Talk:Kanzi

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[edit] Musical skills?

Kanzi has musical skills and has played with Paul McCartney and Peter Gabriel? What sort of music did Kanzi do, sing? play the drums? guitar? Timan123 18:57, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

REPLY: Yes, Kanzi (Panabanisha and Nyota)did play music with Peter Gaberiel for about 2 weeks. Parts of the tracks from this even were included in a song called Animinal Nation. Kanzi, Panbanisha and Nyota "played" keyboard and drums while Peter played the keyboard and sang. Peter was Not in physical contact or in the cage with Kanzi (or the other apes). The apes rather enjoyed Peter Gabriel's visit as he was very lasi back and down to earth.

I do not recall Paul McCartney playing music with the apes. He had a whole Entourage with him and it was quite stressful to the animals (and humans) when he visited. —Preceding unsigned comment added by AnnJohnson (talk • contribs) 16:32, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Disputed

Can someone please clear up in the article if Kanzi is male or female? These are quotes in the article:

Kanzi is a male - this is a typo

"Kanzi, her mother, brother, and sister now live at the Great Ape Trust in Des Moines, Iowa"

"As an infant, Kanzi accompanied his mother to sessions where she was taught language through keyboard lexigrams"

Obviously, one says his, one her - is Kanzi male or female, and would someone adjust the article to reflect such?

Done. His refers to Kanzi. Her refers to Matata, Kanzi's mother.


Why is this in dispute?

These are the main disputed parts:
Matata. As an infant, Kanzi accompanied his mother to sessions where she was taught language through keyboard lexigrams, but displayed little interest in the lessons. It was a great surprise to researchers then when one day, while Matata was away, Kanzi began competently using the lexigrams, becoming not only the first observed ape to have learned aspects of language naturalistically rather than through direct training but also the first observed bonobo to use language at all.
- FrancisTyers 08:30, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

What is the nature of the "dispute"? What would it take to resolve this? --JWSchmidt 13:47, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

See above for the nature of the dispute. Has it been independantly verified in a peer-reviewed scientific journal that Kanzi can "use language" and is this the precise term that they use? If so what are the references? - FrancisTyers 20:58, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
Bear in mind: Languages are not just sets of symbols. They also contain a grammar, or system of rules, used to manipulate the symbols. While a set of symbols may be used for expression or communication, it is primitive and relatively unexpressive, because there are no clear or regular relationships between the symbols. Because a language also has a grammar, it can manipulate its symbols to express clear and regular relationships between them.. I'm happy to accept that this animal can communicate using these lexigrams, what I'm not happy with is that it has a grammar. Maybe I'll be proved wrong :) - FrancisTyers 21:19, 22 November 2005 (UTC)
Kanzi can communicate to a limited extent by using Yerkish, but I doubt that any non-human ape will ever master the full complexity of a human language's grammar. There have been articles published describing the details of Kanzi's ability to communicate. The Kanzi article should provide a description of which components of human language have been learned by Kanzi and which seem to be beyond the "grasp" of a chimp's mind. The article should describe the fact that Kanzi and other young chimps have learned symbol systems for communication in the same way that young human children do, by being exposed to language users. Nobody ever claimed that chimps can learn a complete human language, so there is no need to create a make-believe "dispute" and request evidence to support something that has never been asserted. Someone just needs to take the time to describe Kanzi's abilities. --JWSchmidt 01:57, 23 November 2005 (UTC)
Well, that's what it seems to suggest in the text. I have no doubt that with further editing to the article, the dispute could be removed. I agree that the article should provide a precise description of which components of human language have been learned, and which have been taught. When you say articles have been published describing Kanzi's ability to communicate, do you mean to say they used "communicate" and not "language" (the two are different, see Language). I don't particularly have the time to spend investigating this. - FrancisTyers 12:55, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Since there is a chance that some Wikipedia readers may make the incorrect assumption that this article is about a chimp learning a complete human language, it could be made explicit that the Kanzi article is discussing a chimp that has learned only a subset of the behavioral and cognitive features that are traditionally used to characterize human language and that Kanzi's abilities are a form of non-human language. Another alternative is for Wikipedia to adopt the position of those who reject the terms "non-human language" and animal language. If Wikipedia adopts that position, then the Kanzi article should be edited so that it uses terms such as "communication" rather than "language". In my view, the way to improve this Wikipedia article is for someone take the time to describe the details of Kanzi's abilities. I still feel that it would improve the chances of resolving this "dispute" if there were a clear statement of what "facts" are under dispute. --JWSchmidt 15:58, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Both of those proposals seem very reasonable and would resolve the dispute without either of us having to put extra work into the article. I agree that the best way to improve the article would be to describe the details of Kanzi's abilities, but as I don't have the time this is not going to be done by me. I think the second best way would be to take both of your suggestions and merge them into one. i.e. explain that Kanzi has learnt a subset of the behavioral and cognitive features that are traditionally used to characterize human language and that some people refer to this as non-human language and some people refer to it as "communication" rather than "language". This way we are presenting both sides of the argument. - FrancisTyers 19:51, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps it could also be noted that Kanzi significantly outperformed a human 2 year old in controlled studies of spoken English comprehension, and the fruit of the research has been using the aided language system to teach mentally retarded humans how to communicate. 128.163.170.33 20:08, 11 January 2006 (UTC)Larry York

I think it would be a misuse of wikipedia to attempt to make an authoritative scientific ruling on the subject when Kanzi's abilities have been historically so contraversial in the scientific community. It would be far more constructive to simply state Dr. Savage Rumbaugh's claims as claims and let readers decide for themselves what they would like to believe about them. - KanziODP

[edit] Further info

But What Have You Done for Us Lately?: Some Recent Perspectives on Linguistic Nativism

For a while that appeared to spell the end of ape language studies, but recently there has been a flurry of excitement over a bonobo named Kanzi, trained by Susan Savage-Rumbaugh, who seems to understand a wide array of English language commands, and can produce sentences by using a touch-sensitive symbol board. In a recent experiment Kanzi was faced with 310 sentences of various types. There were (in order of frequency) action-object sentences (e.g. "Would you please carry the straw"), action-object-location sentences (e.g. "Put the tomato in the refrigerator") and action-object-recipient sentences (e.g., "Carry the cooler to Penny"). Of the 310 sentences tested, Kanzi got 298 correct. Savage-Rumbaugh concluded that Kanzi's sentence comprehension, "appears to be syntactically based in that he responds differently to the same word depending upon its function in the sentence." (cited in Wallman, 1992, p. 103). Wallman (1992) argues, however, that this conclusion is ill-founded. Almost all the sentences with which Kanzi was presented were pragmatically constrained so that the relationships between agent, action, and object are clear simply from a list of the nouns used in the sentence. (For instance, how likely is it that Kanzi would be asked to carry Penny to the cooler? Or put the refrigerator in the tomato?) With respect even to those sentences that were pragmatically ambiguous enough to require a syntactic analysis, one still must be cautious about rejecting the pragmatic account because the sentences were given in everyday (i.e., not experimentally well-controlled) situations over a three month period. Without knowing the contexts in which the sentences were presented, it is difficult to know what can be validly concluded about Kanzi's behavior. As to the matter of Kanzi's sentence production, similar doubts arise. According to Wallman (1992, p. 95) Kanzi's most frequent string consists of "only one lexigram in combination with one or more deictic gestures."
Consequently, Kanzi does not show evidence of the kinds of grammatical knowledge that would pose a serous threat to the Chomskyan view. In fact, as we shall see below, Kanzi's behavior is precisely what one would expect from an intelligent animal who is attempting to communicate, but does not have the grammatical resources normally available to human beings. What is truly fascinating about Kanzi's performance is its remarkable similarity to the behavior of human beings who, for one reason or another, have access to some basic linguistic vocabulary, but not to the structure of the language to which the vocabulary belongs.

Some of this might be mentioned somewhere in the article? - FrancisTyers 17:30, 3 December 2005 (UTC)


I'm not sure that citing Wallman, a criminologist, is appropriate for the article. Despite the fact that he has published a book on the subject, this is not his area of expertise. He has a biased view and is interested primarily in maintaining the Chomskyan view that language is somehow "inherent" to one species only -- us.
Kanzi has demonstrated an understanding of sentences requiring syntactic analysis. For example, he can correctly interpret the pattern agent action object action recipient in the following sentences:
Make the dog bite the snake
Make the snake bite the dog
These examples are ambiguous enough to falsify Wallman's claim that "... the sentences with which Kanzi was presented were pragmatically constrained so that the relationships between agent, action, and object are clear simply from a list of the nouns used in the sentence."
Ape language research seeks to address a fundamental question of cultural evolution: Did a genetic predisposition favoring the development of language exist within the common ancestor of champanzees and man? Kanzi and other apes may provide a partial answer to this question. - Wilford Nusser 13:13, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
Where has the following claim been published? For example, he can correctly interpret the pattern agent action object action recipient in the following sentences Can you please give a reference. - FrancisTyers 21:55, 19 February 2006 (UTC)
This is not definitive by any means, but we just watched a video in class where Kanzi was doing several actions. They didn't show the dog and the snake biting each other, but they did show "Kanzi, give the dog a shot" and "Kanzi, get the ball that's outside" (in which he had to ignore a ball that was inside). More pertinently, there was a dog and snake there (stuffed animals, that is); that makes me inclined to believe that they probably did ask for those two sentences. *Shrug*. Just thought I'd contribute. Domenic Denicola 15:14, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Multiple articles on great ape language

This article is one of at least 16 articles on Wikipedia primarily about the fascinating but controversial subject of Great ape language. These articles have been created independently and contain much interesting but uncoordinated information, varying levels of NPOV, and differences in categorization, stubbing, and references. Those of us working on them should explore better coordinating our efforts so as to share the best we have created and avoid unnecessary duplication. I have somewhat arbitrarily put the list of 16 articles on Talk:Great ape language and would encourage us to informally coordinate efforts there. Martinp 18:02, 15 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Photograph needed

A photo of Kanzi would be good for this article. Das Baz 16:29, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Ambiguity: little interest

“ As an infant, Kanzi accompanied his mother to sessions where she was taught language through keyboard lexigrams, but showed little interest in the lessons. ”

There is some ambiguity there: who did show “little interest in the lessons”? Matata or Kanzi? I would say Matata, since Kanzi leanrt so much, but Kanzi is a possibility too: he learnt very fast and after just fot bored? So, who showed little interest?
David Latapie (✒ | @) 01:36, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps the wiley Kanzi pretended to show little interest, while really taking in more than he let on.Das Baz 18:20, 11 November 2006 (UTC)

Kanzi would play nearby while Matata would have her lession. Matata participated with interest in what was going on while Kanzi bounced around the room. —Preceding unsigned comment added by AnnJohnson (talk • contribs) 16:37, 28 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] As alpha male, Kanzi is not the "undisputed leader" of the group

I just watched an OPB special on bonobos, and was interested to learn they are a completely female led species. There may still be an alpha male (they didn't mention), but he would still be subordinate to the alpha female. This link [1] is to a biopage for Kanzi's mother on the Great Ape Trust's website (GAT being the research center where Kanzi and his family live), and states in the very first sentence that she is the uncontested dominant member of their group.

Anyways, I'm not a member, and I'm not going to deal with figuring out how to edit or anything, but if someone out there wants to fix this for the sake of science, please do. And please forgive me if I do something wrong in signing or posting this; I've never done this before.

71.34.75.211 09:24, 16 February 2007 (UTC)

You are right. I have made the correction based on your observation. Thank you, and keep up the good work. Erudil 17:41, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] A slanted article

This article abounds with an inappropriately enthusiastic, commendatory tone toward its subject. Additionally, several scholars dispute Savage-Rumbaugh's findings that Kanzi is linguistically skilled; S-R's opponents find that Kanzi is a well-trained animal, but that we cannot prove her linguistic comprehension. The Sue Savage-Rumbaugh article mentions Steven Pinker as a critic, but I believe several more exist. I have already begun to tone down some of the POV statements.--The Fat Man Who Never Came Back 08:23, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

These critics are just knee-jerk negativists who have never met Kanzi and don't know what they are talking about. Erudil 17:34, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

Kanzi is a male, so when you talk about "her" linguistic abilities, you show a lack of grasp of the subject. Erudil 17:43, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Smithsonian source incorrect

The article cites Raffaele, Paul (2006), "The Smart and Swinging Bonobo" but this is not the article Raffaele wrote about Kanzi (Kanzi is not even mentioned). In fact Raffaele wrote two articles about Bonobos and the one that should be cited is "Speaking Bonobo" (link below)

http://www.smithsonianmagazine.com/issues/2006/november/speakingbonobo.php

68.101.79.58 00:25, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. Rather than delete the first article, I clarified that it's a general article about Bonobos. I added the article that discusses Kanzi to the External Links section. TimidGuy 11:42, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Appearance

Does it really matter what he looks like? 66.117.221.211 (talk) 22:08, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

It seems to matter to the editor who insisted on its inclusion. But it was indeed odd the way it was highlighted with a major heading. I've integrated it into to biography section, making it less conspicuous. TimidGuy (talk) 11:53, 21 May 2008 (UTC)