Imagine That!

Annals of Ordinary and Extraordinary Genius

Robert and Michele Root-Bernstein are co-authors of Sparks of Genius, The 13 Thinking Tools of the World's Most Creative People (Houghton Mifflin, 1999). See full bio

July 22, 2008, Creativity

Comments on "Are You Smarter than an Ape's Uncle?"

Are You Smarter than an Ape's Uncle?

By Michele and Robert Root-Bernstein on July 22, 2008 in Imagine That!

Linguists and philosophers argue that rational thought is impossible without words or symbolic forms of language. But one primate puzzler challenges us to consider forms of effective thinking that do not involve words or numbers. Read More

When we see a stranger pull

Submitted by Anonymous on July 22, 2008 - 12:41pm.

When we see a stranger pull out a gun and we run, do we think? When we go over to and peel a banana do we always think about what we're doing? I don't know that trial and error could explain chimps being able to put together a few sticks and have the process form into a habit. I do kind of doubt it. I've noticed crows lifting large leaves in a marsh-of-sorts presumably because insects and worms will hide under those leaves during the hot, sunlight hours. That seems like it could more easily be habit formed by association.

Dear Anonymous, Not sure

Submitted by Robert and Michele Root-Bernstein on July 23, 2008 - 4:26pm.

Dear Anonymous,

Not sure what you're getting at. When we run at the sight of a gun, what are we doing if we are not thinking? If we didn't recognize the object as a "gun" would we still run? Probably not. So how do we recognize the "gun" as a weapon to be feared? Doesn't that involve thinking? But do we need to process the gun as a symbol in order to be afraid?

Conversely, when the chimpanzees "monkey" about with the sticks or the boxes, don't they need to reconceptualize (however you want to think about that term) the sticks or boxes as objects to be used to solve a problem? And how do they reconceptualize them if they don't have language? That's the puzzle that underlies thinking (at least from our perspective).

My response to your questions

Submitted by Anonymous (M, 22) on July 22, 2008 - 1:17pm.

Hmm... I like your puzzle. Out of curiosity, how did Koehler reach the ceiling so that he could hang the banana from it?

I think my answer to the question you pose in your final paragraph is that I visualized the solution to each problem, and that my visualization was assisted to some degree with language that represented the images in my mind. I saw, in my mind's eye, a series of interconnected poles reaching out from within the cage to the food. There was also some kind of operational and sequential processing occurring in my mind, though this was mostly unverbalized; I processed how the ends of the rods fit together, and also the fact that I would have to assemble them first and then extend them out from within the cage. What was verbalized was merely this: "And then... and then... and then..." Finally, I seem to detect impulses to name the objects themselves (e.g., rods, food, cage), though those impulses never gave rise to this verbalization.

Of course, this process happened quickly, perhaps in one or two seconds - assuming, of course, subjective temporal measurement of one's own thinking can be accurate! But I believe these are the teased-out details of that process.

At any rate, I took for granted the idea that we reason verbally as well as non-verbally. On the other hand, had I read elsewhere that Chomsky and Pinker believe rational thought is impossible without symbolic language, I probably would not have questioned their proposition.

Thanks for inviting us to look at the workings of our own minds! It would be interesting to see how others experienced their own problem-solving process as they read your article.

Dear Anonymous, Thanks for

Submitted by Robert and Michele Root-Bernstein on July 23, 2008 - 4:17pm.

Dear Anonymous,

Thanks for the input. This is exactly the kind of thinking we're trying to stimulate! Hope other people engage in the discussion, too.

To answer your question: Koehler reached up on his tiptoes and hung the banana from a hook on the ceiling.

Before I read the comments...

Submitted by Shamrock on July 23, 2008 - 1:21pm.

Did he throw feces at that darn thing?!

Dear Shamrock, No objects of

Submitted by Robert and Michele Root-Bernstein on July 23, 2008 - 4:29pm.

Dear Shamrock,

No objects of any kind were thrown at the banana. But great idea! How did you come up with it? Using words? Symbols? Feelings? Images? Tell us more!

I would tend to agree with

Submitted by Anonymous on July 24, 2008 - 9:30am.

I would tend to agree with you. Rationality is not limited to those who can use symbols. The end result for the chimps is the banana. Through trial and error the chimps figured out multiple ways for obtaining the result or banana. One of the ways was stacking boxes to achieve the optimal height for a chimp to grab the banana.

I'm thinking the chimps knew they needed the height and one of the opportunistic chimps may have jumped on the back of another to reach the banana before any other tools or devices were introduced to the cage.

I think that rationality often is confused with or swayed by emotion. By definition, rational means only to understand or have reason. The chimps understood they wanted the banana. And they solved the proplem with various innovations without the help of symbolic language.