Animal Language

The power of speech makes human beings different from other animals. Perhaps it is the power of speech that helped human beings develop into modern society .Do other animals also have language? It is question worth considering.

    Some people say that human beings are the only animals that have language. Is this true? It is a very difficult question to answer .A person must have a good definition of "language". Different kinds of animals must be studies. Some animals certainly seem to have a communication system. That system may not be a language .For example, the bee has ways of telling other bees about food.

    The dolphin, a kind of fish, has ways of giving information to other dolphins. The monkey, an animal that is similar to humans in many ways, can use a human language system. Does this mean animals have language? We will study each of these animals to try to answer this question.

    Bees do two kinds of dances to tell other bees of their discovery of food ..First, there is a round dance. In this dance, the bee moves in a circle inside the hive. The round dance is used when food is close by. The food must not be more than ten meters away .If a bee comes back and does a round dance, other bees know they must go out and look nearby for food. The bees also smell the bee that has found the food. The smell tells them what kind of flower to look for .After watching the round dance and smelling the bee that has found the food, the other bees can find the food source.

    A second kind of dance done by the bees is a tail-wagging dance .In this dance, the bee wiggles the end of its body as it moves in a straight line .The tail-wagging dances used when the food is more than ten meters away. The bees know from the speed of the tail-wagging dance just how far away the food source is.The line the bee dances on shows the direction that the bees must fly in to find the food. In the tail-wagging dance, the bees also smell the bee that has found the food .The smell tells them what kind of flower to look for. After watching the tail-wagging dance and smelling the bee that has found ,the other bees know three things. They know how far to fly, what direction to fly in, and what kinds of flowers to look f or.

    The bees' communication system is extremely interesting . Each bee can tell all the other bees where to look for food. The bees can also tell one another if the food is especially good and how much of it there is. Karl von Frisch did an experiment with bees .He put a food source very high above the bee hive, and put a bee into the food. The bee returned to the hive and did the round dance, but none of the other bees could find the food. This suggests that bees do not really have a language .One bee could not tell the other bees the height of the food.One bee could not communicate this new information to the others.

    Dolphins,like bees , have been studied to see if they have a language . Although scientists have not studied the dolphin as carefully as they have studied the bee, they have made interesting discoveries .Many observations have been made. A few experiment with dolphins have been done. The dolphin has been studied because its general behavior is much like that of humans .For communication, however, the dolphin's system is much more limited than a person's. The dolphin has three kinds of calls or noises to tell other dolphins about food, danger, or other things.

    It seems that bees and dolphins communicate, but that they do not have language .It is much more difficult to decide whether monkeys have language .Monkeys are very intelligent and similar to humans. Because of this similarity, some scientists in the late 1940's tried to teach a monkey named Viki to talk. After a year, Viki could only say a few words. Part of the problem with this experiment is that monkeys do not have the same kind of mouth and throat as humans. They are not really able to make human speech sounds. As a result ,the experiment with Viki did not work well.

    In the mid-1960's,other scientists tried to teach a money named Washoe to use a sign language. In a sign language , words are not spoken. Instead ,signs are made with the hands. Many people who cannot speak or hear use this sign language. It seemed to be a better kind of language to teach to a monkey. After two years, Washoe could make thirty-four signs with her hands For example, she could put three fingers next to her ear as a sign for her name, Washoe.. She could also do two other things. .First, she combined signs to make sentences.. Second, she used one sign for all things of one kind, generalizing her use of the sign. The ability to combine and to generalize is important in language use.

    A third group of scientists have been working with a monkey named Lana in the past few years. Lana is being studied at the Yerkes Primate Research Center in the Unite States. The scientists who are working with Lana are studying her ability to make sentences. She makes sentences by pressing symbols on a computer board. Lana may ask the computer to give her food ,water, or toys. She must press the symbols in a correct sentence order to get what she wants. Lana has learned to use the nearly 100 symbols on the computer board .She can also use the symbols on the computer to answer simple questions which the scientist asks, using the computer also .She has shown that she understands sentences in two ways. First, she can correct the word order in a sentence. If the scientist presses the symbols in the wrong order ,Lana will press them correctly. Lana has also shown that different word orders have different meanings for her .Lana's achievements are quite amazing .Does she have a language?

    Of course, the answer to this question depends on how "language"is defined. We may define language as any system for exchanging information .If this definition is used, then bees ,dolphins, and monkeys all have a language .But language may be defined in another way. We may define language as a system for exchanging information by making new combinations of symbols .If this definition is used ,then bees and dolphins do not have a language, but monkeys may have one. Monkeys are clearly able to combine symbols in a human language that they have been taught. This is not their usual language, however.

    Animal language, then, is a very complex thing. Many experiments are interesting because they tell us more about animals . They are also interesting because they may help us learn language. The system used to teach Washoe has helped some humans to learn language . These experiments are a help to humans. We really cannot say whether animals have language or not .Much more research will have to be done before we can be sure.

From Readings in Contemporary Culture.
ed. , Alice S. Horning, New York, 1970.
Approximately 1290 words.