this post was submitted on 27 Dec 2025
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The argument that apes have never asked a question "is a classic example of overstatement," said Heidi Lyn, a professor at the University of South Alabama's Comparative Cognition and Communication Lab at the Department of Psychology and Marine Science.
"There is plenty of evidence of apes asking questions, although the structure may not look exactly like humans asking questions," Lyn explained.
https://www.snopes.com/articles/467842/apes-questions-communicate/
Yeah, the moment I read that, I thought it sounded like bullshit. I doubt there's a database of every sign language interaction with apes that proves that no ape has ever asked a question.
Obviously not in the spirit of the question. No curiosity, no attempt to learn about what's going on around them. The article has no examples of real questions, so to me I'd say the meme rings true.
Yeah that's just a quirk of the English language in that "ask" means both inquiring, trying to learn information from a response, and request, a communication to another that the "asker" wants something.
Yeah, when my cat meows, it is “asking” for snacks. But it’s not inquiring about snacks, or curious about where the snacks come from or why cats enjoy snacking so much.
Granted, many humans don’t ask such questions either, but that’s because intellectual acuity is on a spectrum also occupied by non-human animals, at least in the realm of being an incurious dumbass.
I think there are several separate cognitive abilities needed to ask questions. Curiosity (which is very common), complex communication (much less common), and advanced theory of mind (exists on a spectrum, you need not only awareness of your own mental state, or metacognition, but awareness that others have a mental state that is distinct from your own. Humans actually develop this ability slowly throughout childhood, and it goes through stages). Though there are other species with similar traits, it might well be the case that humans are the only living species in possession of all of them simultaneously.
How do you know your cat isnt curious, is it survival bias. All the curious cats died
Cats don’t need to ask questions about the world because they are scientists and will figure it out for themselves if they don’t get shown the answers. They know where the snacks come from, at least in regards to their own world, that’s why they come running when they hear the package.
They knock stuff over to see what happens. They meow for treats to see what happens. They sit on your face to wake you up to see what happens. They get into things just to see what’s in them.
And when the result is something they want, they try it again to see if the result is consistent. Reproducible.
That’s why the best way to get a cat to stop doing something they do to you is to ignore them. They meow to wake you up for food? They do that because it’s been working. Stop responding, and the behavior will also stop.
What you are doing is anthropomorphizing an animal's behavior and ascribing intent behind the action without having any substantial basis for that claim.
Cats are intelligent, yes, but what you have described is completely devoid of any understanding of animal behavior or psychology.
Well of course he is. He’s not a cat.
It’s not that cats can’t ask questions. It’s that they can’t ask abstract questions. That’s quite different.
They can, but they don't know how to dumb it down enough for their minions to understand.
That's crazy. You think monkeys aren't curious about the world around them?
They just don't look to humans for answers, they look to humans for treats
Well, curiosity comes in different stripes. Investigating your environment is one thing. Asking second-order questions is another.
“May I have food?” vs “Why am I here?” and “What is the nature of consciousness?”
"Why are we here?"
"One of life's great mysteries isn't it? Why are we here? I mean, are we the product of some cosmic coincidence? Or is there really a God, watching everything? You know, with a plan for us and stuff? I don't know man, but it keeps me up at night."
"What? I mean why are we here, in this box canyon in the middle of nowhere?"
Oh man, RvB reference in the wild after all these years. Warms my heart.
if you wake up in a compound, catered to your every need by weird alien captors, “why am I here?” is a pretty obvious question.
You ask the aliens why you are there, meaning the cell they imprisoned you, and they tell you how their species created humans and what humans purpose is. You immediately go catatonic by the revelation.
Well, the information that aliens created us for some particular purpose is kind of academic. It’s empirically fascinating, don’t get me wrong, but normatively insignificant.
For insights that can alter my perception of reality, I would need to learn about the aliens’ philosophical progress (if any).
They already understand the second order questions though. Why would they ask the humans?
They know what's outside their enclosures, they know they're there because the humans want them there, they know strange humans like to see and interact with them through the glass. They just don't care, so long as they have their tribe around with things to do and they get tasty food
Animals understand existence better than humans do. They understand life and death better than we to. Our higher intelligence makes second order questions complicated because we put ourselves through mental gymnastics
We should be asking apes about the meaning of life, not the other way around
Second-order questions aren’t just the prosaic things any intelligent creature would ask, such as “why am I here?” or “what do you want from me?”
but also the more esoteric, “what sort of creature are you?” And “what sort of creature am I?”
Animals (and, indeed, most humans) don’t ask (or don’t really understand) second-order questions very well because that requires abstraction, which is the sort of reasoning that takes enormous amounts of education and curiosity.
I agree, but that is the kind of question they do think about. Koko was "a wonderful gorilla person" in her own words
There's a dog that uses one of those word button mats that thinks small dogs are cats, dogs are dogs, and that she's a human (or that her owner is also a dog, she's convinced she's the same as her owner and always gets confused when it's explained otherwise)
They don't ask, because they already know what they think. They aren't confused about where they stand in the world, it's learning human categorization that confuses them
I don't want to conflate the pragmatic use of tools or manipulation of the environment with questions about the meaning of life. Even most humans can’t do the latter. We have a lot of depressing research showing that most people can barely engage in abstract reasoning at all, let alone effectively.
I think nearly every sentient creature can be depressed and understand how badly life is going. But that’s different.
I don't think that's different, I think that's very related to the topic at hand
And yeah, that's all true. All living things can suffer, down to single cells
The real question here is where is the line between us and other animals. And I think you're almost there - you're on the verge of recognizing there is none, or maybe of internalizing that realization
Most animals don't often think about the meaning of life, just like most humans. They don't think to ask us either, because we're honestly a pretty foolish species. We're powerful and intelligent, but not wise
An orca, elephant, or corvid is probably the wisest being on earth right now. Possibly even a whole forest
Elephants are wise in that they’re concerned with (some of) the things that matter most — social bonds and creature comforts. But, as far as we know, they can’t abstract away from those concerns, or scrutinize them analytically, or reflect on the nature of wisdom or the metanormative conditions of their own experience.
We can do that — due to some freak accident of evolution that probably has to do with the recursivity of language and the self-referential nature of subjective experience. And again, when I say “we,” I mean some humans sometimes. Many “wise” humans are just like the elephants.
What are you even saying? What evidence do you have?
That sounds like a bunch of unfounded nonsense to me.
Elephants seem to clearly understand life and death, cause and effect, who fucked them over and where they ran off to
I'd bet the average elephant has a better grasp on the meaning of life than the average human
So to be clear, you think elephants contemplate the meaning of life? Okay, and what about the Metaphysics of Modal Logic? Do you think an elephant mind can grasp the bizarre fact that formal systems can’t prove their own consistency or even the concept of prime numbers?
How many elephants are out there right now, wondering about the nature of right and wrong?
Zero
Zero elephants are doing any of that, because these are abstract concepts.
I have no idea if they're curious about the world around them. But that's also not the question at hand.
It is the question at hand. It's a question about the mental process of animals
The question isn't are they curious - we know they are. The question is why they don't ask humans questions when you teach them how to speak
The answer is - it's because you're not speaking gorilla, the gorilla is learning a foreign language, which it learned by being motivated by food.
Animal languages have a different grammar to human languages. When they ask questions, they often do it by making statements to be agreed with or corrected. They might even disagree, and assert the statement again in reply
You have to meet animals halfway... Well, really like 10% of the way since they're the ones learning to speak to us in our languages
These people aruginf against the intelligence of animals would fit right in with people who encounter savages on their voyages.
That label was based on cultural differences and these fools are too ignorant to see they are making the same mistake across the difference in species.
It's quite fascinating. Maybe if we give them treats they can be trained to recognize their superiority only exists in their mushy little brains.
Also
WE ARE APES. We ask questions all the time.
Ook, ook-ook?
What did you say?!
Yes, sir. The reference desk is right over there. But you'd know that, being the Librarian, right?
Ook.
I’m pretty confident most scientists studying animals have stated that apes have never asked a question. It’s pretty clear on record that only two ever have, both African Grey parrots.
And yet the scientists that did those studies stated that the animals never asked a question. Those are all other researchers claiming after the fact that questions were asked.
This right here. Humans assume so much based on their experiences and interpretations. It's infuriating the assumptions we make. "That turtle just eats, sleeps and shits! It's clearly not intelligent! It's never read The Hunger Games!" goes back to working to afford a place to eat, sleep and shit while also subjugating others, inciting wars, destroying the planet and reading The Hunger Games