Chimp Found Plotting Against Zoo Guests

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.'"

Comments

Re:Translation:Cycles.

[NeutronCowboy]

No. Elephants don't bring sticks and rocks to scare away lions they regularly meet at yearly watering holes.

This involved:
- detection of arbitrary cycles
- planning for how to deal with them
- relatively elaborate creation of tools to support plan

Pretty exciting stuff indeed.

Re:Chimps are mean little effers

[Hatta]

They will fondle themselves in front of you, throw stuff at you, and even be very violent should it be their wish

I'll just leave this here.

Re:Translation

[Shihar]

I wonder what all the animals that prepare to hibernate in the winter would think of your statement?

You are under the assumption that it is planning that causes an animal to prepare to hibernate and not pure instinct leading them by the nose.

You don't eat because you realize that if don't various mechanisms in your body are going to fail. You eat because you are hungry. The same is true for hibernation, mating, and a pile of other "planned" behaviors. Two deer don't bang in the fall because they realize that this is their chance to make babies and if they miss the window they will have none. They got at it because they are horny.

Re:Translation:Cycles.

[dtml-try MyNick]

Arguably, he demonstrated more foresight and planning than the primates running the investment banks on Wall Street.

This is that far from the truth as you might think ;)
A while ago a Dutch TV show did a experiment on this very subject.

They had let a group of apes handpick a bunch of stocks and let a group of notable bankers do the same.

After 1 month the apes had yielded a higher net profit then the bankers did.....

Of course this was for shits and giggles but very funny nontheless.

Re:Translation:Cycles.

[fishbowl]

>This involved:
>- detection of arbitrary cycles
>- planning for how to deal with them
>- relatively elaborate creation of tools to support plan

I would even speculate that there is an element of "avoiding being caught executing the plan."
Does that imply a guilty conscience to some degree, or only fear of his handlers?

Re:Translation

[Knowbuddy]

Any zookeeper who has ever worked primates would tell you that this is pretty typical.

My wife worked as a keeper at a prominent chimp and orangutan sanctuary for several years. She would come home with tales that would make your skin crawl of how smart the apes (both chimps and orangutans) are. It turns out that the OUs (you don't say "orangs", as it offends some of the more hard-core keepers) are the more cunning of the two -- she likened them to engineers.

Some examples:

• An orangutan who kept a bit of metal in between his bottom lip and teeth, using it to try to pick the locks at night when the keepers weren't around. After they finally caught him doing it, they went back and reviewed the tapes and saw that he'd been at it for weeks.
• An orangutan who threw her baby onto the hotwire (electrified fence) to use as an insulating glove to get herself over it.
• An orangutan who used a sweater in the same hotwire-insulating capacity. (OUs love sweaters, shirts, and dresses.)
• Chimpanzees that would hear people approaching, then position themselves just close enough to the walkway to be able to urinate and/or masturbate onto the guests (generally not the keepers).
• An orangutan who used a hard plastic toy to chip away at the concrete substrate (foundation) of his enclosure for days, until he finally managed to get to the bare rebar beneath.

Did you know that the apes you see in TV ads (such as CareerBuilder) and films (such as Dunston Checks In) are never more than 3 or 4 years old, but have a lifespan only a little shorter than humans? They're only "cute" when they are very young, and quickly become uncontrollable, no matter how well-trained they are -- precisely because they have that kind of intelligence. (Roughly that of a 4- to 6-year-old child.)

After that, they are retired and put in cages (rarely zoos) for the rest of their lives. The entertainers wash their hands of them, then your tax dollars are spent to maintain them for the next 40+ years. Depending on the facility, this can be as much as $20,000USD per ape per year.

So every time you see a "funny monkey video", think about how much of your paycheck is going to support that ape in a few years.

Re:Translation

[I cant believe its n]

I'm on your side Hurricane. Humans are special (but not that special)

I have actually seen our dog understand how to catch rodents. The insight was an obvious watershed, because he went from zero successes over 5 or 6 years, to multiple successes per month for the rest of his "active" years after the realization:

Over here we have a type of rodent(in swedish they are called Skogssork, similar to or the same as Bank Voles) which creates a nest for its family by digging tunnel systems in the dirt. These tunnels can be several meters long so the Voles can exit the nest at many places.
Our dog had for many (annoying) years stood barking with his nose stuck down any of the tunnel openings, trying to dig his way to the Voles. He did this for hours at end and it was his best passtime.

One day when he had barked into an opening, I happened to be nearby and I saw a Vole exiting the nest by an opening far away from where our dog was, it having reacted to the dogs threat. I called out to our dog to chase it. Our dog saw the Vole and tried to get it, but could not catch it in time before it went underground again.

Now comes the cool thing:
He then (after years of stupid barking down tunnel openings), went to the opening where the Vole had gone in, barked really loud, and then silently snuck back to the opposite side of the nest where he waited silently. After many years of pointless barking, he finally caught his first Vole. After that day our dog regularly brought home Voles, because he had understood how to outthink his rodent enemy.