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Thursday, June 10, 2021

Low Tech Communication Aids

 


The latest development on my YouTube channel is Memberships. In order to support my research, you can join the channel as a Donor, a Patron or a Benefactor. Here is a link:

https://www.youtube.com/c/AyaKatz/membership

Among the perks available to members are previews of videos about Bow's writing, literacy and other intellectual pursuits at a time when these are not yet available to the general public. Since revenue from viral videos comes primarily from people who are not subscribed to my channel and could not care less about ape language research, this seems like a fair allocation of our resources. The general public gets to view grooming videos right away, but more recent advances in ape language studies are shared first and foremost with our Donors, Patrons and Benefactors.

Since the inception of  Project Bow, I have found that low tech methods work better and are more cost effective when working with a strong but intellectual chimpanzee such as Bow. A talking machine was quickly replaced by laminated menus, self-flushing toilet by a plastic potty chair and a touch screen computer by an old fashioned notebook and pen.

The problem that the touch screen computer was meant to solve was Bow's reliance on caretakers' hands to point at letters on the glass. This is a problem of proof, not of communication. It looks to outsiders as if Bow is being manipulated by his interlocutors to point at the letters.  But it certainly does not look to us that way, and it does not explain why Bow can tell us things we did not know and share information available only to him. So it was suggested that the intercession of a non-manipulable computer could solve this PR problem for us.

In order to motivate Bow to use a computer to communicate, certain ape language researchers suggested pairing the touch screen computer with a food dispenser, so that Bow would essentially be typing for a food reward. "Machines can't be manipulated, so he would have to say what the machine wanted him to say," I was told.

I don't want Bow to  have to say anything. I want him to be able to say what he wants to say.  Here is an example of something ordinary, but totally unexpected, that Bow recently said to his caretaker while I was away: "Go sit outside." She was confused, "You want me to sit outside? How do you mean, like on the porch?" He answered: "Yes."

There is nothing extraordinary about this exchange, but it could not have happened with a touch screen computer tied to a food dispenser. Bow could not tell the dispenser anything. He would be totally subject to its mechanical limitations.

Recently, Bow and I watched a video of an Israeli young man who lost his voice while serving in the army. Bow identified with the voiceless man. He watched as the young man talked to a reporter by writing in an ordinary old fashioned notebook by putting pen to paper. "You could do that, too," I told Bow. "You could talk to people by writing in a notebook."



Bow was moved to try. His attempt looks like letters, though hard to tell what he wanted to say.  You can contrast his attempt to write letters  with his drawing on  this other page in the same notebook, in which a  month earlier he had tried to draw a face. (The face Bow drew is only in black ink. The other bigger face in blue was one I tried to draw.)


If you want to see the videos of Bow writing and drawing, you can join as a member of my channel. Eventually, these videos will all be released to the public, but you will see them in advance, and you can know that you helped finance my research.

Thank you!




https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCMFOFKeAjwLWAlNrCvQVxvQ

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