Unfortunately, La Mettrie was unable to follow up on his idea, and the proposal that apes could learn to communicate with man lay dormant for years. Training apes to use such communication methods, or at least gestural communication, was to La Mettrie a logical proposal, and he felt that they would be able to master it easily. He was obviously influenced by Amman's works, including Surdus loquens (1692) and Dissertatio de loquela (1700), which contained plans for teaching signs, finger spelling, and lip reading. it would surprise me if speech were absolutely impossible in the ape.Īnother distinction made by La Mettrie, which was later to become a cornerstone of controversy concerning language acquisition in chimpanzees, was that speech and/or communication with lower primates included the use of gestures.
Why should the education of monkeys be impossible? Why might not the monkey, by dint of great pains, at last imitate after the manner of deaf mutes, the motions necessary for pronunciation?. It is apparent that he recognized the intellectual capacity of the ape when he wrote:
La Mettrie failed to distinguish between monkeys, apes, and orangs (he referred to them interchangeably), but his basic idea was clearly two centuries ahead of its time. His idea was to choose an ape with the most "intelligent face" and send him to school under the teacher Amman (an early writer of books on the education of the deaf). 26 La Mettrie, obviously attracted to the striking similarities between man and the apes, proposed teaching sign language to apes in a school for the deaf. I do believe it already understands much English and I am of the mind it might be taught to speak or make signs.Ī similar reaction was recorded by Julien Offray de La Mettrie ( 1709-1751), who, in L 'Homme machine (1748), pondered the varying capacity of animals to learn. Battens to see the strange creature that Captain Jones hath brought with him from Guiny it is a great baboon, but so much like a man in most things, that (though they say there is a species of them) yet I cannot believe but that it is a monster got of a man and a she-baboon.
The famous Diary of Samuel Pepys reflects this interest in an entry made in August 1661:īy and by we are called to Sir N. Probably more than any single factor, the physical similarity between man and the great apes aroused the curiosity of those interested in teaching apes to behave in ways similar to man. Historical Developments and Speculation Concerning Communication The last two were observed by early researchers in man-animal communication. However, some remarkable physiological similarities have been found in blood protein and type, chromosomal characteristics, structure, and behavior. Although man and chimpanzee had a common ancestor, many thousands of years of separate evolution and adaptation have endowed each species with unique physical and behavioral characteristics. It is obvious that a physical similarity exists, but it is important to stress that there are also some basic differences. Since we are interested in two-way communication between man and chimpanzee, we will emphasize the similarities of the communication capabilities of the two species. From either of these aspects we can obtain a wealth of information on the mental and behavioral capacities of the chimpanzee and, in addition, comparative data to assist in the understanding of human behavior. The chimpanzee is a nonhuman primate that is very similar to, and at the same time very different from, a human being. This will be followed by a review of early experiments in raising chimpanzees in a human home environment, and by a discussion of the more recent experiments concerning the use of gestural languages and symbols in establishing two-way communication. We shall begin by selectively reviewing the historical speculation concerning the possibility of teaching chimpanzees to speak. !This chapter traces the scientific inquiries into two-way communication with chimpanzees from the early attempts to establish vocal communication to ongoing research in gestural and symbolic languages.
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