Panzee the Chimp

So, we really are a lot alike our ancestors, chimpanzees. This story from Discovery News tells us about Panzee.

Panzee understands more than 130 English language words. She isn't responding to just a particular person's voice, but really understands the words. She can recognize them when spoken in "sine-wave" form - a synthetic speech. Researchers say that her understanding shows that our common ancestors may have been able to use speech like sounds before the evolution of actual speech.

Some of the words that Panzee can understand are tickle, M&M, lemonade, and sparkler. She knows what the words mean and can match them to photos illustrating the word. Researchers say that Panzee can understand these words because of her early experiences with speech, just like a human learns to speak.

I think that my cats can understand a lot more than we will ever know. (OK, maybe not Henry... he's not the brightest bulb...) But, Oscar really does seem to understand us. And Ben... well, Ben is a special case. Often, it feels like he understands our conversations. He reacts in ways that you wouldn't necessarily expect him to, but fit for what we were talking about. Are we anthropomorphizing? Yeah, probably. But... given what we know about Panzee, I think we don't give animals enough credit for understanding us humans! What do you think?

--Tammy

Comments

[Laurel]

There is more and more research that seems to suggest that animals understand many words and concepts. My dog bear was bugging me the other day, following me around the house and panting over me when I sat down in my chair. Somewhat impatiently, I said, "Bear, go get a drink of water and stop panting. " And he did. And the water dish was in another room and I didn't gesture in its direction. And my voice tone was not encouraging. I think he definitely understood the word "water."

Bear is a smarter than average dog and has a large vocabulary. He is also emotionally intelligent, aware of what is going on around him energetically at all times. I definitely think we underestimate animals command of language!

[Jan]

I'm always finding a story that says that researchers are surprised or shocked to find that dogs understand more than they thought. I think the researchers can't be too smart or they don't have pets.

[Jessica @ YouDidWhatWithYourWeiner]

Well, it is a nice thought but I picture Chester's thought process going something like this:

Picture a huge slot-machine wheel constantly spinning in his head. When he sniffs a certain smell or sees a trigger like a squirrel, the wheel goes "DING" and stops spinning on the picture of whatever it was. Then the wheel is off an spinning again seconds later......