Comments for Primatology.net

Comment on Foresight & Innovation in a Devious Chimpanzee by Jamie Whitehouse

Jamie Whitehouse — Fri, 11 May 2012 12:00:54 +0000

I’ve read a few accounts from Frans de Waal of similar situations with the chimpanzees at Yerkes. But in these situations one of the cheeky individuals retains a mouthful of water to spray unsuspecting visitors at a later time.

Interesting article!

Comment on Do animals keep pets? by Rosalie

Rosalie — Wed, 09 May 2012 20:00:18 +0000

“animal pet owners are not “true” pet owners because they do so in captive or semi-captive settings.”
I live in a captive or semi-captive setting. True it is fellow humans that are keeping me captive but the situation for me is similar. I don’t need to hunt my own food as it is always provided for me – I have the luxury of being able to ‘afford’ to keep an animal for pleasure. In a captive or semi-captive setting so does the chimp.

Comment on New Gibbon Species Discovered by Review of Gibbon Spoting Cambodia Travel Project | ZoQuest Explorer

Review of Gibbon Spoting Cambodia Travel Project | ZoQuest Explorer — Fri, 04 May 2012 08:00:58 +0000

[...] in a series of treks. We viewed a habituated family of Northern buffed-cheeked crested gibbons (Nomascus annamensis), which are a species of ape that was not identified until 2010, for over two hours on one morning. [...]

Comment on Baby Orangutan & Tiger are the best of friends by fern

fern — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 20:59:19 +0000

Sooooooooooooo cute!!!!!!!!!!

Comment on Ethnoprimatology: Human-Macaque Interaction In Sulawesi by dbecker

dbecker — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 19:07:55 +0000

Reblogged this on eukaryography.

Comment on The Human Mutation – a mutation in neuropsin is found only in humans by » 10 Secondes Tigre 10 Secondes Tigre

» 10 Secondes Tigre 10 Secondes Tigre — Sun, 15 Apr 2012 19:35:59 +0000

[...] Source [...]

Comment on Maternal Infanticide and Cannibalism in Moustached Tamarin by Julia Howell

Julia Howell — Sun, 11 Mar 2012 04:01:35 +0000

Interesting article. When I was in school I did a project using mice and how they reacted to being crowded and the two most obvious reactions was gang rapes and new mothers eating all their offspring. My prof suggested that the cannabilism was probably a result of the female trying to curb the growth in the group rather than putting them back is heat. Then we started cutting back on food which caused older males to kill and eat younger males and females to not only eat their own young but raid other female nests.
I think about that project often as I get older and see our social behavior detoriating. I wonder if we’re (Earth) under a big microscope sometimes and who’s watching us.

Comment on Simple Moral Test Clearly Displays Prosociality in Chimpanzees. by Jamie Whitehouse

Jamie Whitehouse — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 16:59:26 +0000

Hey Mike,

The conclusiveness of this article has already been challenged due to the study not demonstrating perfect prosociality from the subjects (Skoyles, 2011), however Horner et al. (2011) defended this with which I believe a good argument explaining why the results were interpreted the way they are; I’d have a look at these paper if you have access! Links* are at the bottom.

In my opinion, I’m not sure how more a study can more conclusively interpret the presence of spontaneous prosociality. The experiment used standard scientific techniques and statistics, and to contradict this paper you must contradict the very definition of ‘significant’ in a scientific context. In fact, I believe this publication is one of the more conclusive in the literature.

In reply to your statement about the methods/social relationships between the subjects, participants of the experiment were carefully chosen based on different compatibility – a pair with a significantly affiliated relationship, a pair with a significantly negative relationship, and a neutral pair. Despite this (surprisingly), the tendency to be prosocial remained constantly throughout all pair types, indicating the presence of ‘true’ prosociality in opposed to a “You scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours.” scenario which you suggested.

Cheers,
Jamie.

___________________________________

Skoyles, John R. (2011). Chimpanzees make mean-spirited, not prosocial, choices. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1114006108
* http://www.pnas.org/content/108/42/E835.extract

Horner, Victoria J., Devyn Cartera, Malini Suchaka, and Frans B. M. de Waal (2011). Reply to Skoyles: Misplaced assumptions of perfect human prosociality. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1114208108
* http://www.pnas.org/content/108/42/E836.extract

Comment on Simple Moral Test Clearly Displays Prosociality in Chimpanzees. by Mike Potter

Mike Potter — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 20:29:33 +0000

“The experiment when run using a single individual (with no partner gaining a reward) actually showed a bias in the “selfish” choice***. ”

Well of course the individual would be greedy when alone. However, knowing that another chimp is around, the individual may decide to share..which the study indicates…but not even nearly conclusively…also, we should know the social relationships between the apes..find out if they cooperate more often with realatives and allies..as I suspect is the case…

Comment on Ultrasonic vocalisations allow tiny Primates to talk in private by Mike Potter

Mike Potter — Wed, 29 Feb 2012 20:21:15 +0000

I love Tarsiers. They are so strange yet intriguing. They are almost unclassifiable, as they possess both anthropoid and prosimian characteristics. This communication system adds to their uniqueness.