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Baboons Learn To Identify Words
thomst writes "Seth Borenstein of the AP reports on a story in the April 13 edition of Science (abstract here, full article paywalled) about a study of baboons at Aix-Marseille University in France that demonstrates the primates are capable of distinguishing between short, but real English words and gibberish letter combinations of similar length with an average of 75% accuracy over the course of 300,000 trials. One particularly talented subject named Dan, a 4-year-old baboon, is capable of 80% accuracy. The study's lead scientist, Jonathan Grainger, explains that a simple change in the study's methodology — allowing the subjects to work the training machine at times of their own choosing, rather than on a schedule determined by the researchers, made all the difference. When they are shown a sequence of letters, the subjects must choose between pushing a blue 'button' on a touchscreen (for a nonsense combination), or a green one (for an actual word). If they choose correctly, they get a food reward. Borenstein writes, 'The key is that these animals not only learned by trial and error which letter combinations were correct, but they also noticed which letters tend to go together to form real words, such as SH but not FX, said Grainger. So even when new words were sprung on them, they did a better job at figuring out which were real. Grainger said a pre-existing capacity in the brain may allow them to recognize patterns and objects, and perhaps that's how we humans also first learn to read.'"
As long as no one teaches them the term "Corporate Whore," I think we'd be better off than with what we've got.
Bobo no accept campaign contribution from Exxon. Bobo represent people.
What political party do you join when you don't like Bible-thumpers *or* hippies?
I was wondering why all those screens were set up.
I am very small, utmostly microscopic.
to get those baboons to edit /.
Set your phasers on "funky"!
The French were using english words?
If baboons can learn to recognize words is it ethical to use them in medical testing? Some retarded human beings can't do that much.
I wonder if this would work with other writing systems. Could they learn to tell real Chinese characters from random fake ones, for example?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
this is going to end with Charlton Heston on a beach cursing at the Statue of Liberty.
... welcome our new literate simian overlords.
"The study's lead scientist, Jonathan Grainger, explains that a simple change in the study's methodology — allowing the subjects to work the training machine at times of their own choosing, rather than on a schedule determined by the researchers, made all the difference."
What I take from this is that when I was in high school, I should have been able to get up at noon and go to school then if I wanted to. Guarantee I would have learned more in calculus than having it at 7:30am.
"The refs are calling too many penalties."
stop teaching useful skills to animals with big pointy teeth please
teach them to laugh at youtube or something
"allowing the subjects to work the training machine at times of their own choosing, rather than on a schedule determined by the researchers, made all the difference."
This is directly applicable to humans as well, and probably deserves more research.
Grainger said a pre-existing capacity in the brain may allow them to recognize patterns and objects
That reminds me of a column I read a while ago suggesting exactly that, and offering an evolutionary basis for it, along with an explanation for conspiracy theories. I guess this means that literacy begets superstition?
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
"Researchers make great strides in understanding the means by which these rather primitive humans use to communicate."
Someone get an infinite number of these word-recognizing baboons, and an infinite number of typewriters!
Good judgment comes from experience.
Experience comes from bad judgment.
" ... perhaps that's how we humans also first learn to read."
We didn't learn how to write until much later.
By Mr Burns
Slashdot ya no es que lo era!
First, I would want to start with animals of even higher (subjective, to me) intelligence -- crows, african grey parrots, octopui, squid, elephants, bees, maybe domestic dogs and cats -- and then perform similar experimentation with all forms of human language: gesture (sign) language, written language and especially spoken language. I would especially like to do a double-blinded study with safely-administered psychedelics. We already know that psychedelics have a large effect on the language center of the human mind, so it would be natural for a similar effect to be present upon other animals. Most of those animals already have proven to have communication mechanisms and tool-using capabilities that are non-trivial, and so I feel they already have a similar language capability to humans. Those could be even potentiated through the use of thought-enhancing drugs.
Brian Fundakowski Feldman
The Commission for Shakespearean Literature thanks Aix-Marseille University for its contribution towards re-creating some of Shakespeare's lost works. We look forward to your effort in producing a line of typographical input devices, such as would be more ergonomically suitable for this work.
Please accept this anti-lice shampoo as a token of our gratitude.
That is all.
We should use this teaching method in the Palmetto State. I can imagine a day where our literacy rate is nearly as high as our unemployment rate!
She's at something like 5% accuracy. But what she reads to me is pretty damn funny.
"The ability to delude yourself may be an important survival tool" - Jane Wagner -
No, really! She could.
I killed da wabbit -Elmer Fudd
Can they learn sign language like Gorillas, and communicate with sentence structure to convey an understanding of more abstract concepts like the passage of time? It seems like that could be a possibility, since sentence structure is kind of an extrapolation of spelling.
Birds (mostly I'm thinking of parrots) are known to develop large vocabularies, and gain a sense of context to the noises they make, as an exchange of information regarding their own situational awareness. Understanding noises and even words, and discerning their meanings relative to context is a task that many animals are capable of. Beyond mere habituation through operant conditioning, we have seen Dolphins, Dogs, Pigs, Horses, Elephants and all the Great Apes perform similar tasks through vocalization. But literacy and text is a pretty interesting twist for baboons.
Mae'n dda nad oeddent yn defnyddio'r Gymraeg.
> Baboons Learn To Identify Words
Still Won't Read Words Before Voting On Them
Bada-bing!
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Words are made up of letters. Letters are specific shapes. So words are basically patterns of shapes. The baboons are able to identify specific patterns of shapes 75% of the time. That should come as no surprise, because in their natural environment, they must also be able to identify specific patterns of shapes to survive. Teaching them new patterns, while interesting, is just expanding on what they already do in nature.
It does not mean, however, they can distinguish one word from another, such as dog and cat, although I am sure they can be trained to do that. Nor does it mean that they can interpret the pattern d o g or the pattern c a t to mean a dog or a cat, although, again, I'm sure they can be trained to do that. The real question, as it relates to reading, is can they assimilate what they are seeing. If not, they aren't actually reading.
While driving a car and stopping because you see a big octagon shaped sign is not the same as reading the word "STOP" on it, even though both give the same desired outcome.
Baboons can recognize drawn shapes. Oh boy. Next thing they'll show that baboons can't drive cars. Oh boy. Soon they'll show that, after 50,000 years of existence baboons have the cognitive skills of an 8-month old. Great.
Lets just go ahead and send a cowboy into space.
Then we can get our "Get your hands off me you damn dirty ape"!
Oh wait. That's already happened.
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Optimist.
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I guess you wouldn't need an infinite number of monkeys after all.
who prays for Satan? Who in 18 centuries has had the humanity to pray for the 1 sinner that needed it most? ~Mark Twain
I see you've met my wife.
If not us, who? If not now, when?
Frogs are giving tests to baboons.
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