Short Wave Tea time... with an ape?
7 snips
Feb 17, 2026 
Chris Krupenye, a cognitive scientist who studies animal minds, discusses experiments with Kanzi the bonobo. He explains how researchers adapted child pretend-play tests into tea-party trials. They probe whether apes can imagine invisible outcomes and what that means for the evolution of imagination.
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Kanzi's Communication Skills
- Kanzi, a bonobo who lived in research settings, could communicate using symbols and understood much spoken English.
- He performed like a two-year-old human on comprehension tests and responded by pointing or selecting objects.
Imagination Defined As Mental Departure
- Chris Krupenye framed imagination as departing from the present to entertain alternative scenarios like pasts, futures, or pretend worlds.
- He positioned this capacity as central to human mental life and worth testing in apes.
Tea-Party Task Adapted For Kanzi
- Researchers used classic child-development tea-party tasks as a model to test apes' pretend play.
- They adapted the task so Kanzi could respond by pointing to indicate where imaginary juice remained.
