Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Chimp Found Plotting Against Zoo Guests

Posted by samzenpus on from the give-em-hell-Santino dept.

rjshirts writes "In further proof that Planet of the Apes is coming to pass, researchers in Stockholm, Sweden have proof that primates can plan ahead. From the article: 'Santino the chimpanzee's anti-social behavior stunned both visitors and keepers at the Furuvik Zoo but fascinated researchers because it was so carefully prepared. According to a report in the journal Current Biology, the 31-year-old alpha male started building his weapons cache in the morning before the zoo opened, collecting rocks and knocking out disks from concrete boulders inside his enclosure. He waited until around midday before he unleashed a "hailstorm" of rocks against visitors, the study said.'"

7 of 435 comments (clear)

  1. Translation by grub · · Score: 5, Insightful


    Translation: "I'm an intelligent primate who doesn't like being caged up for your amusement."

    --
    Trolling is a art,
    1. Re:Translation by MichaelSmith · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Because it's an aspect of chimpanzee intelligence that hadn't previously been observed, apparently.

      Years ago I read about some animal sanctuary where they were trying to keep chimpanzees in captivity. They had to run the place like a real jail for humans. If you forget to lock a door in (say) the elephant enclosure at the zoo you would be okay for a while. Not so with chimps.

      I am surprised that anybody is surprised by this. Chimpanzees are nasty scheming vicious murderous animals. Just like us.

      --
      http://michaelsmith.id.au
    2. Re:Translation by Experiment+626 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Comparing Bush to a chimp is considered fair game. Comparing Obama to one is considered unacceptable. One president is afforded better treatment and respect because of the color of his skin, and somehow this is touted as preventing rather than exemplifying racism.

    3. Re:Translation by v1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Any kid with a subscription to zoobooks can tell you about arctic foxes burying portions of a kill for later use during winter.

      There is a VERY important difference here. Arctic foxes don't survive through a few winters without a food cache and think "hey I bet it's going to do that again next year, maybe I should stash some food this summer so I have more to eat next winter?". Evolution has taught them to do that. Same as any other instinctual behavior in any other animal. Babies don't learn to suck the tit.

      These chimps identified a pattern, and prepared in advance to benefit themselves when they expected it to repeat. Gathering rocks in the morning to attack tourists in the afternoon is not evolutionary adaptation. Something like that could become an evolutionary behavioral adaptation, but not from 100 years of zoos.

      --
      I work for the Department of Redundancy Department.
    4. Re:Translation by pluther · · Score: 5, Insightful

      One president is afforded better treatment and respect because of the color of his skin

      You really believe that that's the only difference between the two men?

      --
      If the masses can keep you down, you're not the Ubermensch.
    5. Re:Translation by c6gunner · · Score: 5, Insightful

      How is building a pile of stones to throw different than a bird building a nest before laying eggs?

      Because building a nest is genetically wired into the bird. Make the bird sterile, and it'll keep building nests anyway. Moreover, it's a behavior which has existed for millions of years. It's a completely different phenomenon than a chimp learning to use objects as weapons.

      The big thing is that it demonstrates that chimpanzees have some rudimentary understanding of time. He's obviously able to observe his current situation, remember it as a past event, detect a recurring pattern, deduce that it's likely to repeat in the future, decide on an action to be carried out at a future time, and prepare materials required to carry it out. That's no small feat.

    6. Re:Translation by bhagwad · · Score: 5, Insightful
      One word: Learning.

      A bird doesn't learn how to build a nest. Neither does a spider acquire the experience to spin a web after experimentation. That knowledge is built into them and is instinct, and not cogent though in spite of your high blown words like "multi dimensional gradient" and "quantization".

      Without a doubt, the chimp in question learned a pattern. I leave it as an exercise to you to guess what that pattern was.

      The distinction between instinct and cogent thought is very real unlike what you imply. If spiders had to learn how to spin a web, they would starve, and so in their case, cogent thought is neither needed nor important.