April 23, 2007

Some researchers in England got a grant to put a typewriter into a habitat of six macacques at the Devon Zoo for a month and monitored the results. I'm sure you're familiar with the old saw "put a thousand monkeys in a room with a typewriter and eventually come up with Shakespeare." It's basically the working model for hiring screenwriters in Hollywood (which explains how ABC came up with that Geico Caveman show idea)

The macacques did seem to like to press the letter "S" more than the others and did eventually type five pages of gibberish (which were immediately overnighted to Paramount), but nothing the remotest bit Shakesperean. They also flung the typewriter around and defecated on the keyboard, demonstrating advanced managerial skills. The flaw in their experiment design, obviously, was not enough monkeys, but I suppose one must make do with the grant money one has. There used to be a website called "The Monkey Shakespeare Simulator", but it doesn't exist anymore. As they say in academic circles, "more research is needed." Oh, and today, by the way, is the traditional day for celebrating the birthday of William Shakespeare himself, even though the date is now considered inaccurate. The day has been credited due to an Elizabethan tradition (now discounted by historians) of baptizing infants three days after birth and documented proof that Shakespeare was baptized on April 26, 1564. It also aligns tidily with the date of his death, which DID occur on April 23, 1616.

posted by briank 17 years ago
  • Key phrase in all this: "got a grant". Now that they've cured cancer, I guess they have to spend the money on something.
  • Awesome. Not as awesome as teaching dolphins to sing the theme from Batman, but awesome nevertheless. And I like the caveman commercials from Geico. Particularly when he's at his therapist's. "It's my mother. I'll put it on speaker." As for a sitcom, I doubt it'll work. Like one of those SNL sketches that have a nice joke, but wind up five minutes too long. Except this would be twenty-two minutes. Whatever. [...] Pay no attention to the derail behind the curtain!
  • The alpha male bashed hell out of the computer with a stone and the other monkeys did little else but urinate and defecate on the keyboard. Nice of the scientists to give the macaques a MeFi account.
  • Pay no attention to the derail behind the curtain! I would love to have a derail-only thread on here, but with our luck it would turn into something coherent.
  • silly scientists! everyone knows macaques prefer Milton!
  • ...with a predilection for the letter S. One researcher said that proved the monkeys were not hitting the keyboard at random... Maybe they were just trying to pick up the letter that loooks like a tasty worm. Mh, if I squint, *all* letters on my keyboard look like tasty bugs...
  • I like the caveman ads but don't think the series has a chance. But what do I know, I basically almost never watch sitcoms anyway. Oh, and here's Caveman's Crib (Flash).
  • The alpha male bashed hell out of the computer with a stone and the other monkeys did little else but urinate and defecate on the keyboard. Nice of the scientists to give the macaques a MeFi account. LOLLARPIES
  • All's they need is the O and K keys.
  • weuoioierto[pofghk;lk;l';'f;gh'lkjldfgkjlkjlkjlkskdfkjlkjlkjlkjlkjkjlkssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssk;lk;lkdf;gk;l;lcvbn,mn,zxcioiuoisuoiuoiuoi23487979834509-09-09-0567fghssgg
  • Oh, kamus; you're going to need several rolls of toilet paper to clean that up.
  • Nice of the scientists to give the macaques a MeFi account. Skrik so owns this thread!! MonkeyFilter: They also flung the typewriter around and defecated on the keyboard, demonstrating advanced managerial skills. MonkeyFilter: The flaw in their experiment design, obviously, was not enough monkeys I do love the caveman and the gecko, too. But a sitcom. There goes the concept, right into the terlet.
  • As Simon Munnery once said, the monkeys will write Shakespeare, but you'd have to climb over 600 copies of 'Money' by Martin Amis to reach it. I read a fantastic short story by Lin Carter about a man who built a machine which simulated the million monkeys, by printing very fast on reels of paper tape, and then spotting patterns in the results. The patterns he noticed first weren't Shakespeare, but proved to be some scrolls lost in the fire at Alexandria - that is, the oldest known written works! The machine was recreating all of humankind's writings in sequence! And when it reached the present day... it carried on! The story ended with the man complaining he wouldn't live to see the public reaction to the Greatest American Novel, which would be written in 2014 or something. Great story.
  • Isn't this blog the result of what happens when you get 6494 monkeys at typewriters with internet access? Researchers, look no further though if you were expecting Shakespeare you got Daisy Mae instead. Sorry about that!
  • Shall I compare thee to a Daisy_May? Thou art more lovely and more literate. Flame wars do scorch the darling blogs some days And bees's lease had far to short a date. Sometime the too hat the monkey tembers flare And sometime their in-jokes too cliquish be Banning there is, though merciful and fair When naughty little Monkeys can't agree No, Monkeyfilter's summer shall not fade, Nor our higher reason shall we lack, And though we'll have occasional tirades We won;t fling poo like Plymouth-Town macacques. So long as man the Intartubes can see, So long lives this (if we don't piss off Tracee).
  • *applauds. throws bananas.*
  • *cries*
  • Choked on my salad at Skrik, wiped a tear from my eye at TUM I give this thread four thumbs up! OOK!
  • t8oyb0e3osrmn9o6t8tdoab3eatmhsattiwswtvhoe3qwuaepsvtbixozn This above excerpt from the macacques shows promise. btw, is the bees really gone?
  • I don't know - I just know he hasn't been around in a while and I miss him whenever the poetry bug bites.
  • damned cell phones
  • Hey, Kamus, that's my password!
  • no amateur cryptologists here I see- heh-heh
  • "if you prick us, do we not OOK OOK OOOK"