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Wednesday, November 23, 2005
Aping around
By Zosimo T. Literatus, R.M.T.
Breakthroughs
We can be more apes than humans than we ever care to admit. Such is the surprising implication of a recent study on primate behavior. The only difference is that humans have the tendency to sacrifice their own interests for others.
In a recent study, results showed that chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) will help other members of their group, but appeared actually indifferent at best to their welfare. The study was led by Joan B. Silk, PhD, a professor of biological anthropology at the Department of Anthropology of the University of Los Angeles California (UCLA), California, USA.
Chimpanzees were used in the study because they “are among the primates most likely to demonstrate pro-social behavior,” the researchers reported.
“They participate in a variety of collective activities, including territorial patrols, coalitionary (group-defensive) aggression, cooperative hunting, food sharing and joint mate guarding.”
In the study, Silk and her colleagues presented captive chimps with an apparatus that allowed them to get food by pulling on one of two ropes. Choosing one of the ropes meant that the chimp could haul in a tasty meal. Selecting the other yielded exactly the same reward, but another chimp in an adjacent cage also received a morsel to eat.
Since the chimp gets the same food reward regardless of which rope was selected, the behavior would ordinarily be mistaken as showing compassion to their companion. But as the researchers observed, “ ...all they had to do was be nice,” Silk said.
The 29 chimps tested were no more likely to choose the generous option than the selfish one, Silk and her colleagues report in the October 27 issue of Nature. The apes are not motivated to help others. The results were particularly surprising, the study indicates, because the chimpanzees had been living in the same groups for at least 15 years, making them, although not related, definitely very close.
Aping around (duplicity) can be a primal heritage of Homo sapiens. Even the more refined among us can show it, as Don Diego de la Vega said in the Mask of Zorro: “A nobleman is someone who says one thing and thinks another.”
Nonetheless, whether we care or not to make some personal sacrifices for others is our choice...whether we do choose to do so or not. (For comments and suggestions, email to ztliteratus6046@lycos.com.)
(November 23, 2005 issue)
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