You were expecting a link weren't you? Well I don't do links. I just saw a documentary "the demonic ape", which was pretty good. It was about the violence displayed by chimpanzees and how all chimp populations display different degrees of violent tendencies. Apparently the more pressure a population is under from the human cancer eating the world the more violent they are. Anyway, this documentary was sparked by the case of the leader of one of the most violent chimp clans in the world("Frodo") snatching a baby off a womans back, taking it up a tree and tearing it apart and eating it alive. I've grown up watching "frodo" the chimp rise to the top, his clan has been the most studied and video taped of all chimp clans. He was yet to be born when jane goodall began living with his tribe 40 years ago. And since then the vast majority of chimp studies and documentary footage of wild chimps has come from that clan in gombi. Frodo was always an asshole, when he was just a 3 year old toddler he kicked jane goodalls ass. And when he got older he put a fairly serious beating on her, stomping on her and dragging her around, also beating up some camera men, but he is said to have a particular disliking for jane goodall and thoroughly enjoys hurting her. I watched "chimpanzee diaries" when frodo overthrew his brother and became the new king. His brother was a benevolent compassionate leader, who was very popular with everyone, when frodo kicked his ass and took over things changed, he became a brutal dictator who the clan lived in fear of. But he was (and is) a great hunter, actually causing a decline of 10% in the local colobus monkey population since he became the leader. Well, now he's trying to put a dent on the human population (and boy that region could use a dent), and some people have the nerve to be up in arms over this. Some want him to be tried for murder like a human and sentenced to death. Isn't this ridiculous? For starters, people in that very same region kill and eat chimpanzees on a regular basis. Does it not logically follow that if frodo is tried for murder a large percentage of the human population in that region should also be tried for murder? The argument for him being punishable is that chimps have been proven to have empathy like humans, and sadism as well. He's basically like a human murderer, he knows he is causing pain and killing his victims. He is fully conscious of what he is doing, like a person, and unlike a shark. So if the argument is that chimps are people, then killing them should be the same as killing people right? If frodo is "put down", then surely a whole lot of natives need to be "put down" as well. I can't see a way around that. Frodos death would need to set a precedent for putting humans to "sleep" for eating chimpanzees.
So would you say that you welcome the dominion of our new chimp masters? Will you be the next to offer up your child to this revolutionary freedom fighter? A little bit of advice in dealing with we old-fashion humans not yet so ready to bow before the will of the apes: When one's child is snatched and eaten, there's going to be a bit of shock and outrage. We're rather predictable in that respect.
It would be pretty revolutionary if we extended human rights to animals. Infanticide is a way for the top males to insure that only their own offspring survive, so in this case, Frodo was just being ambitious, not murderous. You know Bonobos and Orangutans tend to be less violent, and are said to be evolutionarily closer to humans.
<i>"Some want him to be tried for murder like a human and sentenced to death. "</i> Shoot the monkey before he becomes more human!
Well, since you're so lazy, I've done a bit of your work for you. http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0304/feature4/online_extra2.html http://mahale.web.infoseek.co.jp/PAN/9_2/9(2)-06.html http://www.janegoodall.ca/inst/inst_gombe_frodo.html http://www.sciencenews.org/pages/sn_edpik/b_1.htm First of all, it should be noted that this is an incident that occurred over 2 years ago. May of 2002. So, if Frodo was to be punished, it would have been done long ago. Second, it's interesting to note that Frodo was alone in his hunt. He had no backup group of chimps and thus was scared away quite easily. He barely chewed the baby up a little and then ran for the hills. Another intersting thing to note about this is that Frodo has no fear of humans and often includes humans in his ritualistic displays. Why? Because he grew up with a complacent Jane Goodal hanging around. He has a view of humans based on his experiences of an apparently weak-willed weak human whom he apparently dislikes. Jane apparently won't go into his territory without bodyguards after her thrashing. Do you blame her? What she should have done was got those bodyguards to beat Frodo up a little. Instill a little respect in the arrogant fucker. He's cocky because they let him. He hunts human because he's allowed. This is not the only incident of human babies being killed by chimps in the park. But, it is apparently the first by this group of human-habituated chimps. Also, it appears that Frodo has been laid low by some mysterious ailment. Parasites of some kind. He was given medicine and was apparently on the mend, but he was roughed up a bit by other males and now shows deference to another chimp, Sheldon. So, Frodo may have his own punishment of having his brief time in the sun be ended. And ending the reign of his family in the process. It would be ironic if he got the parasites from his few bites of that baby.
I heard about one chimp tribe where a mother chimp and her daugheter killed and ate everyones babies. Goddamn dirty apes.
Roman: You're sitting there with about a decades worth of porn on your hard drive and you’d probably feel for baby roadkill and not dog. Goddamn dirty ape. Dr.Lou: These are the same people that malign homosexuality as wrong and then point to the animal kingdom as proof. Its not natural- they point to the animals as proof. Its not natural- they point to the animals as proof. Its not natural- they point to the animals as proof. But still go home to cooked food and toilet paper. You're never going to successfully show any of these people the faulty logic of humans choosing to regard them as animals for some things and not for others because there *isn't* any logic in it. Its like arguing with a woman or a Christian or choice morons on the forums. Something odd about humans: Nuns would bathe with their clothes on because God may be watching- but they all believed the cannon that he is omnipent and sees everything. But just not through cloth? We get offended by a bare breast and penalize Janet Jackson for nudity, but the small pasty on the nipple makes it ok. So nudity is not a bare breast, but a nipple. Bare ass is not nudity so long as a thong is squeezed in the crack. What? Spidergoat: Which is why the masturbate and sex missionary. And floss. Invert: You'd like to 'teach him a lesson' wouldn't you? Put the chimp in his place?
Gendanken, No. Not really. I think you misunderstand. What I meant was that Goodal would like to teach him a lesson. Look at how the interactions have taken place. Goodal sits all nice and quiet and watches the chimps go about their business without interfering and she consoles herself that she isn't affecting the equation. But, her meekness has affected the equation. The chimps are habituated to humans. And Frodo even displays for them. Now, Frodo beat the shit out of Goodal and feels that he is 'superior' to this pathetic human. And it's quite possible that his evaluation of all humans is dependant upon his evaluation of this one human. He doesn't fear Goodal. He doesn't respect Goodal. He doesn't have any fear of humans. When I suggested that Goodal might want to have her bodyguards rough him up, this was just a concession to his way of life. The chimp lifestyle. Goodal has sat and played the quiet little doormouse and that got her beat up. What she should have done was shown Frodo that she's not to be trifled with. She can't claim that she want's to be impartial and not affect her observations. She has affected it just by observing. By being there. Not to mention giving Frodo medicine when he was sick from parasites. Look. I don't judge Frodo as guilty of any crime. You'll note that I placed crime in quotes up above when I mentioned it. I'm just speaking of animal nature here. That's all.
She's done more than that, she fed them every day for 15 years, then sporadically for 22 years. She stopped 2 years ago. But to be fair she fully acknowledges the impact she has had. She believes, and many agree, she is also partly to blame for how violent chimps in that area are with one another, and baboons. Ofcourse their habitat is shrinking and they're surrounded by dirty refugees, which can't be helping. The whole point of the documentary it seems was to refute "the demonic male" theory which suggests male apes and humans have some unique predisposition to violence against their own kind. Which was obviously thought up by someone who looked at chimps and humans and nothing else. The reality is all animals which are capable will kill members of their own kind when their circumstances call for it. Humans just happen to be getting the call from the wild to kill eachother because there's too many of them squished into the planet, and the particular population of apes which we have studied the most also had that call from the wild due to humans, specifically goodall, filthy dirty(no good) refugees, and loggers encroaching on their environment and putting stress on their living conditions. Here's a transcript of that documentary, http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon/2004/demonicapetrans.shtml I guess I occassionally do links, but don't get used to it.
Oh and apparently frodo has since died by way of other chimps. But still, it's worth criticising the thought of trying him for murder.
What I found to be astounding was the fact that after two years of feeding the chimps, Goodall started to see increased signs of aggression. Now amazingly enough, instead of stopping the feeding, she decides to place the bananas in locked boxes whereby each ape would be fed equally. The result was increased frustration and even more aggression. Did she stop feeding them then? Nope, she kept on going. It got worse as she started to interact with the apes to the point of picking up their young and rolling around with them on the ground as though she were in a pre-school playgroup with a bunch of 3 year olds. She was sent there to observe, not to interact, and definitely not to join the native tribes of apes. Human interaction was the worst possible thing that could have occured and while in hindsight it is easy to say it was wrong, she should have realised during the interaction and with the knowledge that they were becoming more violent... well the interaction should have ceased. Leakey sent her there to observe, not to feed and pat them. They were all wild animals. Feeding them only domesticated them. These apes came to the camp at specific times of the day for food. While they showed up, she played with them. All of the images that I've seen have shown that these apes had become her pets, part of her family. Observation does not include interaction. There is a big gap there and she leaped over that gap and never looked back. Should Frodo be destroyed? In my opinion yes. Frodo displays abnormally violent tendencies and he's been this way since birth. But that is not the reason he should be killed. Frodo is not a wholly wild animal, he's been partly domesticated. His interaction with humans all his life has resulted in Frodo being partly domesticated. I keep thinking back to the stories of animals who turn on their owners and are then destroyed because it could happen again. Frodo has not only attacked Goodall, but also other people over the years. Frodo did not just attack the women and take the baby as self defence. He stalked them, snuck up on them and ripped the baby off the woman's back, took it up a tree, tore it to pieces, ate a little bit of the body and then left the carcass there. He did not kill the child for food, he killed it because he wanted to kill it. Looking at other studies on apes have shown that they are not as violent as the chimpanzees at Gombi. Reason? They did not suffer the human interaction that the chimps at Gombi suffered. Apes are not humans. By looking at the notion of the 'demonic ape' they attributed human characteristics which do not exist. Sure they use tools, but so do other animals, such as beavers who chop down trees and trim down the timber to suit their needs when they build their dams. Sure they think, so do many other animals. As humans, we could identify our behaviours with many other animals, not just chimpanzees. And trying an animal for murder? Give me a break. He should have been killed because he turned on his human handlers and then attacked other human beings in the area. We would do the same with any animal that was domesticated or partly domesticated. Having said that, we should try the humans who have made Frodo what he had become. She is not impartial. She did not just observe, she interacted with them to such an extent that I wonder if her research should even be given so much credence. Observing does not include feeding, playing, treating them with medicine, etc. And you bring up an interesting point, that another scientist also brought up in this documentary. If Frodo is treated with medication, fed, etc, why is he not killed when he attacks a human being? Other animals suffer such a fate if they attack a human being, why not Frodo? The question of 'should we' has arisen because we are trying to identify human characteristics in the animal.
Invert: Gotcha. Good point. Frodo's the boy who grew up to abuse people on account of weak parenting- because of her weakness, he sees all humans as women. What happened to him happened to me, weak women have formed my misogyny as mother’s the first thing I’ve known. But you did use words like ‘arrogant’ and ‘cocky’ as if though you found him distasteful. You sounded like Bells. Actually, I think it has more to do with the kind of species you study. Chimps being higher up in the scale are aware of being observed, it intrigues their curiosity that makes impartiality literally impossible. Same with dolphins and canines. Its them looking back on you that ruins it, not otherwise I feel. Entomologists have for hundreds of years been studying flies and insects without changing their behavior- butterflies lack curiosity so they’re never ‘intrigued’. So I feel you can’t wholly blame human intervention. Bells: You rushed and skimped- its already been stated that Frodo's died. But can one blame her for involving herself? You're blaming human warmth- what person here, other than a miserable wretch with a cold heart filled with hate that can't even stand his own skin- what person but that would not want to at least hold a chimp in their arms? Or at least hold its hand in theirs to study the sameness? Only a robot could be so impartial. But then again not, I feel like a robot for human babies yet not for a chimp’s- that child getting mauled is funny, intriguing, bizarre- not pitiful.
Lou, Do you have a link to where you read this? According to Goodal's site he's still alive. I went looking to see if he was dead or had been knocked down from alpha status because of his illness, but couldn't find any mention of his dying anywhere. In the transcript you linked to it mentions that he was 'laid low' by illness (funny. That was the same phrase I used.) But didn't say that he died. In one of the articles I linked to it talked about how he was roughed up a bit and showed deference to another male named Sheldon but seemed to imply that he was both still alive and still tentatively alpha. I'm glad you found that. It had some interesting things to say on stuff I was just guessing about. About how humans were responsible for the aggressiveness. I had just thought that being used to humans would have made them less fearful of them. This banana thing was somewhat amazing. I can see it very clearly though. Anyway, as this is a thread on ethics, I should bring up the most relevant portion of the transcript: The theory of Mind. I'd heard of these experiments on children although this one was different and altogether more... prone to errors than the test which I am familiar with, but I was unaware of any such tests performed on primates in any satisfactory manner. The theory of mind puts a whole new slant on the situation. In this case, Frodo knew that the baby would feel pain. Frodo knew that the mother of the child would experience pain. Frodo knew the pain that he was inflicting and loves it. Frodo knew that he was hurting another sentient being when he beat up Goodal. He knows because he understands that other animals have thoughts in their heads just like he has in his. He understands that they feel pain just as he does. This puts a bit of twist on the situation, yes? Wouldn't you say? Bells, I agree. But, she was the first. And the transcript states that the methods that she used aren't used by others. She was the groundbreaker and other researchers are now doing the real research which she only showed was possible. A pity that she practically wasted her life, eh? Still, she did get to roll around with the chimps. Possibly abnormal. Possibly not. I wouldn't say domesticated. Not even close. Habituated. Yes. Domesticated. No. Frodo was his own owner. Self-defense? What does that have to do with anything? Chimps hunt monkeys. Monkey babies especially. Researchers have been so excited by this behavior that they had throbbing hardons watching them tear apart baby monkeys. What is really so different about a baby human? The problem, in my opinion, is not that Frodo is violent. This is not an incidence of violence. It's that he is not fearful or respectful of humans. And, he only abandoned the carcass because he was alone. If he'd had a posse you can bet that he wouldn't have run so easily. He did kill it for food. Although, the theory of mind does bring up the possibility of sadism, but what does this say about their penchant for hunting monkeys? Maybe. All this is still speculation. Too little is still known about their behavior as a whole. And, what if it is just something that the Gombe chimps suffer from? It has been shown that chimps have what amount to culture. So, in the Gombe we have war-like chimps. What should be done with them? Should they be culled less their culture spread? Or should nature be left to run it's course. Of course, with the shrinking of habitat, there's really no chance of the culture spreading. Is there? That theory of mind test is interesting though. A beaver wouldn't pass that test. Let the chimps put them on trial. Gendanken, Good way of putting it. By the way, don't think that it mentioned this in the transcript but Frodo also beat the shit out of The Far Side cartoonist Gary Larson. But, he took a special disliking to Goodal. Yeah. You're right. And I should have realized that it wouldn't be read right. I meant them in a sarcastic sort of way. But, he is arrogant and cocky. No real judgement about the traits implied. These are alpha traits. And not necessarily good or bad. However, I'm sure you'd have a definite judgement about his attitude if he was dragging you around and stomping on you. Wouldn't you? Well said. Not only do we learn from them, they learn from us. But, this being the case, then we should keep in mind what it is that we're 'teaching' them. Yes? A point to consider is that the chimps in other areas are not aggressive in this manner. The question is where does the aggression come from? The bananas? The refugees? The snare injuries? The thinning of habitat? I suppose we don't have the expertise to control what it is that they are learning from us yet. Should we allow a fully open experience between chimp and man? A true learning both ways? What can the chimps learn from man? The chimps in the Gombe would seem to have learned nothing good. Do we corrupt everything we touch? Or allow to look at us with curiosity? I suppose not. In the end, we're part of nature as well and can't extract ourselves from the equation no matter how hard we try. No. And considering that she was the first the blame is lessened even further. Hindsight is 20/20 they say and we have learned much even from her mistakes. Think about it. Before Goodal, all that was known about chimpanzees was from the behavior of captive chimps. What fools we were. That's like studying prisoners (and ill-treated prisoners at that) and expecting to discover the secrets of human behavior in them. Misopedo. And what would you think if it was your child? I doubt if you would find it pitiful then either. But I bet you that you wouldn't find it funny. What do you think?
Added thought on the theory of mind. Ok. So, we have devised experiments to test chimps for the theory of mind. We've also come up with tests to test ourselves. But, the chimps aren't that smart. Do you think that they think that we know they have a theory of mind? Do you think it would be a default behavior? That if we have a theory of mind that all animals do? Or do you think that other species would need to prove it in some manner? That a test would need to be devised? A test which we didn't come up with for some 10's of thousands of years after having begun to walk upright. And are still shakey about.
I'm in a rush, leaving town for the weekend, I have more to say in this thread but I just want to address this. Why do people always say that? If it was my baby I'd be bothered, it wasn't so I'm not. Whats so hard to understand about that? And how is this a strange or incorrect way of thinking? What allegiance do I have to some african woman? I don't see why I should care for her sufferring any more than I do the for the colobus monkeys who have their babies taken off them and torn apart. How is it relevent whether we would care about our own baby or not? How would confessing that we would indeed care about our own baby obligate us to care for that baby? If anything that baby is competition, while my baby is my legacy, the point of my existence. There's really no comparison. I wouldn't expect some aids victim in africa to care about my misfortunes thats for sure.
Nothing. Well, it displays a lack of empathy but it's not necessarily incorrect. Or strange. None. Ha. I thought sure you'd say that you feel more for the suffering of the monkeys. You're slipping, Lou. Here's why I brought it up. Because, while it has little to do with our personal feelings. Those of us discussing this abstractly in this thread. But, Frodo also means nothing to us. Jane Goodal means nothing us. Africa means nothing to us. We aren't deciding the judgement on this chimp. We aren't the ones who will levy any punishment should a punishment be deemed appropriate. That woman who had her baby stolen. She would be an enactor of punishment. Her family who feel the loss of life would be enactors of judgement. Her tribe, those who care for her, have a stake in the matter where we don't. Other women in the area with babies who are afraid that their babies are going to be snatched by 'man-eating' chimpanzees. Their livelihood is at stake. To these people it's more than just text. It's their lives. That's what I'm saying. Edit: Hmmm. Just realized something. What we're discussing here is empathy. The ability that man has to place himself in the shoes of another. To live vicariously another's experience. It is this trait that allows us to enjoy a good book, a night at the theatre, a rousing joke, a million and one human specialties are dependant upon this empathy which we have. Know what else you can call this empathy? Theory of mind. Maybe humans don't have a theory of mind. See, this is the problem with studying limited populations and trying to extrapolate general features for a species as a whole. If we studied Lou and his friends, we'd have to decide that man was just a dumb beast with no theory of mind. Ha! Blessed irony. (I probably should have waited for Gendanken to post for this revelation. Shouldn't I? See if I couldn't catch her in the snare as well? Oh well. A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.)
Yes she was the first and the groundbreaker in the research. But even she admits that feeding them was a bad mistake. Even she admits that when she noticed their aggression at being fed bananas, she changed tactics and placed the fruit in a locked box, and that only made things worse. One would think that if leaving the bananas out would cause aggression, placing themin a locked box would make it worse as the animal becomes frustrated at not being able to get at the food. Now after, say, 6 years for example, of observing the increasing aggression, you'd have thought that she'd have stopped the feeding. But she did not. People make mistakes, and she's made many. But the difference with most people is that they adjust and adapt after those mistakes and don't continue with the same behaviour. The researches have admitted in a round about way that the level of aggression was abnormal. Looking at other alpha male chimps, their aggression was not as high as Frodo. Frodo could very well be an anomally, who really knows. He displayed his aggressive tendencies from a very early age. Even Goodall admits that and she stated herself in this documentary that she had suspected that Frodo would one day kill a human, because of the levels of aggression he'd displayed in the past. Feed any animal to the point where it comes back daily for that food, and then that animal begins to interact with you to the point where you can roll around on the ground with them, hold them, etc, then it is well on the way to domestication. I meant self-defence in the sense that Frodo was not being attacked or hunted by the two women who were walking through the rainforest on that fateful day. Had Frodo never had contact with humans, then this sort of behaviour would have been overlooked as something of an abnormality. Yet, other chimpanzees, to my knowledge, have never attacked a human baby before, let alone killed one, even those who have been in contact with humans throughout most of their lives. Maybe it's that Frodo has become so used to human presense that attacking them has just become second nature, that they are a part of the group he commands over. As you rightly pointed out, he is not fearful of humans because he's been in contact with them all his life. Isn't it that we fear and respect the unknown and frankly don't care about the known? Once an animal becomes used to human presence, they no longer fear them. Part of this documentary involved an interview with another scientist who'd discovered a group of chimpanzees that had never once seen a human being before, and she said the level of aggression was minimal and nothing like the levels at Gombe. I wonder if such low levels of aggression will last once the chimps become more used to human presence. I think sadism is a high possibility. They've witnessed Frodo and his 'posse' killing other chimps and monkeys out of pure aggression. One chimpanzee from a neighbouring group had been beaten to death, strips of his skin torn off, and his testicles torn on. That shows a high degree of sadism. They did not just kill that chimp outright, but tortured it and before they killed him. I've never once heard of any other animal that beat an other animal to death, then tore strips of skin off as well as ripping of their testicles. As for their perchant for hunting monkeys, well they are carnivors. It's part of their diet. They hunt in packs when hunting monkeys, stalking through the bush in silence as they approach the trees where the monkeys are. I guess it shows their cunning and precise nature. Frodo is a violent animal... I say is because I never heard of Frodo having died... I agree, there is culture there. And they should not be culled for displaying a culture that is opposed to what we want them to be. But when any animal becomes so bold that it attacks humans without any fear of retribution, controls must be put in place. Had a lion killed that child, that lion would be dead by now. Yet Frodo was not. If Frodo is not killed, then the human population should be forced to find other ways to move around the area and not approach the forest that is his territory, because if it's not and he's still alive, then in the future we may see more human deaths at the hand of the apes and chimpanzee deaths at the hands of the humans seeking revenge. I agree that the destruction of their habitat will not help matters much, and that is something that needs to be addressed, as lack of food and space will only result in increased aggression and possibly increased attacks. Human observors should be just that, observors. Observation from a safe distance where their presence is not felt is the best way to go in my opinion. Their presence should be minimal to the point of non-existence. Many other animals display the same level of 'theory of mind' as that in the test with the chimpanzees. I've seen dogs do the same thing, where food is hidden and the alpha dog does not see it, and the other dog takes the food and runs before the alpha dog sees it, but if the alpha dog sees the food first, the other dogs will just leave it be. Chimps are not the only ones who would pass this test. Monkeys would also display the same in such a test. Hell I've seen it in my boyfriends cats.
I don't even think it displays a lack of empathy. There's a difference between not being able to put yourself in someone else's shoes and not caring how uncomfortable their shoes are. Say you're playing a basketball game. Even though you've probably lost before, and you know the opposing team will be down in the dumps, you can empathise with how they're going to feel if they lose, you'll want to win anyway. Maybe you even want them to lose so they will suffer. This isn't a lack of empathy. It's simply not having an alliance with the other team. I know lady who lost baby would have suffered, I can imagine, I'm just not bothered by that. I don't want her to have a happy life, she isn't on my team. It wouldn't be hypocritical of me to laugh at her misfortune and then weep when my baby gets eaten by a chimp. Thats normal behaviour. I "use" empathy for family and friends, thats what it's for.
