Meet Tatu and Loulis—the last of the 'talking' chimpanzees
National Geographic • • science
Key Points:
- In the 1960s and '70s, scientists successfully taught American Sign Language (ASL) to chimpanzees, notably Washoe and others, challenging the belief that language is unique to humans; only two chimps, Tatu and Loulis, remain from these experiments.
- Tatu and Loulis, now elderly and living at the Fauna Foundation sanctuary in Canada, continue to use ASL, with Tatu knowing 215 signs and Loulis 78, but they will never return to the wild due to captivity-related survival challenges.
- The research revealed that chimpanzees can learn and even teach sign language to each other, as seen with Loulis learning from Washoe, but raised ethical concerns
