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Cognitive Daily
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Cognitive Daily reports nearly every day on fascinating peer-reviewed developments in cognition from the most respected scientists in the field.
Greta Munger is Professor of Psychology at Davidson College whose works include The History of Psychology: Fundamental Questions. Dave Munger is co-founder and president of ResearchBlogging.org and a writer whose works include Researching Online. And yes, he is married to Greta.
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« Best way to handle crises like 9/11: A good sense of humor? | Main | Cool infographic on how Lasik works »
Chimp playing Ms. Pac Man
Category: Fun and games
Posted on: July 12, 2006 3:53 PM, by Dave Munger
Comments
That's Kanzi! He's at the Great Ape Trust of Iowa.
Posted by: Kambiz Kamrani | July 12, 2006 8:50 PM
Apparently that is Kanzi -- a bonobo, not a chimp -- who now lives in Iowa at the Great Ape Trust (http://www.greatapetrust.org/) He is one of the most studied apes in the world.
Have you ever seen Ai, a chimpanzee who lives in Japan and who plays counting games on a computer. Her young son watched her and figured out how to play the games. (http://www.pri.kyoto-u.ac.jp/koudou-shinkei/shikou/chimphome/index-E.htm)
Posted by: Gerry L | July 12, 2006 10:44 PM
kanjii is something of a superstar.
Strangers visiting should be careful, particularly if male. Kanjii reported to have bitten a fingetip off a male visitor (or maybe it was some other bonobo?)
Posted by: gbruno | July 12, 2006 11:51 PM
I may have conflated 2 incidents. Kanji is maybe guilty merely of flinging shit?
Posted by: gbruno | July 13, 2006 12:15 AM
Oh, yes. These chimps get treated like royalty. Some of the research done with them may be quite good, but it's hard to escape the notion that much of the work with them is rather like spoiling a child who'll never grow up.
Posted by: Dave Munger | July 13, 2006 6:10 AM
To my eyes, there isn't much that this chimp is doing in this video which shows he actually understands what Pac-man is, because he actions whilst playing are essentially fairly random and stop-start. I'd say it's more likely that any purposefulness is his game is more because he's more responding to Savage-Rumbaugh's (assuming this is Kanji) excitement, in an operant conditioning kind of way.
Posted by: tim byron | July 13, 2006 6:22 AM
Tim:
There are a couple moments where it looks like the chimp is actively controlling the game, but for the most part, I'd agree with you. It's like those toddlers who are constantly begging parents for quarters to play the game. They usually don't even notice when the game's over and back in "demo mode."
Posted by: Dave Munger | July 13, 2006 6:58 AM
I'd agree with Tim and Dave. The chimp didn't seem to be doing well enough at the game that it was apparent he knew what the rules were. Like a toddler, I expect he might not notice if it were in demo mode.
Posted by: Katherine Moore | July 13, 2006 7:13 AM
i love how this woman researcher that loves these guys so much doesnt seem to realize all she is doing is possibly training them for when they can be used as some sort of slaves.. silly silly blind researcher..
Posted by: steven2 | July 13, 2006 8:19 AM
This would be so much cooler if the monkey were playing Donkey Kong.
Posted by: Tiax | July 13, 2006 4:57 PM
Tiax, you win the "day's best comment" award. Hilarious!
Posted by: Dave Munger | July 13, 2006 4:58 PM
Id be much more impressed if it was playing grid wars or tetris.
Posted by: word9995 | July 13, 2006 9:13 PM
Videos like this are fun and intriguing to watch, but the skeptics are right that the video doesn't really show enough toconvince us that Kanzi is playing it how a human child at a particular age does. One could, however, statistically analyze his joystick movements to see if they correspond to what is on the screen and how 'intelligently'. I suspect you'd find he has figured out that joystick movements affect what is happening, but you'd hafta see the data to say much more.
At any rate, I think there's much more interesting and scientific data out there for both chimps and other primate species (i.e. capuchin monkeys). Peer-reviewed journal articles demonstrate their ability to navigate 2D and 3D mazes on a screen using a joystick (or touchscreen?), analyze any errors and where they occur, etc. And this stuff is done with controls against simple operant conditioning explanations and against an experimenter biasing the results (e.g. cueing the subject). Non-human primates can indeed play video games, and often quite intelligently -- though perhaps the representational ghost-chasing aspect or the complicated make-ghosts-not-bad-by-hitting-item rules of a Pacman type of game are less likely to be comprehended.
Posted by: Brian | July 15, 2006 4:31 PM