On Tue, 26 Oct 2010 10:11:07 -0700, Michael Sylvester wrote: >Not referring to an Abbot and Costello flick, but I saw a program on Jane >Goodall where she saw chimps use sticks to fetch ants from an ant hill.
I know it is too much to ask of you where and when you saw such a program but I'll willing to bet that it might have been this past Sunday's 60 Minutes program. Here's a link to the episode: http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=6987701n >She was fascinated by their tool utilization and alerted the scientific >community who initially remained skeptical. To clarify the issues: Goodall observed the chimps using long plants to pull termintes out of a termite mound. When something enters the termite mounts, the termites attack by chomping down on the intruder or, in this case, object. What was significant about this was it was the first observed use of a tool by a wild animal in its natural setting (i.e., it could not have learned it by imitation by watching a human). At the time (circa 1960s), the position was that animals did not use tools spontaneously and this was one of the things that distinguished humans from animals. Louis Leakey, Goodall's advisor was key in pointing out the significance of this activity. The National Geographic society has a VHS/DVD of a how they did title "Jane Goodall Among the Wild Chimpanzees". I actually have this taped off the air from around 1986 and in a NatGeo edition VHS. By the way, according to the voice over on the NatGeo program, when chimps groom each other, it is not pick out bugs or nits or whatever -- they do it just for the physical contact. >However ,when I was at Wishita State in the early 1970s, I knew >a prof at WSU by he name of Neil Pronko who published a text of >articles in a work titled PANORAMA OF PSYCHOLOGY where >he had a piece on monkeys on a Pacific island that washed potatoes >before eating them. On source for background on potatoe washing is the following: http://www.springerlink.com/content/uw017m11r3318155/ The key point however here is not tool usage but "cultural transmission" as presented in this USA Today article: http://www.usatoday.com/news/science/2001-06-05-animal-usat.htm >For monkeys to wash potatoes before eating them certainly implies higher >cognitive function. Perhaps but that is the not the significance of either Goodall's or the cultural transmission studies. For more on higher cognitive functions in apes, see "Ape Genius": http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/apegenius/ >I do not remember the time line for the both of those animal observations. >Anyway why were Goodall's chimps eating ants? Ain't those Bozo types >vegetarian? First, chimpanzees ate termites, not ants. Second, no, chimpanzees are definitely not vegetarian though it often easier for them to obtain vegetation than it is to obtain meat. Chimpanzee "cannibalism" is not unheard of and it is one of the more disturbing find in the NatGeo special on Goodall which provides additional evidence for meating eating. -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=6018 or send a blank email to leave-6018-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
