ShortHand: Was Koko Talking?
Koko, a female western lowland gorilla, had a signing vocabulary of more than 1,000 words. She described her dreams, had a pet kitten, made jokes, expressed love and grief, played bass with Flea, and even made Robin Williams laugh.The world fell in love. But then, a bunch of killjoy academics called monkey business on the whole endeavour. So: can apes talk to humans? It’s complicated. Here’s the ShortHand.
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Sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/21/us/koko-gorilla-death-sign-language.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clever_Hans
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/19/magazine/why-tell-koko-about-robin-williamss-death.html
‘A Conversation With Koko The Gorilla’
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/120306-gorilla-genome-apes-humans-evolution-science#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20new%20genetic,according%20to%20the%20new%20study.
https://www.britannica.com/science/human-evolution
https://www.koko.org/blogs/news-and-events/
https://www.koko.org/news-and-events/4439/join-us-in-celebrating-kokos-life-1971-2018/
https://www.youtube.com/@kokoflix
https://daily.jstor.org/the-legacy-of-koko-the-gorilla/
https://web.archive.org/web/20180911032259/http://www.koko.org/interspecies-communication
https://web.archive.org/web/20180911164205/http://www.koko.org/scientific-goals-history
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/magazine/article/conversations-with-koko-the-gorilla