Chimpanzee Memory

December 3, 2007 5:29 PM

Working memory of numerals in chimpanzees. Are you smarter than a chimpanzee?
posted by homunculus (41 comments total)

I never claimed I was.

*hides from math*
posted by louche mustachio at 5:31 PM on December 3, 2007

fuck you I'm a dragon
posted by Henry C. Mabuse at 5:32 PM on December 3, 2007 [1 favorite]

Without clicking on the link, I'm going to say... no.
posted by Faint of Butt at 5:36 PM on December 3, 2007

Hmm... Is there any evidence that the chimps were thinking of these as "numbers", rather then arbitrary symbols? I wonder if the "mathematical meaning" of the numbers was confusing the humans.

I was wondering if perhaps literacy had something to do with it as well, I've wondered if maybe illiterate people were better at remembering sequences, but according to this PDF their memory is worse. Oh well.
posted by delmoi at 5:37 PM on December 3, 2007

Not only am I not as smart as a chimp, I am willing to admit that one could probably beat the crap out of me.
posted by Astro Zombie at 5:43 PM on December 3, 2007 [1 favorite]

Also, I thought there would be a flash version of this.
posted by delmoi at 5:45 PM on December 3, 2007

After clicking the link, I am now certain that most chimpanzees are smarter than me. Exceptions can be found among chimpanzees holding elected office.
posted by Faint of Butt at 5:45 PM on December 3, 2007

Hmm... Is there any evidence that the chimps were thinking of these as "numbers", rather then arbitrary symbols? I wonder if the "mathematical meaning" of the numbers was confusing the humans.

I don't think it matters, since even if they were replaced with random symbols that had a certain order (this one before that one and so on), I would think the humans would do even worse since they would be spending time wondering which one preceded the other rather than where the symbols were in relation to one another.

If anything, having these symbols already associated with values seems to be an advantage for the humans.
posted by rooftop secrets at 5:50 PM on December 3, 2007

If anything, having these symbols already associated with values seems to be an advantage for the humans.

Yeah, having seen the video I think you're probably right. Also, humans trained for six months and they were not able to improve. But, if shown for 8/10ths of a second, the humans are able to compete with a Chimp. It's just when they are only shown the numbers for 4/10th's of a second that the humans fall behind.
posted by delmoi at 5:54 PM on December 3, 2007

"Smarter?" Better at "math?"

How about "apparently chimps can memorize the order in which numbers disappear from a screen better than college kids under certain situations."

When chimps are completing Portal--nay, speed runs of Portal--and helping my children with long division, then you may use the headline "Are You Smarter Than a Chimpanzee?"
posted by CitrusFreak12 at 5:55 PM on December 3, 2007 [1 favorite]

Is there any evidence that the chimps were thinking of these as "numbers", rather then arbitrary symbols?

No. It's more like photographic memory.
posted by homunculus at 5:59 PM on December 3, 2007

Yeah, but who's in the cages, pushing pellets for food?

No, really, I just shrug my shoulders at the framing of this and similar stories. The whole "ooo, ooo, chimps, are smarter than college students in this very specific test, ooo ooo, we have to redefine what it means to be human." Well no, the chimp is still a chimp and just 'cause the it can still remember numbers, when they're only displayed for four tenths of second isn't an earth shattering event.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:59 PM on December 3, 2007

It's just when they are only shown the numbers for 4/10th's of a second that the humans fall behind.

Right, so I understand how this seems to be a visual memory advantage rather than a reasoning one.
posted by rooftop secrets at 6:00 PM on December 3, 2007

Or what homunculus said.
posted by rooftop secrets at 6:03 PM on December 3, 2007

At last, solid proof of the lie that is evolution. If we evolved from chimps, wouldn't we be better than them, eh Mr. Darwin?
posted by Krrrlson at 6:04 PM on December 3, 2007

At last, solid proof of the lie that is evolution. If we evolved from chimps, wouldn't we be better than them, eh Mr. Darwin?

Humans and chimps descended from a common ancestor.
posted by delmoi at 6:08 PM on December 3, 2007 [2 favorites]

Methinks Krrrlson is being a tad sarcastic.
posted by rooftop secrets at 6:13 PM on December 3, 2007

*throws poo at Brandon Blatcher*
posted by homunculus at 6:42 PM on December 3, 2007

Is there any evidence that the chimps were thinking of these as "numbers", rather then arbitrary symbols?

Silly hu-mans. As if there were any difference.
Cue Pythagoras and his minions...
posted by joe lisboa at 6:59 PM on December 3, 2007

This is pretty clear. Humans do worse because they don't get peanuts as a reward after every successful trial....

Perhaps the human subjects are less dextrous and slower to press the numbers than the trained chimps, so since iconic memory fades fast, they lose out. And the study doesn't seem to say that the human subjects had any training.
posted by parudox at 7:25 PM on December 3, 2007

Yeah, but who's in the cages, pushing pellets for food?

Cages with polyester fiber walls that don't even go to the ceiling and tokens representing food and you have described most of us. At least the chimps would try and escape.
posted by srboisvert at 8:00 PM on December 3, 2007 [2 favorites]

No. It's more like photographic memory.

Is it me, or does that look like the coolest video game ever. I mean, I know the graphics suck, but every time you score a point ... food comes out!

I guess I would get pretty good at that game, too.
posted by YoBananaBoy at 8:38 PM on December 3, 2007

According to data and error bars on this graph, some humans were better than some chimps, some were worse. That's a far cry from "chimps are better than humans at this random task I invented."

Also, keep the humans in cages, feed them gruel every day, make them practice your game every day for two years, and give them candy whenever they get an answer right. Then we'll see who does better.

You can really publish anything in Bio journals, can't you?
posted by noble_rot at 8:48 PM on December 3, 2007

Without clicking on the link, I'm going to say yes, unless a chimpanzee can complete my grant application, do a couple of employee reviews, send a note to a friend whose kid has lymphoma, work on songwriting for a while, assemble a tasty hot dinner out of things found in the fridge and pantry, make a seasonal mix CD for my brother, pay my bills and reconcile my bank account, and find time for some social blogging.

There are a lot of dimensions to intelligence.
posted by Miko at 9:40 PM on December 3, 2007

According to data and error bars on this graph, some humans were better than some chimps, some were worse. That's a far cry from "chimps are better than humans at this random task I invented."

The chimp you see in the line below is the mother, Ai, from an adult/aged population, and the chimp scoring better than the humans is young.
So, it would help if they had some age-matched controls. As the text later says:
Eidetic imagery ... is known to be present in a relatively high percentage of normal children, and then the ability declines with age.
posted by NikitaNikita at 10:59 PM on December 3, 2007

assemble a tasty hot dinner out of things found in the fridge and pantry

Virtually any animal can assemble a tasty dinner out of things they find in your fridge and pantry. (in my experience, animals generally don't like hot food, and I don't see how that's related to intelligence).

The rest of your items seem to involve working for you, which also seems a bit odd as a definition of intelligence.
posted by effbot at 11:24 PM on December 3, 2007

*gets homunculus transferred to medical testing labs*
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 2:27 AM on December 4, 2007

Is there any evidence that the chimps were thinking of these as "numbers", rather then arbitrary symbols

Well, what are numerals except arbitrary symbols arranged in an arbitrary order.
posted by empath at 5:23 AM on December 4, 2007

are there any video links that work?
posted by empath at 5:23 AM on December 4, 2007

here is one video.
posted by empath at 5:25 AM on December 4, 2007

effbot, points for intentional obtuseness, but the chimp wouldn't have made anything for dinner that my family would eat.

My point, obviously, is that directly comparing intelligences in different species with questions like "Are you smarter than a chimp?" isn't likely to lead to insights into the nature of intelligence. Intelligence is variously defined, but one of the very most useful definitions has to do with one's capability to accomplish tasks deemed important by oneself and one's social group. I listed things I had done today because they are valued by my society and are considered signs of intelligence. Since the question was posed "are you smarter than a chimp?" I can only answer "yes, if we are testing the chimp on abilities for which I am considered smart rather than on the chimp's own abilities within a chimp cohort."

If the question were "Can you complete a contrived, finite task better than a chimp" I wouldn't have challenged it.

Intelligence is a socially constructed concept. What makes a chimp intelligent to other chimps is not likely to get him accepted to an Ivy League program. What makes a human intelligent to other humans is not likely to lay the groundwork for success as a chimp. I'm as interested as anyone in cognition and how it's adaptive, but the question bothered me in its simplicity. Human minds are very complex and highly adaptable. Any useful definition of intelligence has to take into account the ability to comprehend and manage tasks one's species finds valuable.
posted by Miko at 5:45 AM on December 4, 2007

"Are you smarter than a computer" is probably an analogous (and equally pointless) question.
posted by empath at 6:02 AM on December 4, 2007

Seeing as how the chimps are not debating 'Who's smarter?' on Metafilter, I'd have to say "no, why no we are not!'

However, we are better looking.
posted by sfts2 at 6:16 AM on December 4, 2007

the chimps are not debating 'Who's smarter?

The chest-beating, tooth-baring, and poop-throwing take care of that.
posted by Miko at 6:50 AM on December 4, 2007

“Smart” is such a loosely defined word. Like “fittest.”
My mom, f’rinstance, never graduated high school. But she busted her ass, worked hard, made some savvy financial decisions and did pretty well for herself, has her personal life squared away, plenty of friends, works in the community, etc. etc. Solid well rounded citizen. My brother in law graduated from MIT, sits on his ass all day, doesn’t have two nickles to rub together. No friends, can barely wash dishes. Who’s smarter? (I granting the intellectual advantage to my brother in law, but smart? Nah.)

Similarly - nearly any human is ‘smarter’ than any chimp given we have access to tens of thousands of years of culture, learning and technology.
My personal intellect can no longer be quantified within specific tasks and parameters as they were in the early 18-1900s.
I no longer need to have those rote skill sets. I should be judged on how smart I am - that is - how well I access and manipulate resources and use tools to efficiently achieve a broad spectrum of survival goals.
So - I don’t know dick about quadratics, but my town has a huge well stocked library and in a few years I could teach myself and train myself to do it well.
But I don’t even need to do that - I have a computer, and access to other minds. I can figure out almost any mathematical query put to me (and so can you).
In those terms of ‘smart,’ what we’re capable of, I - and all of you - are the smartest beings that have ever lived. Chimps aren’t even in the same league, not even the same game.
So why the hell do I need to have a really good numerical memory?
I don’t need it any more than I need huge canine teeth or a super thick hide or a tail to shoo flies with.
I’ve got tools. That’s what humans do - we use the environment and other animals.
Should we exploit them or think of ourselves as apart from nature? No.
So - are young chimps better than adult humans in a specific memory task? Apparently.
That gives them a specific cognitive edge based on brain architecture. In limited ways they have greater intellect than we do. (And dolphins probably have huge chunks of intellectual acumen we don’t have too)
But let’s not lose sight of what it is humans do. If we allowed ourselves to remain a less shaggy, plains adapted primate, we’d die off the next generation.
The human-animal dichotomy might be wrong, but part of the ‘human’ part of that equation is stewardship of the planet.
The burden of responsibility that humans have that animals really don’t have because they have only what they carry with them. We, on the other hand, massively manipulate our environments.
Think a chimp knows or cares about conservation of resources and the general welfare of life on Earth? They are some savage bastards when they battle en masse. It’s doubtful they’re that altruistic. But even if they knew, and cared, they don’t have the ability, the smarts.
I’d argue, that makes our understanding and responsibility for care of the Earth all the more poignant. Animals that we are, we are still the creatures most directly responsible for what happens to life on the planet.
They depend on us, and we on them. The only real difference is we know it. (Or some of us should know it, and obviously don’t.)
So are we smarter than chimps? Well, the whole damned world, chimps included, better hope so.
posted by Smedleyman at 8:37 AM on December 4, 2007

Wow. The defensiveness in this thread is rather amazing. As if there were actually a question of which species is more intelligent.

Young chimpanzes are better than adult humans in a memory task.

The fact clearly tells that the human-animal dichotomy is wrong.

He has a very good point. Most humans generally assume that we are superior to chimps in all cognitive abilities. They are now proven completely wrong.

Of course, chimpanzees aren't "smarter" than humans ... It would be impossible for them to be smarter because we define the term. They may be brutal little fucks when it comes to food and sex, but their suicide and pollution rates seem much, much lower than humans. Just a thought. (They also seem to take much better care of their bodies.)
posted by mrgrimm at 10:15 AM on December 4, 2007

Good point...and how do you suppose chimps define the term? Or do they? What is the chimp body of thought on the nature of intelligence? Where are their intelligence studies on humans to be found? I'm eager to hear about their scientific method and what results it's producing in the chimp academy.

Personally, I'm coming from a more 'offensive' than defensive standpoint. I am not anti-animal, nor do I necessarily believe humans are more important than chimps (though, I'm sure that between saving a drowning human and saving a drowning chimp, all things being equal, you'd go after the human first). My point is actually exactly like yours, mrgrimm: any assertion that humans or chimps are "smarter than" one another is silly. My cat is much more intelligent than I am when it comes to finding and killing mice with her bare limbs. However, I am more intelligent than she when it comes to setting traps - and traps are less bloody.

It's just a silly dichotomy. Though all life is worthy of respect and has dignity, we are all adapted to the work of our own species. The general rule in cognition is that the more behavior is unprogrammed at birth, the more 'intelligent' (that is, responsive to learning and adaptable) the animal will be. Humans have an enormous capacity for learning, and for recording and passing along that learning, and that's important. That provides the adaptability for some serious intelligence. A lot of other animals (elephants, dolphins, the primates) come very close to our ability to learn and to communicate information. But those behaviors are so much broader in scope than a single apprehension test. It's as empath suggested: my computer is smarter than me at math, and at searching. But my computer is utterly unable to be a member of society, to develop relationships, to initiate contact, and to be reflective and original. Of what use is it to say that my computer is "smarter?"
posted by Miko at 11:14 AM on December 4, 2007

Now that I've read the articles thoroughly, too, I notice another important point to make.

When reading articles about scientific finding, read for what, exactly, they were testing and the claims the test actually ables them to make.

No one is saying chimps are "smarter than you." They are saying only that chimps can demonstrate superior performance on this one task, "better than that of human adults tested in the same apparatus, following the same procedure.”"

Now, it certainly does appear to be a very significant finding, since, as the researcher says, "No one can imagine that chimpanzees—young chimpanzees at the age of five—have a better performance in a memory task than humans." So, he's been successful in showing that he can create a memory task at which chimpanzees perform better than people. And as a result, he's successfully called into question what is apparently a widely held assumption about chimps: that they wouldn't outperform a human on any memory task.

But that's all.

He asserts that his experiment "clearly tells that the human-animal dichotomy is wrong. Human is a member of the animal kingdom."

Is that really the value of this experiment? Seems to me that just about all life sciences and social sciences have agreed with this assertion for at least a century.

It just seems it's a narrow finding being presented as a rather sweeping one.

Basically, I have no reason to doubt that the chimps were better at this experimental challenge than people. The interesting question to me would be why? Is it because they have better "numerical recollection?" Better pattern recognition? Qucker visual processing? Is it because the chimps live in a research institute and practice this sort of skill quite a bit? What else is going on in the chimps' lives that would compete with this for the power of their concentration? Is it because the human subjects' brains are those of college students and may be responding to the stress of finals or the recent breakup, or are mentally spending their researcher's fee, or are not really caring what they're doing but just going through the motions to get credit or a few bucks?

Intelligence has many dimensions. To use this experiment to make the broad claim that "chimps are smarter than humans" is not only a rather extreme reach from the findings, but just creates the circular question "Who says what smart is?"

Are chimps better at being human than humans? No. Humans are smarter at being humans.
posted by Miko at 11:33 AM on December 4, 2007

Miko is right on, of course. I was just surprised by the defensive reaction of most posters (who I assume are humans).

Just b/c chimps have better random photographic memory abilities in limited situations doesn't make us evolutionary losers. But it's still an important (and fascinating) discovery, imo.
posted by mrgrimm at 6:17 PM on December 4, 2007

Thinking Like a Monkey
posted by homunculus at 9:01 AM on December 31, 2007

'Laughs' not exclusive to humans: The basis for laughter may have originated in an ancient primate ancestral to both humans and modern apes, a study suggests.
posted by homunculus at 11:36 PM on January 2, 2008