# Koko the Gorilla "adopted" kittens: skepticism . . . . **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [June 22, 2018, 6:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561 "2018-06-22T06:05:00Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/21 "2018-06-22T20:23:27Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > Did she do lots of signs for particular words, or did she make a lot of hand movements until she “said” something that her handlers interpreted as a word? I’ve seen some of the unedited tapes, and she tended to move her hands a lot until one of the movements was interpreted as a word. I don’t know about Koko, but Washoe the chimp who supposedly did signs would make a lot of gestures, some of which were signs and some of which were signs that didn’t have a lot to do with whatever they were “talking” about, and the trainer picked out the signs he thought were significant. Some were significant - the chimp knew “more” and “drink” pretty well. Whether there was more to it than “whatever gets me the banana” is hard to say. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/22 "2018-06-22T20:24:42Z")
> [@RivkahChaya](#): > > IF Koko did sign anything deliberate at all, she signed completely on the semantic level, not at all on the syntactic level. She mostly used single signs to ask for things she wanted. She did not do anything that resembled conversation. I have no doubt that gorillas can learn the meanings of words (spoken or signed) or even very simple phrases - dogs, cats, birds, horses, etc. can do as much. I have never been convinced that gorillas can use human language as humans do. They can communicate… but that’s not the same as having a language. From what I’ve seen (which is admittedly limited) Koko isn’t doing anything more than what my parrots do - my birds know words and phrases and can use them to communicate very basic needs and concepts (Food. Danger. I want my head scratched. Etc.) What they can not do is hold an actual conversation with me. The notion that a gorilla could ask for a favorite food or identify a familiar person doesn’t surprise me. More than that requires more evidence than I ever saw with Koko. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 8:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/23 "2018-06-22T20:25:27Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > And this is why people don’t trust science. Don’t blame science for something that wasn’t science. ---
**Author:** ![Musicat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/musicat/32/20189_2.png) [@Musicat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Musicat)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/24 "2018-06-22T20:28:40Z")
> [@Earl\_Snake-Hips\_Tucker](#): > > I actually had thought that it was generally understood that Koko’s use of sing language was exaggerated. Never knew gorillas could carry a tune. Maybe she would sing for her supper. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/25 "2018-06-22T20:30:51Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > Don’t blame science for something that wasn’t science. To the average person, though, it seems like science. A respected person with a Dr in front of her name tells how she taught a gorilla to sign. And that the gorilla can form rudimentary sentences and communicate more complex ideas than conventional understanding of animal minds would think. A non-scientist, upon finding out that the whole thing was bogus, would file it under “never believe anything so-called scientists say”. And it’s a small step from that to anti-vaxxers. ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/26 "2018-06-22T20:39:47Z")
Penny Patterson made a monkey out of a lot of people. It was much too convenient that she was the only one that had meaningful conversations with koko. Koko could indicate that she wanted something. A favorite treat or toy. Maybe even a desire for interaction and attention. Patterson tended to extrapolate a lot more meaning from koko’s gestures than was really there. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/27 "2018-06-22T20:44:24Z")
> [@Sarabellum1976](#): > > There were certainly plenty of assertions that Koko’s use of language was greatly exaggerated by her keeper, in order to keep up funding. > > These assertions did not seem baseless, at least to me. My friend was a ASL interpreter. She watched Koko, and yes, Koko was making some signs, like for food. But she said they were by no means complete sentences and many were gibberish. So yeah, Koko did learn (among others) the sign for food. But Koko wasn’t “talking”. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/28 "2018-06-22T20:47:39Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > I don’t know about Koko, but Washoe the chimp who supposedly did signs would make a lot of gestures, some of which were signs and some of which were signs that didn’t have a lot to do with whatever they were “talking” about, and the trainer picked out the signs he thought were significant. > > Some were significant - the chimp knew “more” and “drink” pretty well. Whether there was more to it than “whatever gets me the banana” is hard to say. > > Regards, > Shodan Thanks for the reminder. I first heard about Washoe in(I think) The Skeptical Inquirer, then later in Skeptic. ---
**Author:** ![mixdenny](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mixdenny/32/2962_2.png) [@mixdenny](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mixdenny)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/29 "2018-06-22T22:58:24Z")
> [@aceplace57](#): > > Penny Patterson made a monkey out of a lot of people. > > It was much too convenient that she was the only one that had meaningful conversations with koko. > > Koko could indicate that she wanted something. A favorite treat or toy. Maybe even a desire for interaction and attention. > > Patterson tended to extrapolate a lot more meaning from koko’s gestures than was really there. Did she ever flash her nipples to Koko? I’d like to see that. Dennis ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [June 22, 2018, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/30 "2018-06-22T23:23:42Z")
> [@Beckdawrek](#): > > Wha? The gorilla signed to see nipples? I thought only creepy guys on the internet did that. That was mentioned in my local newspaper, and that two women were fired for refusing this request, and eventually won a settlement from the facility. :eek: That alone made me wonder just how ethical this whole experiment was. This story also referenced Nim Chimpsky, about whom a documentary was made a few years ago. I did see it, and from what I remember, that experiment didn’t go so well, and neither did a similar one with a chimp named Washoe. However, these were chimps, not gorillas. > **[Nim Chimpsky](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nim_Chimpsky)** > > Neam "Nim" Chimpsky (November 19, 1973 – March 10, 2000) was a chimpanzee and the subject of an extended study of animal language acquisition at Columbia University. The project was led by Herbert S. Terrace with the linguistic analysis headed up by psycholinguist Thomas Bever. Within the context of a scientific study, Chimpsky was named as a pun on linguist Noam Chomsky, who posits that humans are "wired" to develop language. > As part of a study intended to challenge Chomsky's thesis that only... ---
**Author:** ![Merneith](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/57b2e6/32.png) [@Merneith](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merneith)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2018, 12:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/31 "2018-06-23T00:22:02Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > My friend was a ASL interpreter. She watched Koko, and yes, Koko was making some signs, like for food. But she said they were by no means complete sentences and many were gibberish. > > So yeah, Koko did learn (among others) the sign for food. But Koko wasn’t “talking”. If she could use some signs deliberately, repeatedly - then that’s “talking”, even if it’s not talking in complete English sentences (and even if it’s not by-the-rules ASL). Naturally, her vocab was strongest with the things that would be of most interest to a gorilla. That should be expected. She’s a gorilla. All gorillas communicate. Koko might have learned a few signs in order to communicate with non-gorillas but her interests would still have been all-gorilla. I think it’s clear that she could communicate but unreasonable to define communication as being purely the way adult human English & ASL speakers do. I think we have to understand her communicating on its own level, as we do with other species. ---
**Author:** ![senoy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dbc845/32.png) [@senoy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/senoy)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2018, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/32 "2018-06-23T00:36:58Z")
Unfortunately, it most certainly is science. Patterson has dozens of papers in peer-reviewed journals and has presented at major conferences. The dirty secret of science is that much if not most of it is false. A lot of it has to do with poor statistical inferences, small sample sizes and too large of confidence intervals. A minority is simply faked and unfortunately a larger percentage is simply confirmation bias. There have been a number of papers that have attempted to address the issues, but there’s quite a bit of inertia within academia, not to mention a great deal of money that tends to work against revolutionary action. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2018, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/33 "2018-06-23T19:51:26Z")
> [@Merneith](#): > > If she could use some signs deliberately, repeatedly - then that’s “talking”, even if it’s not talking in complete English sentences (and even if it’s not by-the-rules ASL). > > I think it’s clear that she could communicate but unreasonable to define communication as being purely the way adult human English & ASL speakers do. I think we have to understand her communicating on its own level, as we do with other species. I dont define “talking” as knowing a couple of words. Communicating, sure, but not talking. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2018, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/34 "2018-06-23T19:58:05Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > My friend was a ASL interpreter. She watched Koko, and yes, Koko was making some signs, like for food. But she said they were by no means complete sentences and many were gibberish. > > So yeah, Koko did learn (among others) the sign for food. But Koko wasn’t “talking”. I’m more familiar with chimp signing and not so much Koko, but there is no doubt the signing was real, if limited. As you say, no complete sentences. Usually just one or two words, often about food and often with “hurry hurry” thrown in for good measure. [Kanzi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanzi) the bonobo was taught to point to abstract symbols on a board to communicate. No need to interpret sign language. Pictures of Kanzi always gave me a bit of the creeps as I’ve never seen pics of a bonobo in the wild that was so very much overweight. They are usually downright skinny looking. ---
**Author:** ![Tzigone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Tzigone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tzigone)\ **Post date:** [June 23, 2018, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561/35 "2018-06-23T20:02:08Z")
> [@](#): > > I dont define “talking” as knowing a couple of words. That’s slightly odd to me, because if I asked to say “yes” or “no” if a baby was talking yet, I’d say yes, even if the baby only used a few words. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/koko-the-gorilla-adopted-kittens-skepticism/816561.md?page=1)