Saturday, February 24, 2007

 

Chimpanzees with Spears: Another Threat to Humanity?

I had always thought that most, if not all, of the great apes were vegetarian. Now, it turns out that chimpanzees make and use spears for killing smaller primates to eat.
Chimpanzees in Senegal have been observed making and using wooden spears to hunt other primates, according to a study in the journal Current Biology.

Researchers documented 22 cases of chimps fashioning tools to jab at smaller primates sheltering in cavities of hollow branches or tree trunks.
Perhaps, "Planet of the Apes" is more prophetic than I thought. This also brings up the question, "What will destroy the human race first, global warming or armed apes?

Comments:
I thought this was settled a long time ago; chimps are tool users who modify natural itens to become better tools.

They are not tool makers as that would imply more intent than has ever been shown and KEEPING the tool which took so much time to make.
 
To make matters worse, those observed were the FEMALE chimps. Be afraid, be very afraid!

JW is, of course, correct, chimps are tool users not tool makers. This has been observed in zoos where fruit was placed out of reach but things to stack and pieces of branch were available. The chimps stacked things up, took the branch and wholloped the fruit till it fell down.
 
I was trying to ignore the female part. Just too scary.
 
As I remember in this case the big deal was that the chimps did in fact modify the sticks, which makes them tool makers, and they made them in advance, which you would pretty well have to do with a hunting weapon.

I bet after millenia of watching humans they finally caught on.
 
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