Hi all,
I read this amazing book about a chimp "Washoe": she learned to use ASL
(American Sign Language).
It appears chimps (and other anthropoids) have a personality comparable to
humans - to a certain extend, of course.
Any comments?
I'm an interested layman...
Best regards
Kris Derboven
Belgium
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Notes
Book: "Next of Kin", by Roger Fouts with Stephen Tukel Mills.
Site: http://friendsofwashoe.org/
A review:
"'Convinces a skeptical linguist', June 28, 2004 (J. Larsen-hall, Denton,
TX).
I have just finished reading Roger Fout's Next of Kin book and was very
impressed. I am a linguist (...) I had always just accepted the
conclusion
found in most introductory linguistics textbooks that what chimps can do
is
really not very much, doesn't resemble human language, and that people
like
Dr. Fouts have expanded the notion of what 'language' is to somewhat
unacceptable lengths. I accepted that Terrace's work with Nim Chimpsky
(which you read about in the book) showed that just those researchers who
were highly emotionally involved with their animals were the ones who
ridiculously thought that chimpanzees could really produce creative signs.
After reading this book I am convinced that chimpanzees are highly
intelligent and have been able to learn to use sign language in a way that
I
would consider langauge.(...)
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