Talking with apes

Professor Sue Savage-Rumbaugh in a class at the Ape Language Research Centre of Georgia State University with Kanzi and Panbanisha (By Wcalvin – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=49108463)

 

On concluding my Master of Science at the University of London, (studying philosophy of biology with Professor David Papineau at King’s College), I flew to the United States to a Language Research Centre to meet with the bonobo – or pygmy chimpanzee – Kanzi, and the biologist and psychologist Professor Sue Savage-Rumbaugh of Georgia State University.

Below is the piece I wrote as a cover essay for the Financial Times Weekend section in the winter of 2001.

Advertisement