Orangutans Helping Discover Our Evolution

DiZASTiX writes "An article at MSNBC says, Orangutans share distinct "tricks of the trade" for feeding, nesting and communicating. Scientists say these behaviors represent humanlike culture. The discovery offers tantalizing new clues about our own evolution. By documenting these behaviors scientists are finding more and more information on our past. We may be more related to monkeys than we think."

Comments

Enabling Cultural Evolution

[airuck]

The Science article makes the case that observed orangutan behavior is more closely correlated with geographic location and opportunities for direct transfer of skills than to habitat (independent innovation). The authors then speculate that the common ancestor of all the great apes could have had this ability, and therefore, the beginnings of hominid culture could extend back 14 million years.

I find it interesting to speculate that something in our neural circuitry enabled early primates to learn from each other. I wonder if anyone within the human brain project is considering this area of research.

Your missing the point

[Cy Guy]

The fact that they have these types of social interactions is not new, what is new is that distinct geographically isolated populations have different ways of accomplishing the same thing.

NPR ran a nice piece on this today, and used the example of a fruit which one population eats by getting it open with a stick (a picture is included in the MSNBC article). A neighboring population seperated by a river, either eats the fruit by bashing it on rocks (much more inneficient) or by ignoring it as too hard to bother with. i.e. one population has learned to use a tool for specific task and has passed that information on the other Orangs in the community. Its the passing on of this knowledge, and the fact that it couldn't be passed to the neighboring population that makes this 'culture'.

From a SlashDot perspective, one could speculate that on the one side of the river, the solution for eating the fruit has been open sourced. But on the other side of the river, the solution was either never discovered, or if it was found, was closed source and died with its dicoverer(s).

Other examples given are a Kiss-Squeek gesture & sound, and "snag riding" a demonstration of male virility of breaking off trees and holding on to them while they fall, jumping off before they hit the ground (Orang candidates for the Darwin Awards perhaps?).

Re:man, that's a low standard

[hal9000]

It's not only learning that the orangutans have shown here. They also displayed long term memory, the ability to recognize the advantages of their actions (e.g. tools used for opening a fruit husk, arbitrary male displays that attract females). Many creatures do this sort of thing, but it's generally believed to be hard-wired. That behavior varies geographically in orangutans clearly shows that this is evolution on the memetic, software level -- a phenomenon that humans have long believed was our own.

What the orangutans also show is a desire to provide their fellows with these memes (i.e. to teach). That these memes exist, not in terms of individual orangutans, but in terms of *groups* of orangutans, in which individuals come and go, is what makes this a display of culture. In essence, orangutans have meme pools.