If these monkeys could talk

December 9, 2016 12:28 PM

For years, the standard line in Ling 101 courses has been "Monkeys and apes can't make human speech sounds because of the shape of their vocal tract". A new paper is challenging that idea; NPR write up here.

Using live X-ray data from living monkeys (as opposed to plaster casts of dead ones), researches showed that a variety of macaque vocal tract configurations can produce a range of human speech sounds, with the notable exception of the "i" sound in "beet". Using their data, the researchers created synthesized monkey vowels, which humans were able to tell apart in a perception experiment.

Listen to a simulation of what it would sound like if a monkey said "Will you marry me?"* here.

Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately), the monkeys still appear to lack the neural control necessary to actually produce the sounds on their own, so there won't be any talking monkeys any time soon.

*For linguists keeping track at home, they replaced the /i/s with /ɪ/

posted by damayanti (18 comments total)

So how does one say "Take your stinking paws off me you damn dirty ape!" to them so they understand ?

(This is fascinating -- there are vocal cords/larynx, but lacks the brain/nerve connections to control it better ?)
posted by k5.user at 12:38 PM on December 9, 2016

MetaFilter: What it would sound like if a monkey said "Will you marry me?"
posted by Strange Interlude at 12:38 PM on December 9, 2016 [8 favorites]

so there won't be any talking monkeys any time soon.

Well, they won't be speaking human.
posted by Celsius1414 at 12:42 PM on December 9, 2016

Final line of the NPR article [real]
"The new Planet of the Apes is a pretty accurate representation of what we think is going on"
posted by Lazlo Hollyfeld at 12:44 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

Very cool. I'm glad they acknowledge the hard work grunting, cooing, threatening, and lip smacking by Franco, Patrice, and Emiliano. In case anyone is interested, "Monkeys were seated in restraint chairs for placement within the x-ray field of view, but were not head-fixed and were allowed a complete range of head motion, essential to capturing natural orofacial gestures." Sometimes, they got treats.
posted by ChuraChura at 12:45 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

Sounds pretty much like one of my staff meetings.
posted by Celsius1414 at 12:47 PM on December 9, 2016 [7 favorites]

k5.user, the bigger problem had been theorized to be further up the vocal tract. The shape of your mouth/lips determines what sounds can come out (just like, say, a flute sounds like a flute because of its shape); basically, past research suggested that monkey's mouths couldn't make the right shapes. This research shows that they can.
posted by damayanti at 12:49 PM on December 9, 2016

GregNog: Then it starts singing a Christmas carol generated by a neural network.
posted by Quindar Beep at 1:00 PM on December 9, 2016 [3 favorites]

I compared this to some of Labov's charts, and it looks to me like the monkeys would have trouble with back vowels— human [u] and [ɑ] are off their charts. (They get to an F2 of 1300, while humans can go as low as 600.) Which is probably why the reconstruction sounds like "Will yuh marry me".

[i] (as in 'beanplating') is off the chart too, but not by as much. But we're very sensitive to distinctions here, which is why that region sounds like [ɪ] (as in 'bin').
posted by zompist at 1:39 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

steve
posted by scruss at 2:15 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

I might have thought the fact that we've known for decades that a harbor seal can produce not only human vocal sounds, but complete words and phrases in a recognizable regional accent would have made people more cautious in asserting that this or that shape of vocal tract was absolutely necessary.
posted by jamjam at 3:10 PM on December 9, 2016 [4 favorites]

In that film, after a lab chimp named Caesar undergoes brain changes, he eventually is able to speak words such as "No."

Simians might not be able to verbalize a recognizable human sound such as 'no', but every one I have ever seen has been able to get the concept across, even without feces throwing.
posted by BlueHorse at 3:16 PM on December 9, 2016

jamjam, I remember my mom telling me about Hoover but I had forgotten his name - thanks for the link!
posted by en forme de poire at 3:17 PM on December 9, 2016

This research is about the shape of their vocal tract, though.

The shape of the vocal tract is important because it's not just the acoustics that matter; it's how the sounds are formed, their articulation. This might sound like a distinction without a difference, but it's actually rather important for things like the study of how human language evolved.

Linguists are well aware that there are animals that can imitate the sounds of human speech. I mean, parrots can do a excellent job of it, and their vocal tract is far more foreign than any primate's. The research isn't about this, though.

Also, I don't know if you've listened to the recordings of Hoover, but.. he's no parrot sorry hoover you're great
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 4:31 PM on December 9, 2016 [2 favorites]

I remember hearing (sorry no cite) that various language studies (using symbolic, sign language forms etc as well as verbal) have shown that other ape species don't have a particular propensity for language acquisition, in fact less so than some species of bird, for instance (e.g. the parrot as mentioned, which I think may be able to learn a significantly larger vocabulary than say chimps)

Are people still barking up this tree, so to speak?
posted by iotic at 5:39 PM on December 9, 2016

I mean, Hoover is amazing for a harbor seal. It's more "animal sings along to the radio viral video" than "Alex asking for a cork nut" levels of cool, but still! It's a sea dog making human noises!
posted by en forme de poire at 9:57 PM on December 9, 2016

So how does one say "Take your stinking paws off me you damn dirty ape!" to them so they understand ?

This sounds more like the kind of thing they would be trying to say to us.
posted by A Thousand Baited Hooks at 2:03 AM on December 10, 2016 [2 favorites]

"Final line of the NPR article [real]
"The new Planet of the Apes is a pretty accurate representation of what we think is going on""

It's always fun to see a sentence that has never existed before.
posted by klangklangston at 12:50 PM on December 10, 2016 [1 favorite]