Discussion Questions:

Animal Communication, Apes, and Language

  

1. Non-linguistic communication and analog signals. "Dr. Eugene Morton of the Smithsonian Institution has observed that regardless of the species, low and harsh calls signal a sender's aggressive tendencies, while sounds that are high and tonal indicate the sender's fearful or submissive state. Intermediate calls indicate intermediate tendencies." (ZooView, Quarterly Magazine of the Greater Los Angeles Zoo Association, Spring 1989, page 15)

Consider the sentence, "Put the gun down," uttered by the following three individuals in the respective contexts:

(1) Clint Eastwood, who has the drop on a bad guy about to rob the unarmed stage coach passengers.
 
(2) A movie director telling an actor what he will do as the next action in a scene.
 
(3) A store clerk, ready to give the contents of the cash register to an armed robber.

(a) How would the most likely way these sentences might uttered relate to the quote above?

Clint would probably say the phrase in his "Make my day!" voice. This corresponds to the "low, sharp aggressive sound".
 
The movie director would probably speak in a rather "neutral" voice. There would be no emotion attached. This corresponds to the "intermediate sound".
 
The store clerk would probably cry out with a high pitched voice, corresponding to the fearful or submissive state.
 
These voice qualities appear to correspond to the characteristics of animal calls, but in human communication, they can overlie the message itself, whereas in animal calls, the specific vocalization would probably be tied to the voice quality type, e.g. a chimpanzee could not choose to emit the pant-grunt in a high loud pitch on one occasion and a low agressive pitch on another.

(b) Relate the quote and your answer to (a) to Pinker's notion of showing differences in meaning using "analog" signals.

These "voice quality overlays" for language are analog in the sense that they could vary in degree depending on level of emotion.

(c) Why could the differences illustrated in (1-3) not be used to argue that language is an "analog" communication system?

The propositional content of the language would remain the same, i.e. the BASIC MESSAGE would not change. In an analog system like the bee dances, the speed of the dance, for example, communicates distance--the "propositional content" is actually affected by the analog differences.

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2. The typology of animal communication systems. "As spring approaches we begin to hear more and more bird sounds associated with courtship. Mockingbirds sing complex songs, composed of a variety of phrases they have picked up from animals nearby. A male singing in his territory repels competing males and simultaneously attracts females. Researchers have found that each year males learn additional phrases. Females select their mates in the spring and are most likely to pair with males who sing the most complex songs. Here a simple auditory signal is cleverly utilized by the females: Males who have survived a longer period have demonstrated their fitness. Therefore, females who select older males are more likely to produce offspring who survive." (ZooView, Spring 1989, page 14)

Does the variation in song show that some mockingbirds have the ability to learn to communicate new messages? (Relate your answer to Pinker's typology of animal communication systems--see page 121 of the APS book.)

"Propositional content" of the mockingbird's song is not changing. It still means, "I'm a desirable mate," or the like.
 
The observation at the end, about females choosing males "more likely to produce offspring who survive" is relevant to the topic of Week 9, the Origin of Language. In the case of the mockingbird, variation in message apparently is useful even though the content of the message (basically, "I am a desirable mate!") does not change. One could, however, well imagine that if individuals in a population somehow managed to produce a larger variety of messages which also varied in content, that this could have survival value and would be passed along. See the "fable" of The Ugly Daughter in the study questions for Week 9 (APS book, page 134).

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3. Non-vocal communication systems and communication design features I. Many animals communicate using pheromones, "odorous substances which are released causing a reaction in another animal, usually of the same species. The functions of chemical communication parallel those of visual and auditory systems. Pheromones are used in determining the identity and physiological and social status of individual animals, or the identity of social groups. Pheromones may stimulate aggregation or dispersal in animals."

"[Some animals] are like walking chemical factories. The black-tailed deer, for example, produces secretions in at least seven different sites: tarsal glands, metatarsal glands, preorbital glands, forehead gland, interdigital glands, as well as feces and urine." (ZooView, p. 17)

(a) What features does pheromonal communication share with vocal communication, including language?

Pheromonal systems share with vocal communication a variety of discrete messages and the feature of arbitrariness--here, species specificness in "understanding" meaning.

(b) What relative advantages and disadvantages would pheromonal communication have with respect to vocal and/or visual communication? (The answer to this question would presumably say something about why certain types of communication have had selective evolutionary advantages for certain species.)

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4. Non-vocal communication systems and communication design features II. Name some gestures, including facial expressions, and some non-linguistic vocalizations which humans might share with other apes. Name some gestures and non-linguistic vocalization which humans would probably not share with other apes. To what extent do gestures and non-linguistic vocalizations have the feature of arbitrariness? How might these gestures and vocalizations be characterized in Pinker's typology of animal communication systems?

Shared: e.g. (maybe?) gestures: arms raised to show agression, arms outstetched to beckon, crouching to show submission; expressions: smile, quizzical look, bared teeth for anger; vocalizations: cry of pain, something like laughter, something like crying
 
Not shared: e.g. gestures: various abusive gestures, applause, fingers to lips for silence; expressions: sticking tongue out as an insult, winking to show connivance; vocalizations: whistling to sign approval or disapproval (depending on culture), various vocalizations meaning 'yes' or 'no' (such as grunting "mhm" or "m'm")
 
Most of the non-shared would probably be arbitrary. Some of the shared might seem abitrary as well, e.g. quizzical look, but most would probably have some ecological explanation.

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5. Apes and language: Lana. Lana began her "utterances" with a symbol meaning 'please' and terminated them with a symbol meaning 'period'. This demonstrates (1) that Lana mastered the concept of politeness and (2) that she had mastered the grammatical concept of a complete sentence. True or false? Justify your responses.

False: Both the initial "please" and the final "period" for Lana were just part of the sequence of buttons that she had to push to get the rewards. There is no evidence whatsoever that she conceived of them in the terms the labels that the human designers gave them.

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6. Apes and language: Koko. Here are a couple of signed utterances by Koko, the gorilla, which Francine "Penny" Patterson has cited as examples of Koko's creativity in using sign (from LA Times, December 1, 1981):

"[Koko] can come up with some pretty devastating insults. After a scolding, she declared, 'Penny dizzy toilet devil.'"
 
"One of the arguments is that the gorillas are [learning to sign] by copying you, but what about when they invent signs? [Koko used] an intense blow sing for 'You blew it.'"

What about these examples should make us skeptical of Patterson's claims?


Koko signing, "Help."
from http://www.gorilla.org/

"Dizzy toilet devil." One must be very skeptical that Koko could learn to communicate an internal state such as dizziness, much less extend it to a metaphorical use to mean 'silly, foolish'. Likewise, what could 'devil' possibly mean to Koko? The use of this word as an insult is rooted in certain religious beliefs, which it seems pretty unlikely that Koko had. Koko may have learned to use these signs in the context of scolding, but one would like to know what evidence could be adduced that she shares any sense of their meaning as humans use them.
 
"You blew it!" Total nonsense. This is a metaphor based on spoken English, i.e. Koko may well have used some kind of blowing gesture to signal displeasure or the like, but for Patterson to translate this as the spoken English idiom using the verb 'blow' is gross anthropomorphism, which assumes that Koko knew the English expression and rendered it as a literal gesture of blowing. One might also note that this could not be the invention of a "sign" that could exist in any human sign language, since human sign languages do not incorporate such gestures as an integral part of signs.

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7. Apes using American Sign Language. Below are some sets of signs in American Sign Language. Which of these signs and sign combinations would we expect a chimpanzee to be able to learn or not to be able to learn? Explain your responses.

The chimpanzee could certainly learn 'black', and possibly 'name' in some kind of context like "me name Washoe", though it seems unlikely that the concept of "name" would be something a chimpanzee could learn, at least as it is understood by humans. It is inconceivable that a chimpanzee could learn, much less create a compound like "blackname" meaning 'bad reputation', where neither of the components is directly relatable to the overall meaning. This contrasts to sign combinations like 'water bird' = 'duck' or 'fruit drink' = 'watermelon' which chimpanzees have been observe to use, where both components of the putative compound directly relate to the object--in such cases the skeptic could claim, as I would, that the chimpanzee is not forming unitary compounds at all but rather is just using two signs that relate to the object.


One can assert with some certainty that a chimpanzee could not associate an appropriate meaning to a sign 'tomorrow' at all. A word such as this requires a sense of ongoing time and projection of thought to a time other than the present. There is no evidence that chimpanzees can do this. 'Morning' likewise seems doubtful as a sign a chimpanzee could learn. This assumes, again, the concept of ongoing time and periods of time. This makes the understanding and use of a compound like 'tomorrow morning' doubly inconceivable.