Koko, the talking gorilla!

About 40 years ago Penny Patterson set out to discover if humans and gorilla could actually communicate. Penny earned her bachelor's degree from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1970. She attained her Ph.D. in 1972 from Stanford University, with her dissertation linguistics Capabilities of a Lowland Gorilla, on teaching sign language to Michael and Koko. Michael, another Lowland Gorilla, who died in 2000.

                                  

Koko a western Lowland female Gorilla was bought to Stanford University by Penny. Penny wanted to find if humans and gorilla can communicate. She started teaching Koko a modified form of American sign language which she called Gorilla sign language or GSL. Koko took a month to learn a new word, she then started using those words to frame basic sentences. Currently her vocabulary consists of more than 1000 words which she use to communicate.






Koko is very friendly and loving. She loves babies, Penny brought kittens for her as it is very difficult to get a baby Gorilla. Koko loves to play with them, she treats the kittens as her own kids. She currently weighs about 300 pound and is 42 years old. She is making us question what we think we know about the animal intelligence and she proved that animal and human can have a great relationship.









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