play, a bathroom and a dining room. Three staff members work with each pet and quickly teach the chimpanzee ASL in strictly planned sessions. The teachers are used to using it - one of the employees is deaf herself, the rest are children of deaf parents. In the presence of animals, all employees on the farm communicate only using ASL, so the chimpanzees never hear human speech.

The working day on the farm begins at seven in the morning, when the servants wake up the chimpanzees. The “sign of the day” is determined daily - new sign, which educators try to introduce into the everyday life of their pets when the situation is appropriate, creating as natural conditions as possible for replenishing their vocabulary. After the obligatory morning toilet, breakfast, including, among other things, a glass of warm milk. And while eating, chimpanzees learn to be independent: they must tie their own bib and eat without outside help. After eating, brush your teeth and brush your fur.

If it's not hot, chimpanzees wear clothes that they have to put on themselves. They make the beds and do the cleaning. As a rule, monkeys are able to wipe up spilled liquid, wash dishes, and perform other tasks. All this has a beneficial effect on language acquisition and allows you to avoid becoming spoiled.

Classes are held before and after lunch. Half an hour - training in the use of signs, and another half hour - viewing illustrated magazines and books. With so-called “pedagogical” games, they are encouraged to draw, select objects from a certain series, play with cubes, they are taught to thread a needle and even sew. It has been established that chimpanzees have enough attention for thirty minutes. And to avoid overexertion, they are sent to bed twice during the day. At about seven in the evening they bathe and frolic until bedtime in long, light clothes so that their fur dries well.

With this lifestyle, Moya acquired vocabulary, numbering 150 signs, and Tattoo - more than 60. Once a week, all the researchers get together to discuss the results of the work, including the evolution of the "chimpanzee to chimpanzee signs" program. In some weeks, up to 19 acts of communication between animals using ASL were recorded. Most of them boil down to signs like “come play” or “come tickle” (chimpanzees love to be tickled). It happened that Moya, willingly rolling Tattoo on herself, gave the signal “here”, pointing to her back, where Tattoo was supposed to climb. Moya signifies "baby" for Nne, coos at him, and lets him drink from her bottle, while Nne himself, for a reason known only to himself, calls Moya a cookie.

This generation of chimpanzees, as comparisons have shown, overtook Washoe in development, since their acquaintance with the ASL language began earlier and they were in a more favorable “stimulating” environment from the first days.

The conversational capabilities of great apes are being successfully studied in the United States and in four other experiments.

But an experiment conducted with chimpanzees at Columbia University in New York was recently interrupted. The reasons that prompted psychology professor Herb Terrace to capitulate caused serious controversy among his colleagues.

Four years ago, Terrace began an experiment in which chimpanzee Nima (his full name Nim Chimpsky - an allusion to the American linguist Nom Chomsky) was also taught ASL. Nim mastered sign language as diligently as the other “prodigies,” and even extended his hands to his teachers to show him new signs. He successfully passed the “baby” phase language development, inventing new signs, and learned... to deceive and scold. Despite all this, Terrace came to the conclusion that chimpanzees are incapable of constructing sentences correctly. In his experiments, Terrais paid attention not to how Nim's vocabulary was replenished, but to the grammar of his statements. Nim, making up a combination of two words, connected the words quite meaningfully. Some words, for example, “more,” were always in first place for him, others, for example, “me,” “me,” were in second. Nim saw that the phrases “give me” and “give me” are not constructed the same way. But, according to Terrace, he did not go further. This is where the differences in the use of conversational skills between young children and chimpanzees begin.

Firstly, if chimpanzees build combinations of three or more word-signs, then the third and subsequent elements only in rare cases contain additional information they either repeat a gesture that has already been used, or add a name to the personal pronoun - “play (with) me by Nim.” Of the 21 four-part sentences that Nim formed, only one did not contain repetitions. In children's language, such repetitions, according to linguistics, are almost never observed.

The second difference is what linguists call the average length of an expression. As children get older, they use increasingly longer and more complex phrases. At two years old, the average length of their sentences was approximately the same as Nim's - 1.5 words (or characters), but in the next two years, the length of Nim's sentences grew very slowly, while children (both deaf and healthy) ) it increases sharply.

And Nim’s semantics was different from the children’s. He was unable to communicate between semantic meaning sign and the way it is used. The positional connection between, for example, something edible and the corresponding verb did not exist for Nim - he did not see any difference between “there is a nut” and “the nut is.” It follows, Terrace argues, that chimpanzees do not understand what they say.

Finally, Terrace held thorough analysis films that captured Nim's "conversations" with a person, and compared these results with a study of conversations between children and parents. Children early begin to understand that conversation is a kind of game in which the participants constantly change roles: first one will speak, then the other. The child rarely interrupts the interlocutor or speaks at the same time as him. In Nim's case, in about 50 percent of cases, statements were inserted into the interlocutor's speech.

There are three ways to maintain a conversation after your partner has finished speaking: you can repeat the other person’s phrase in full, you can partially reproduce what was said and add something of your own, and, finally, you can say something completely new. Children under two years of age repeat up to 20 percent of their parents’ statements. . On next year the percentage of repetitions drops to two percent. Nim, however, imitated 40 percent of his teachers' phrases throughout his third year. Children under two years of age complement what the interlocutor says in 20 percent of cases, and by the age of three they support half of the conversations in this way. Nim's additions did not exceed 10 percent

Between ape and man

One of the main problems is that we look everywhere for “similarities” to our mind and our language, unable to imagine anything else. "Talking" monkeys are completely different creatures from their natural relatives, the "stupid monkeys" as Washoe calls them. But they never become people, at least in the eyes of the people themselves.

Washoe was named after the area in Nevada where the Gardners lived. It subsequently turned out that in the language of the Indian tribe that originally lived in this area, “Washoe” means person. Washoe herself considered herself a human being. “She’s a person just like you and me,” says her teacher Penny Patterson about her Coco. In an experiment on dividing photographs into two categories - “people” and “animals” - Vicki, who knew only three words, confidently put her photo in the “people” group (like all the other “talking” monkeys with whom this experiment was carried out ). She also confidently and with visible disgust placed photos of her own “non-speaking” father in the “animals” group along with photographs of horses and elephants.

Apparently, linguists and biologists simply do not have a reasoned answer to this question. AND main reason The disagreement lies in the fact that there are still no established definitions and concepts. The fact that a child and a monkey perceive human language differently is undeniable. But “talking” monkeys classify reality in a way similar to humans. They divide the phenomena of the surrounding reality into the same categories as people. For example, with the sign “baby” all trained monkeys designated children, puppies, and dolls. Washoe made the “dog” sign when she met dogs, when she heard dogs bark, and when she saw pictures of them—regardless of the breed. Children do the same thing. Koko the gorilla, seeing a ring on Penny’s finger, “said”: “finger necklace.” And the chimpanzee Washoe called the swan “water bird.” What is this if not the language of a child? He, too, when he sees a plane, says “butterfly.” Moreover, Koko’s gorilla fiance Michael, who learned sign language at a very late age, showed miracles of ingenuity! He appealed abstract concepts such as past, present and future.

He once talked about how when he was little and lived in the jungle, hunters killed his mother. Unlike people, “speaking” monkeys long ago solved the problem of “identifying” their language: in their opinion, it is definitely human. And since language is a unique sign of a person, it means that they themselves “became people.” This conclusion was confirmed more than once. Washoe, for example, without doubt, considered herself a member of the human race, and called other chimpanzees “black creatures.” Coco also considered herself a human. When asked to separate photos of animals from photos of people, she confidently placed her image with the images of people. But she placed a photograph of her hairy and naked father next to a pile of elephants, horses and dogs.

How should we relate to these creatures? In the glorious Soviet film “The Adventures of Electronics,” there was exactly the same problem: for adults, Elektronik is a talking robot, and he can and should be “turned on and off,” but children clearly see: this is a person, even more people than his twin Syroezhkin.

Today, animal rights supporters are viewed as sentimental nutcases. But perhaps tomorrow everything will change, because once upon a time slaves or representatives of other human races were not considered people.

Super-intelligent chimpanzees so far only exist in films, like the recent "Rise of the Planet of the Apes." In real life, monkeys are still just very smart animals. Just how smart are they?

The first evidence that chimpanzees have the rudiments of strong intelligence was obtained in the 60s of the last century in Gombe, Tanzania. Now famous anthropologist Jane Goodall conducted observations of a group of chimpanzees and witnessed their ability to use improvised tools when obtaining food (chimpanzees made sticks for catching termites). Until this point, making tools was considered the privilege of only Homo sapiens.

In the photo Francine "Penny" Patterson(left) asks the gorilla using sign language Coco Isn't she hungry? The photograph is dated May 21, 1976. Coco tells her with gestures that she is hungry.

Gorilla Koko was born in 1971 and today she is the most sociable of primates. Her sign vocabulary consists of more than a thousand characters and she can understand about two thousand words of spoken English. At the same time, she can start a conversation with a person herself, since she is interested in communicating with people.
Her IQ level fluctuates between 75 and 95 points, while among people 100 points is already considered normal for full development.

The next photo shows a researcher Sue Savage-Rumbout(Sue Savage-Rumbaugh) hugs a chimpanzee named Kanzi V scientific center for language studies in Atlanta. Kanzi has just successfully completed one of the language texts.

Kanzi was born in 1980 and is now the most famous "talking" monkey in the world. He was the first chimpanzee to learn sign language as he grew older, as small children typically do. Greatapetrust.org also reports that he was the first chimpanzee to construct new phrases and sentences that required specific responses. Moreover, Kenzi has established himself as a master at stone processing and creating tools from stones.

The next photo shows an orangutan Azi points with a finger at the symbol representing an apple after being shown a piece of an apple. Photo taken in 1996 at the Brain Institute in Washington.

The new photo shows an adult female gorilla in national park Congo uses a stick in his hands to measure the depth level. The moment was captured by researchers in 2005.

In total, in 2007, a group of chimpanzees were recorded making sticks and spears for hunting mammals 22 times. The latter was also a kind of discovery. Many people previously believed that chimpanzees did not eat meat. They hunted, in particular, smaller species of primates.

One memory test used two young chimpanzees against two humans. The monkeys prevailed, which casts doubt on the assurances of many scientists that humans are superior to monkeys in all cognitive parameters.

Wildlife Conservation Society's Breuer notes that great apes better than man They navigate memory tests, solve them much faster and in a completely different way.

Comparative psychology deals with the evolution of the psyche, and to do this, studies often compare organisms of different species. But the results of research in this area should be interpreted with caution, since when conducting experiments it can sometimes be difficult to maintain objectivity and ensure fair and equal conditions participants. Even within the same species there are difficulties: to compare intelligence different groups people, it is necessary to take into account everything that influences this intelligence. It was once believed that this was an innate characteristic, that it was inherited, and comparison seemed simple. But back in 1981 it became known that in addition to genes, important role plays the environment in which the individual grows and develops, his education, life experience, health.

But if it is difficult to compare people with each other, then what about interspecies differences? Ideally, the intelligence of children and monkeys can be compared only if the monkeys are exposed to the same environmental influences. In tests of social intelligence (language and gesture comprehension), lack of experience with human habits can be especially important and significantly affect test success. Studies have already been carried out with monkeys that grew up with people, in one of them the scientist Winthrop Kellogg “adopted” a young chimpanzee named Gua, who lived and grew up with his young son. However, at present, such a study is unlikely to be replicated and published due to ethical restrictions.

This is just one of the errors that the authors found. They studied several comparative experimental research recent decades, which concerned the social intelligence of children and monkeys and, in particular, their ability to interpret and correctly use a gesture indicating something ( index finger, directed towards the object). In all studies, humans outperformed monkeys in test results, and this was explained by its evolutionary uniqueness. The works were checked for compliance with the criteria that the authors described as necessary to ensure the objectivity of the experiment: equality of environment, preparation, sampling protocols, testing procedure and age of the subjects at testing.

The authors found non-compliance with almost all criteria. The environment in which the subjects lived was not the same, the discrepancy was quite gross, without any attempts on the part of the experimenters to equalize these conditions. In the experiments, monkeys sat in cages, and children, of course, did not, but the presence of physical barriers could negatively affect the results (as was the case with dogs). Also, experimental animals often grew up in sterile laboratory conditions, while children grew up in good conditions that promote cognitive development. This fact also influenced the sample, since intellectual level people was higher due to environmental conditions. The sample was also skewed by additional selection criteria among people: in some studies, in order to participate in the test, the child had to have done something similar before. For monkeys, no such criterion was put forward. In terms of training, in studies involving language and gesture, children had much more experience with the subject than monkeys. The testing procedures also differed: in one study, children who failed the task of pointing at an object were given a “second chance” and allowed to answer by placing their palm on it, but still concluded that the person was superior.

Inadequate conditions comparative studies lead to contradictory results. The results of all the studies analyzed by the authors were later refuted. In the hidden object study, the results indicated that the monkeys did not understand the pointing gesture, but some monkeys still managed to do it. In another study, scientists only partially refuted these results when they found that success in performing the same task was influenced by the distance of hominids in relation to the container.

So do monkeys have social intelligence? While in comparison tests the monkeys do not always perform at the level of a one-year-old infant, other results show that they are at the level of a two- to three-year-old child and are able to understand the false beliefs of other individuals. Many studies indicate that monkeys can be taught to speak, for example, sign language, but their speech remains poor and is not transmitted further. Development champion human language Among the monkeys, the pygmy chimpanzee Kanzi, who could understand about three thousand words by ear, is considered. Winthrop Kellogg's chimpanzee achieved some success, but stopped short social development quite early, as she turned out to be indifferent to communicating with her new parents.

Summarizing the work on errors, the authors make several recommendations for conducting comparative studies. They mention the technique of cross-fostering, as in the Gua chimpanzee experiment, but although it solves many problems associated with unequal conditions, it is not ideal for ethical reasons. Therefore, it can be replaced by adequate training to pass the test: for example, if a child at the age of nine months can navigate by adult gestures (if the gesture points to an object nearby), then the monkey should be trained for at least nine months. In addition, one should be more rigorous in explaining behavioral outcomes and rely only on variables that can be observed and measured. And the sample needs to be made more equal and balanced, paying more attention to the influence of the environment.

Scottish primatologists together with scientists from Emory University made a sensational discovery during their observations: their experimental monkeys discovered unprecedented intelligence!

It must be said that scientists working in the field of primatology and anthropology have increasingly begun to obtain results that clearly indicate that the level of “intelligence” in apes is incomparably higher than is commonly believed. Back in the sixties famous explorer chimpanzee Jane Goodall discovered that the monkeys, our hairy forefathers and foremothers, did not in fact turn into dandelion grandparents, who only knew how to sharpen their bows and please the selfish possessors of intelligence who stared at them through the bars - oh, no! – evolution is not familiar with the concept of “retirement”, and monkeys, immensely humiliated by circuses, zoos and Sir Charles Darwin himself, behave surprisingly – as Gudal established, they use tools to obtain food, fight, wage real wars and arrange truces.

Of course, Goodal's discovery triggered a wave of similar research in the field of primatology. Thus, Swiss researcher Christophe Besch discovered that chimpanzees have their own culture, and more than one! He observed a group of animals in the Thai National Park on the Elfenbein coast. His students cracked nuts in a special way, using a stone, and, most interestingly, passed this method on to subsequent generations. Amazing fact- East African primates were not at all familiar with this approach to obtaining food.

Besh was perplexed - are these guys really recruiting? useful knowledge and skills through imitation?

The scientist more than once witnessed a scene when a little monkey looked with interest at its mother breaking a nut shell - what is mother doing? How does she do it? And after some time, Besh found the little girl from earlier doing the same thing; she deftly handled the nut in the same way!

However, for a long time scientists could not agree on one explanation for this phenomenon. But finally, the staff of the Scottish University of St. Andrews seems to have managed to get closer to a solution. Their paper, published in the journal Nature, details the behavior of chimpanzees who deliberately imitate each other in order to achieve a desired goal. Food. For the experiment, scientists prepared a difficult task for the monkeys - using a stick to fish out bait from a tank, which was also plugged with a stopper. Scientists divided the experimental animals into two groups, and then selected one monkey from each and taught them in different ways pull out the cork and take out the food. The "pioneers" were named Erica and Georgia. After a short course, they were sent back to other monkeys, and after two months, all the Scottish scientists' pets were successfully eating using the techniques they had learned by imitating Erica and Georgia. The third group - not a word has been said about it yet - did not learn anything at all, and after the mentioned period, not one of its representatives even took a step in the direction of the bait. They could not complete the task without a “mentor,” experts say.

Not only adults have a hidden desire to be like others, anthropologists say; even children are familiar with the desire to quickly learn from their comrades to do what they like so much. As it turns out, people here are not alone. The primates of Scottish researchers are a striking example of this.

Squad - Primates

Family - Great apes

Genus/Species - Pan troglodytes. common chimpanzee

Basic data:

DIMENSIONS

Height: male - 170 cm, female - 130 cm.

Weight: male - up to 80 kg, female - 50 kg.

REPRODUCTION

Puberty: from 7-10 years old.

Mating season: does not have a specific season; Cubs are born every 3 years.

Pregnancy: 225 days.

Number of cubs: 1, less often 2.

LIFESTYLE

Habits: chimpanzees (see photo of monkey) stay in small groups.

What it eats: mainly fruits, leaves, buds, flowers, bark, honey, resin, termites and ants, as well as small mammals.

How long does a chimpanzee live? 40-50 years old.

RELATED SPECIES

The closest relative of the common chimpanzee is the pygmy chimpanzee or bonobo (G. paniscus), discovered in 1928.

Chimpanzee reactions to magic tricks. Video (00:09:49)

In chimpanzees to a greater extent than in other apes, the facial muscles are developed, hence the variety of their facial expressions. When communicating with each other, chimpanzees give out more than 30 different sounds. Facial expressions, hand gestures and body postures also play a big role.

REPRODUCTION

Chimpanzees breed throughout the year. When a female comes into heat, she mates in turn with several males from the same group. There are no fights between male monkeys. The menstrual cycle of female chimpanzees resembles the menstrual cycle of women. After a 225-day pregnancy, the female gives birth to one baby, in some cases Twins are born. A baby chimpanzee is born almost naked and completely helpless.

For the first 5 months, the female wears it on herself. The baby clings to the fur on his mother's chest, and the mother carefully holds him with her hand in the first weeks. Later the baby climbs onto her back. A 6-month-old baby takes his first independent steps, but even at this time the mother closely monitors his every step. A one-year-old chimpanzee weighs about 8-9 kilograms. The baby stays with his mother until he reaches the age of three or four.

WHAT DOES IT EAT?

The bulk of a chimpanzee's diet consists of plants. In the morning, waking up from sleep, chimpanzees leave their night nests and go in search of food. They collect juicy leaves, buds, flowers and ripe berries.

LIFESTYLE

Chimpanzee monkeys live in groups whose numbers are not constant. Each group includes from 2 to 25, and sometimes up to 40 monkeys. The composition of such a group is also unstable. A chimpanzee herd may consist of a pair and their young; There are also groups of exclusively males and groups of mothers with cubs of different ages. There are also mixed family groups.

In a herd, monkeys have a hierarchical relationship. Adults perform mutual grooming. Chimpanzees are active during the day and rest at night. Monkeys sleep in trees, a different one each time. Chimpanzees build night nests in the middle part of a tree. The daytime nest can be located either in a tree or on the ground. Monkeys keep their nests clean.

CHIMPANZEE AND HUMANS

Despite the fact that visitors to zoos and nature reserves around the world pay attention to chimpanzees special attention, since they are interested in observing these intelligent animals, the most serious enemy of the chimpanzee, as before, is man.

If at first man was a competitor to chimpanzees in obtaining food, then later people began to cut down tropical forests and thus deprived the chimpanzees of their natural places habitat. In some places, young chimpanzees are harvested for zoos or pet stores. This activity brings local residents considerable income. Chimpanzees are closer to humans than other apes, so medical experiments have been carried out on them for a long time.

FEATURES OF THE DEVICE

The chimpanzee is one of the few animals that are capable of using tools. Moreover, monkeys have reached certain heights in this matter. Chimpanzees use sticks to dig out insect nests and for self-defense. Some people use sticks when hunting stray ants.

INTERESTING FACTS. DID YOU KNOW THAT...

• Chimpanzees, like humans, can suffer from certain common diseases, for example, malaria.
• Before a rainstorm, male common chimpanzees perform a “rain dance.”
• Chimpanzees are the only mammals (except humans) that recognize themselves in the mirror.

CHIMPANZEE FAMILY

Chimpanzees have more developed facial muscles than other primates, hence the variety of their facial expressions. Scientists who have observed chimpanzees have noticed that these primates can “laugh”, “poster”, show “concern” and “fear”.

Aggression: The chimpanzee bares its teeth, warning its opponent and defending itself from the enemy.

Joy: when receiving a treat, the chimpanzee shows something like a smile - the corners of the eyes shrink, the eyes sparkle, and the corners of the lips rise up.

Calm: The chimpanzee is absolutely calm, nothing bothers him.

- Habitat of chimpanzees

WHERE DOES IT LIVE?

Chimpanzees live in Africa, in countries from Guinea to Western Uganda and Tanzania.

SAVE

The chimpanzee is found in a limited area and the species is threatened with extinction. Previously, chimpanzees were used in scientific experiments, however later, under the influence public opinion, animals were no longer used for laboratory experiments.

Chimpanzee beats human in memory test. Video (00:03:40)

Man is the crown of nature. Only nature doesn’t know about this :)