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Chimps Found Making Own Weapons to Hunt for Food
Pojut writes "The Washington Post has an article involving chimps and weapons. Apparently, there have been direct observations of chimps in the west African savannah modifying sticks to create spears. They then use these spears to kill small mammals and eat them. It is the first time that an animal other than a human has been directly observed in crafting a weapon for the purpose of hunting or killing."
It was the females making the tools, not the males. A woman's body-building competition might be more apt here.
The grass is only greener, if you don't take care of your own lawn.
First this: Evidence of Chimp Developing "Spoken" Language, then this: Chimps Use Tool Kit, and now Chimps Found Making Own Weapons to Hunt for Food. I'm telling you, we gotta get off this rock soon.
We always knew Comcast was corrupt, here's the proof: http://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1909890&cid=34545432
Crows, it appears , will also use tools to get at grubs they otherwise wouldn't be able to kill and eat. Some critters are smart that way. There are also now observed cases of mother dolphins passing along tool-using culture in food-gathering.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
Anvil: A bunch of good guys fighting with bad guys, and their job isn't so much to win, it's to keep everyone fighting at a draw over the next few hours. (Sometimes the Anvil is a geographical obstacle like a cliff or shoreline, but in human warfare, it's traditionally been a bunch of guys who act as an immovable object, whether they're armed with spears/shields/pikes or a wall of machine guns.)
Hammer: A bunch of well-rested good guys whose job it is to (optionally, chase the bad guys towards the anvil, but in all cases - even if it's the anvil that starts the fight - once the bad guys are engaged with the anvil) swoop in and crush the somewhat-tired bad guys who have spent the earlier part of their afternoon stuck on the anvil.
Bad guys: Squished like bug.
The tactic dates back around 5000 years in human history. From a hammer chimp's perspective, it requires faith and foresight: you have to believe that your anvil-buddies will be able to hold off the bad guys, for long enough, and at the right location for you to get there before the bad guys are aware of your arrival. From an anvil chimp's perspective, it requires even more faith and foresight: as the anvil, you're thrown into a losing fight (the bad guys won't attack the anvil unless they think they can kill you to the last man!), and you have to belive your tribal leader when he says he'll be able to actually deliver the "hammer" troops that will win the day (read: "save your chimp ass!") before you're wiped out.
It's been decent tactical strategy between evenly-matched forces since prehistoric human times, up until the WW2 and Korea, and (albeit on a much smaller scale) engagements in Vietnam.
It's something you can't do unless you have not just a pack hierarchy/dominance structure, but also a language/communications system capable of abstracting out concepts like "position" and "time". Plenty of nonhuman species have exhibited the former trait, but humans (up until these chimps :) have been pretty unique when it comes to exhibiting the latter.
If chimps are indeed doing it, it's pretty impressive, and if we screw up in such a way that we're wiped out, but they aren't, they're welcome to the planet once we're through with it. I'd rather see our 2-million-year-separated cousins take over the planet than the cockroaches.
There are two species comprising the chimpanzee genus. The common chimp is what you describe, the Pygmy Chimp (also called Bonobo) is much different. Bonobos don't engage in warfare and prefer having sex with each other all day over aggressive encounters. They're much less dominant and aggressive within their tribes, too.
Both species seem to thrive well. I find it kind of refreshing to see that there are very different social models possible and both work. And while the chimps seem to be more inventive when it comes to killing, the Bonobos are certainly more inventive when it comes to having fun. I think we should learn from them.
It's also interesting to see that the behaviour of Bonobos seems to be much too unsettling that you will see or read much of it. Even in scientific literature they were more or less taboo for a long time and even today you won't see documentaries showing them having all kinds of sex just for fun (and they really do that all the time, including oral sex, masturbation and homosexual sex).
I think that's the "foresight" part...
"We are so close to Chimpanzee's that a human/ape hybrid is possible without the help of genetic manipulation,"
No. That's not possible.
And for those who haven't seen that this is an urban legend:
Claim: The United States standard railroad gauge derives from the original specification for an Imperial Roman war chariot. Status: False.
Stop it, stop it, it's fine. I will *destroy* you.