Nim
A Chimpanzee Who Learned Sign Language
by Herbert S. TerraceThere was a time when it was presumed by American scientists that only humans were capable of language. By language, they meant the representation of actions and things by arbitrary sounds, objects, or gestures. In the 1960s, behavioralists showed that various animals were able to learn to use arbitrary signs to request differing rewards. Some animals, mostly chimpanzees, were taught what their teachers claimed was language. Terrace, for a variety of reasons, disagrees with their assertation. He applied for his own chimpanzee- a male one, because most of those studied were female chimpanzees. Nim Chimpsky was his subject. Nim fostered with a family for his first two years, and then moved into Delafield, a mansion where he was worked with 16 hours a day. Project Nim did not go as Terrace wanted due to several factors. Nonetheless, he felt that Project Nim had shown the intelligence and the limitations of intelligence of chimpanzees. He covers the entire project, including his thoughts and frustrations, but also gives the results, with his analysis. Project Nim ended when Nim was 44 months. He had acquired a sign language vocabulary of about 125 words, including a few of Nim's own neologisms.
Terrace clearly feels that his work was groundbreaking, but the distiction between this and other chimpanzee language programs is slight, and later programs overshadowed it. This book was published in 1981, and went to press at the same time that papers on Koko the gorilla did. Although Terrace lists factors that he feels hurt his program, I think that he greatly underestimates the failures of his program. The greater successes of other primatologist support me.
Today, few people get exited about animal communication. It doesn't hit the news or make for bestsellers. Graduate students wouldn't eagerly sign up in hordes to volunteer to teach sign language to chimpanzees. Behavioral studies are distant from the public eye. This book captures the excitement of the time when interspecies communication excited the public.
Question: What is language?
Happy reading
: 1:12 AM
