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Stone-Throwing Chimp Back In the News With Better Plan
sciencehabit writes "Three years ago, a stone-throwing chimpanzee named Santino jolted the research community by providing some of the strongest evidence yet that non-humans could plan ahead. Santino, a resident of the Furuvik Zoo in Gävle, Sweden, calmly gathered stones in the mornings and put them into neat piles, apparently saving them to hurl at visitors when the zoo opened as part of angry and aggressive 'dominance displays.' But some researchers were skeptical that Santino really was planning for a future emotional outburst. Now Santino is back in the scientific literature, the subject of new claims that he has begun to conceal the stones so he can get a closer aim at his targets—further evidence that he is thinking ahead like humans do."
And yet we still keep him, and his relatives, in a cage.
They must have a clinical definition of "planning" that is more precise than we normally think of animals. Cuz I can tell you that my dog used to plan ahead. He was devious! Maybe this has to do with the time scale - she would usually make 5 minute plans, rather than 2 hours or whatever the monkey's time scale is.
Well yeah, if humans threw stones at people we'd put them in a cage too called "jail"
Don't Squirrels store nuts??
Humans who plan their aggressive dominance displays ahead of time also tend to receive longer periods of imprisonment as well(unless elected to suitably high office, or endorsed therefrom, of course)...
Except we call his relative's cages "cubes."
Now, excuse me, I need to go have my banana for lunch.
Please do not read this sig. Thank you.
He's planning to throw stones! At humans.
Also, didn't you ever watch Planet of the Apes?
He isn't just planning ahead, and then coming up with a new plan. He's being deceptive.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
The rocks he is throwing are planning ahead as much as a few people I know.
I know where there are a whole bunch of them, every day they throw stones at a big block of stone in the middle of a desert. They even plan ahead by going to that one place at least once in their lifetime so they can go throw stones at a big rock.
How wonderful that our imprisonment of these creatures is causing them mental and emotional problems resulting in behavior that is so useful for scientific study!
I might be interested in seeing this ape but I think if we're sent in as targets, admission should probably be free (unless they're going for the kink crowd, in which case they could probably charge a couple hundred per person.)
I would go and see this chimp if they would let me throw the stones back at him. Hell, I'd even pay good money.
then there's hope for American politicians...yay!
--- b2b.mallaidh.org | www.mallaidh.org | www.kidsalive.org/article/kahlil-pfaff/
Santino, a resident of the Furuvik Zoo in Gävle, Sweden, calmly gathered stones in the mornings and put them into neat piles, apparently saving them to hurl at visitors when the zoo opened as part of angry and aggressive 'dominance displays.'
As a stone-thrower, he's already advanced further politically than we have, seeing as how we are still at the poo-throwing dominance display stage.
I tried this at work but the custodial staff kept finding my little piles of rocks and removing them from my office. Sometimes it doesn't pay to plan ahead.
Alex, I'll take keybindings not used by Emacs for $400....
Next they will tell us about chimps that have writing skills, and about smoke-grenade throwing chimps with devious plan to kill all humans...
You wait until lunch? I have a banana break at 10:30 each morning.
---
ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
If I give 2 bones to my dog and he is full he will bury them for later eating. To me that is planning ahead
Since they're that smart, they'd have escaped already if they wanted it. They're just waiting and giving us a false sense of security until they make their move for global revolution.
Santino was castrated. Seems zookeepers decided his planning ability was too advanced for their liking. Thing to remember for one intending to show advanced planning ability to more technologically advanced species.
You wait until lunch? I have a banana break at 10:30 each morning.
You get breaks?
There is no "I disagree" mod for a reason. Flamebait, Troll, and Overrated are not substitutes.
Good for him. using the tools at hand to fight his oppression.
"In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes, except stone-throwing chimps, that will be for 30."
How is this news? How do scientific not already know this?
Don't Squirrels plan ahead for winter? They bury food months ahead of when they will need it.
Don't Leopards drag their kills into trees to save their meals for later? Or plan their menu for tomorrow?
Bower birds plan out the design of their nests in extreme detail and then tear them down when bad weather is coming through. That's involves very detailed Planning.
Even dogs will bring their toys to the front door hours before a person comes home from work because they are planning for that person to show up and play.
It's like Mr. Obvious became a scientist and needs a reason to request grant money. Next week Scientist discover that animals hate fire because it's hot.
I get breaks, who doesn't?
Well, OK, I hide in the restroom and call it a break...
At least he isn't thinking like a chimp and throwing poo.
Nothing to see.
So the detention without a trial that was approved in the US is just an extension of what was already done to the monkeys? It's nice to know the US is working towards interspecies equality!
`echo $[0x853204FA81]|tr 0-9 ionbsdeaml`@gmail.com
Well yeah, if humans threw stones at people we'd put them in a cage too called "jail"
Usually the way that works is you throw the stones first and then get put in a cage. Not the other way around.
Dammit, I need mod points.
Yeah. Clearly we should let the monkeys free. Those cages could be used for bankers and politicians who, unlike this story, have proven they have no ability to think ahead.
Great Intellect...
No, not deceptive.
He's just showing off his knowledge and understanding of our human religious scriptures, as well as showing that he himself is without sin.
Sheesh. You psychologist-type people will just read ANYthing into some situations. ;-)
Karma: NaN
why humans always insist that all animal behavior is instinctual and not thoughtful.
Yeah, we should send the little guy back to the Congo so the locals can eat him.
If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error.
If he keeps getting smarter, he'll eventually start listening to hiphop, drinking malt liquor and collecting welfare. And we can't have that.
There's a difference between doing something by instinct, and developing a new behavior in response to personal experiences. Squirrels don't bury food because they remember getting hungry last winter; they just do it. Leopards certainly don't "plan their menu for tomorrow". A dog bringing toys to the front door is simply a learned behavior, repeating something they did by chance previously that resulted in a positive outcome. What appears to be happening here is the chimp devising a new behavior, not by chance, but by anticipating the future.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
No, Santino aka Sonny was the hot headed one as evinced by his death at the tollbooth. This ape, his methodical planning sounds much more like a Michael to me. I suspect the research community was tipped off by an ape named Fredo, the stupid git.
"My fingers Emit sparks of fire in Expectation of my future labours." William Blake
Well, if we were stupid enough to give the people in jail stones - I bet a significant number of them would get thrown. Fortunately, humans plan ahead enough to know it would be idiotic to allow prisoners to have stones. And we also seem to realize that taking kids on field trips to see humans in jail wouldn't be prudent either.
He's planning to throw stones! At humans.
Yes, because humans have never done anything to him. I don't think I've ever been to a zoo and not witnessed a teenager taunt the primates. Or put the chip in the cage to begin with.
Also, didn't you ever watch Planet of the Apes?
I suppose you missed the part at the end where the humans had nuked the planet.
My family was driving through Florida in the 60s and we stopped at some wretched “jungle zoo” by the side of the road. I ran ahead of the rest looking at the really sad caged animals and saw the chimp cage. It had ragged poly sheets hanging in front with big holes and tears in them with a chimp sitting quietly. As soon as I got close enough, the chimp sprayed me with a most foul mouthful of something bad and jumped down to a bucketful of nasty and sucked up another huge mouthful.
I wasn’t the brightest bulb on the tree but even I knew to run like hell. This happened in full view of my family who promptly collapsed in hysterical laughter. The chimp knew exactly what it was doing and planned accordingly.
Peace is easy to achieve, just surrender. Liberty is much harder get/keep.
I'm pretty sure that you aren't allowed to waterboard chimps these days. The IRBs just get touchy.
So this is what happens when stone-throwing chimps are kept away from /b/ !
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
they're in sweden. they might have figured out it's not worth escaping to the wild.
the dude still needs a way to show off aggressive dominance to get chicks though, regardless of imprisonment.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
In lieu of (+6, Sad-But-True), please accept this cartoon, which hangs on my cage wall: I'm the next contestant on the hot new game show: Who's the dumb ape?
And we also seem to realize that taking kids on field trips to see humans in jail wouldn't be prudent either.
Not the case - I was on a traveling football team in my younger years (early teen). We had drug and theft issues running through the community and team. We were actually brought to see the humans in jail. I decided at that moment that it was never going to be the place for me. Maybe we should take MORE of our kids to see humans in jail.
-g
Oh no, that's not a banana.
-g
Considering he seems to be acting like a cranky old man, and considering where we stick our cranky elderly relatives? Sounds like he is a bit better ahead.
by Anonymous Coward: I, for one, welcome the shift from car analogies to pizza analogies. um.. overlords?
Swinging from branch to branch in our dense spruce forests could be difficult.
c++;
Feel free to go give one a hug, they rip faces off.
They need to be in a cage...otherwise the next step is the statue of liberty buried up to her neck on a beach!
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Or start leaving guns around in his enclosure until he learns how to defend himself and starts eating the locals
... still waiting for this free-as-in-beer free beer I keep hearing about.
That was before we had precogs. Welcome to the future, caveman.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
the typical republican voter could plan this far in advance.
MY banana break is at 11:45, and we start throwing feces around 3:12 pm. Unless the hot receptionist is here, then we all run around with our chests puffed up...
BRB, I need to jump on daves desk and scream at him.
Just another day in Corporate america.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I'm assuming that some poor researcher got this study confused with another on Dick Chenney's strategic defense plans.
Still this is a stupid as they come. The problem is humans are proud, so they will convince themselves that they have discovered something and congratulate themselves on a job well done. All the researchers are busy patting themselves on the back and thinking they are smart and insightful and they have really uncovered something here when all they did was just notice something the chimp does normally.
You dunk a new born baby underwater and they hold their breath, squirrels will bury nuts to keep for the winter time to dig up later, dogs bury bones to dig up later when they want them, alligators will stuff prey under a log or rock in the river to come back and eat later, birds sometimes will hide bits of trash and grass inside tree holes to use for when they build their nest. None of them are actually making a concious act or planning ahead, they are doing what animals do normally. Its built into the genetic structure to do certain things.
I mean hell my cat knows about what time of day I come home and she waits on the steps by the door. But that doesnt mean she says "Well its 430 so he will be home soon. Id better go wait for him on the steps". Much like the chimp knows its scared and feels threatened and has gotten used to the thing its afraid to come around at certain periods so it waits to defend itself.
If someone came into my home and locked me in a cage someplace Id be pissed also.
He should be a gorilla warfare expert in no time!
Drugs are illegal mostly because some people want to control others. I guess you threw in your lot with the political power junkies?
It is like the perfect metaphor for modern society.
Next thing you know, he'll be swinging bones at visitors,,,
So we have a chimp that is showing remarkable signs of intelligence, and the best activity we can come up with for him is to stick in him a cage and let the tourists ogle him?
It's cute how we like to pretend we're "advanced".
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
And yet we still keep him, and his relatives, in a cage.
For scientific reasons.
Oh, wait, it's fashionable to prattle on about how humans stink. I see why you left that off, never mind. To atone for this, in the next thread about SETI I'll make a joke about how aliens won't respond back to us because there's no intelligent life here. I should get modded up because we all read that Calvin and Hobbes cartoon, right?
"I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)
humanity worsened so much that it forces even animals to react.
learn to protest people, for your rights.
And yet we still keep him, and his relatives, in a cage.
Someday he and his relatives will rise up and take over the planet!
Yeah and he got his balls cut off for his past displays of aggression. I bet he didn't plan on that happening.
Code monkey get up, get coffee . . .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4Wy7gRGgeA
I had my fun in high school and college. I am just not super motivated or at all interested in politics enough to worry about the political power junkies. I stay off their radar, they stay off mine. I still hold the view that if more of these kids understood the consequences of jail, we'd have less of them in it. *over generalization* I guess you are a drug abusing hippy without a job spending all your time resisting "the man"? *over generalization off*
-g
And yet we still keep him, and his relatives, in a cage.
For scientific reasons.
Oh, wait, it's fashionable to prattle on about how humans stink. I see why you left that off, never mind. To atone for this, in the next thread about SETI I'll make a joke about how aliens won't respond back to us because there's no intelligent life here. I should get modded up because we all read that Calvin and Hobbes cartoon, right?
I have no problems with them keeping him in a cage for scientific reasons. But that is simply not the case. He's on display for the entertainment people. Or did they do the following as a precursor for how to deal with violent criminals? To control his behavior, and keep his hormone levels down, zookeepers castrated Santino. Since then, Santino has been observed to be more playful and is growing a "Buddha belly" How scientific of them.
One of the issues I see in this whole debate is the bias, intentional or unintentional, of the observer. It seems that some observers have the idea that apes have the ability to plan ahead. It is quite possible that observations are being interpreted to fit the hypothesis when there may be other explanations. It could just be an extension of learning hunting skills. Would a large cat that conceals himself near a game trail be considered to be planning ahead like a human? All hunters do similar things but are not considered to have human like intelligence. Perhaps some researches have the idea that chimps have human intelligence and are looking for anything to prove that theory.
Zoos are 'entertaining' because they're educational. Nice try, though.
Whatever, Chimps are so smart that they'll rip your lips off and eat them, piss in your face while they tear a hole in your chest, then jack off in your hematoma while shitting on your dead and lipless face. They exist at the top of the food chain. Why do we keep them around? Why do we care? We should be implanting radar dishes into their skulls and using them to maneuver tactical nuclear weapons into urban areas. Then we can just blame the monkeys and wash our hands of the affairs of the world.
Your honor, I'm a chimpanzee. Your scientists saw me stacking stones and then hiding them and so they sent me to law school. Your world frightens and confuses me! When someone sends me a text message on my iPhone I wonder, "are there tiny people inside typing it?" I don't know. But I do know this: when someone like my client slips and falls on the sidewalk in front of a public library, he is entitled to two million dollars in compensatory damages and two million in punitive damages. Thank you.
I live with two pit-bull terriers (both rescued strays), and unfortunately I must keep them in separate rooms because of a traumatic event where during play the one's jaw got caught under the other's collar -- They remember this episode, but confuse it with each hurting the other; Ever since they fight if left together unsupervised for a length of time.
The one dog, TC (named after the street T.C. Jester where she was found), likes being in the larger part of the house, and would rather not be in the den. So, when I say that "It's time to switch the dogs", and try to put her in the Den, she runs to the back door instead, as if she needs to relieve herself. She knows that the dog in the house usually ends up in the den when the outside dog is let back inside -- to keep them separated.
If while coming back inside she realises that I'll be putting the other dog outside -- making her more likely to be the dog in the den, then she's resistant to coming back inside... She not only thinks ahead, she's worked out several plans to achieve her goal. If TC knows its her turn to have run of the house, then none of this is an issue, she goes in and out without a care, knowing that it's the other dog that'll be relegated to the den -- Even if she sees the other dog going out when she comes in, she's not reluctant to come inside because she's not planning on being put in the den.
Furthermore, I'm beginning to run out of ways to say "Walk" and "Car" -- The dogs love riding in the car, and have learned that "C.A.R." means car, "Truck" and "T.R.U.C.K" is also out, can't say or spell "go" without them getting excited to leave -- Currently I've taken to saying, "Vamonos en el Auto" which is me butchering Spanish (never formally studied it, but I've run out of French and English words), because they've also learned "coche"; However, TC has started to pick up on this too -- You can see her perk up and look between the parties as if she's sussing out whether or not we'll soon be leaving. Names of vacation places, such as "Kerville" must be avoided at all cost -- I sometimes attend the Kerville Folk Festival for a week or so and have the neighbour care for one dog at the house while the other is in a kennel (to ensure separation), TC gets distressed when Kerville is mentioned -- She picks it up even in the middle of rapid speech with other parties. TC normally loves to get the leash so we can go for a walk, but Mention Kerville at all and she runs away from the leash for several days. She's planning not to be the dog in the kennel.
Humans are so damn chauvinistic. There's no such thing as "sentience" -- That's some made up Bullshit right there. There is only varying degrees of awareness and intellect depending on the complexity of the neural network. Bigger network? Smarter. That's all there is to it.
When (not if) machine learning neural networks surpass the complexity of the human mind by leaps and bounds: I sure hope they're understanding enough of our primitive nature, and don't treat us lesser minded humans as we treat the apes and other creatures with proportionally less neurons. Note that I didn't say I own the dogs...
You should be punished for that.
we could treat him like a human and see how he does. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,494067,00.html
Eating each others lice on break is relaxing though...
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
Just like in CareerBuilder commercials/advertisements (ads.)/spots on television/TV. ;)
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Where's the ad-driven video feed?
we could treat him like a human and see how he does. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,494067,00.html
Or we could leave wild animals in, I don't know, the wild perhaps. I don't have a problem with using animals for justified medical/behavioral experiments. Or herd animals for food for that matter. But primates do not make good pets and are, for the most part, too intelligent to stick in cages for their entire life simply to entertain humans.
They should give him a loaded gun and see what he does with it!
...and the problem with that is? Oh, horses are off the list for you as well? Vegan?
So the detention without a trial that was approved in the US is just an extension of what was already done to the monkeys? It's nice to know the US is working towards interspecies equality!
From the second sentence of TFS "Santino, a resident of the Furuvik Zoo in Gävle, Sweden" It's nice to see a chimp has a better understanding of who to throw stones at than some on /.
Bow down to Santino-Caeser, your new chimp overlord, and hope your astronaut doesn't crash near his cage.
Oh no, that's not a banana.
and those are not stones....something beginning with S but a whole lot more smelly.
I am just not super motivated
There you go -- too many drugs!
Or start leaving guns around in his enclosure until he learns how to defend himself and starts eating the locals
That is an excellent idea. What we need is an organization devoted to teaching animals how to defend themselves against humans and supplying them with the weapons to effectively do so. I'd paypal $100 to my local PTA (Planet of the The Apes) fund right now if they existed, much more if they were successful at teaching them how to construct weapons as well.
It is even better to know there is no zoos in the US... freedom for the monkeys! At least for them.
`echo $[0x853204FA81]|tr 0-9 ionbsdeaml`@gmail.com
My cat responds with an innocent expression if I ask if it ate the salmon I was preparing. My kitten looks proud stating "Yes I eated it, it was delicious, got some more". Same as kids, kids don't know how to lie when they are young. Then they learn it badly (lying when the evidence is right there) and then they learn deception.
A lot of this research is problematic. A fish eagle is known to be able to do all it needs to do in a day in few minutes, it is such an effective hunter. So... is it a dumb or smart animal? Evolution gave it the traits it does not need to hunt in packs or track a prey or wait in ambush. Is it very stupid or very smart?
Is a cat opening a door for which it does not have the appendage and for which it has no training by its parents as smart as a toddler who is both younger and older depending on how you count?
Do otters who carry a stone for the next meal plan? Is storing a prey, planning?
For that matter, I have spend weekends without doing anything really intelligent. Just eating and sleeping and my cats did it better. Intelligence is hard to tell if you don't need to display it.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Dammit, I need mod points.
Then start making more useful comments than that one.
Quick! Start throwing stones!
Every time I start to have faith in humanity, I ruin it by driving to work between 7 and 8 am.
Sometimes I wonder why it takes researchers so long to discover attributes in animals that any pet owner has observed countless times.
Here's one incident that comes to mind:
A couple of years ago my father picked up my cat, as he's done many a time. But this time he took him over to another cat who, for whatever reason, he hated with passion. He patiently let my father hold him and return him to the other room. The instant my father released him the cat turned and bit him with all his strength.
Instead of freaking out while in a compromised position he patiently waited to exact his revenge when he was reasonably safe. That sounds fairly good control of emotion and planning to me. It's not collecting rocks, but I think it's compelling nonetheless.
How about pets training owners into performing desired actions?
That could be some very interesting data. Hail Caesar!
I misunderstood the summary title, "Stone-Throwing Chimp Back In the News With Better Plan." I expected the article to be about congressional republicans.
-- QED
I support the right to arm bears.
"He's lost in a 'floyd hole"
Paypal is not a verb. Contrary to popular beliefs not every noun can be verbed. Not without looking like a tool.
But... the future refused to change.
There is still one zoo - It's called Congress
Just be glad he's not gorging on prunes.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
They did that for us in elementary school, escorted us through juvenile as a field trip, even showed off the taser (circa 1991?) for us.
Now when i think back, i am only reminded that real monsters exist, and we encourage whole towns to get into sadistic torture.
Fight war with love, asshole. (so long as it's tough love. You /don't/ tase anyone you love)
CS majors know the time/space tradeoff, but they never get taught the 3rd, crucial, tradeoff of the set: comprehension!
"Whatever you do, don't call him 'monkey'...ohshit"
For the record, chimps are apes.
Mart
"I know I will be modded down for this": where's the option '-1, Asking for it'?
Stoning seems appropriate.
It gripped her hand gently. 'Regret is for humans,' it said.
And we also seem to realize that taking kids on field trips to see humans in jail wouldn't be prudent either.
Not the case - I was on a traveling football team in my younger years (early teen). We had drug and theft issues running through the community and team. We were actually brought to see the humans in jail. I decided at that moment that it was never going to be the place for me. Maybe we should take MORE of our kids to see humans in jail.
A friend of mine in law enforcement explained to me that those "scared straight" programs are mostly worthless. The kids come in, take a look, and say "Oh that isn't going to be me, I am way smarter than those fools."
I'm a good cook. I'm a fantastic eater. - Steven Brust
For the record, chimps are apes.
And orangutans are librarians?
You should be punished for that.
Quick! Start throwing stones!
First let's find one of us who hasn't done anything wrong. Then we'll let him throw the first stone.
Relevant.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvjgIxuVdo4
Quite right, proper nouns especially are exempt. Could you Xerox your thesis on the subject for me, or should I Google it?
All living languages continuously evolve through such abuse, and no doubt the early adopters always look like idiots. No sense getting upset about it.
--- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
A friend of mine in law enforcement explained to me that those "scared straight" programs are mostly worthless. The kids come in, take a look, and say "Oh that isn't going to be me, I am way smarter than those fools."
I'll definitely agree they are MOSTLY worthless. The kids that were still pretty hardcore on drugs and into larceny were still pretty hardcore on drugs and into larceny. Those of us who were not yet into that kind of thing, did not ever go into that kind of lifestyle. I still keep in touch with most of those guys too. I wont go as far as to say I would have picked up that lifestyle if I hadn't gone through the jail, but I can definitely say that it made up my mind at the time.
-g
If your afternoon break is at 3:12, surely your lunch starts at 11:42, not 11:45? (It's an artifact of the IBM time keeping system, which did everything by tenths of an hour...)
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
They get really pissed off if people use the m-word.
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Most cats I've had do just fine free-feeding on dry food, but my two current ones are overweight. (One was a four-year-old rescue cat who weighed about 18 pounds when we got him.) So they're not only on diet food, but they get fed less than they want, twice a day. (Fat cat is down to 17 pounds, after a couple years of this.)
So any time I'm near the kitchen, if they haven't been fed in a couple of hours, they'll tell me it's time to feed them. Even if they have just been fed, as long as they've gone through most of their food, that's good enough to claim they haven't been fed yet. (They're not bugging me for food right now, but that's because it's nap time, and there's a patch of sun they're both sleeping in, but after they wake up they'll start claiming that nobody's fed them all day!
Bill Stewart
New Fast-Compression-only CPR http://preview.tinyurl.com/dy575ks
Paypal is not a verb. Contrary to popular beliefs not every noun can be verbed. Not without looking like a tool.
Calvin would seriously disagree with you.
There is a hughe number of pictures of other chinps that appear to plan ahead, just check this link: https://www.google.com.au/search?q=george+w+bush+monkey+faces&hl=en&client=firefox-a&hs=Zl0&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&prmd=imvnso&source=lnms&tbm=isch&ei=XG-sT66eFYytiQeqsdHbAw&sa=X&oi=mode_link&ct=mode&cd=2&ved=0CBEQ_AUoAQ&biw=1760&bih=884
Don't be an ass. It's called zero-derivation, and regardless of whether it agrees with "popular beliefs," it's a natural part of language. Get used to it.
When I was working with the White Marline Porpoise Circus in Port Aransas, Texas, I watched a dolphin there, named Pete (a bottlenose from Florida) do a similar thing. There was a pelican that would steal his fish if we threw them in the wrong direction, so it seemed Pete was tired of this.
One day between shows, we noticed about 8 fish, about 2-6 inches under the surface, in a circular ring, fairly evenly spaced. As they would sink, Pete went around to each one, pushing each one in turn, to the surface. The pelican appeared interested and wary. After about 10 minutes of this, the pelican flew and dove for one of the fish -- Pete grabbed him, and took him to the bottom and drowned him. First time I had thought of this as "tool use". This shows that the behavioroccurs in tursiops as well.
Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds -- Albert Einstein
Paypal is not a verb. Contrary to popular beliefs not every noun can be verbed. Not without looking like a tool.
Calvin would seriously disagree with you.
yes.
"verbing weirds language". although I dont necessarily agree. ever "phoned" someone?
This seemed like a reasonable sig at the time.
you're right.
we should put him in a glass house instead.
This seemed like a reasonable sig at the time.
I AM one of the locals, you insensitive clod!
when I heard "Stone throwing chimps that learn new behaviors" was that George W. Bush was back in town.
Humans, poo flingers in more formal clothes?
All in all, this is what we call evolution, do we want to stall it, destroy it, or what is the goal of this. We know this will happen to all species eventually, some maybe quicker than others, but we could have walking lizards, walking monkeys, etc.... Just add some time of mutation agent that speeds up this process, and we will have a trove of animals that are now capable of many things humans are...so how much different is this from say aliens?
We are ready to make first contact, but yet not so ready that we have another species from earth show us we are not the only ones....funny, I guess maybe this is because we would hate to find out that we treated animals so badly all these years with no regard for their well being, and they now in turn come into intellectual light with a vengeance....
Is it a pleonasm to say "plan ahead"? Isn't planning always ahead? You can't plan for something that already happened.
Not the first time I've felt a fictitious experience translate into fact. Am starting to wonder whether that chimpanzee's other name is not "Caesar". Remember, it all started with just one of them revolting, then...
By the way, I'm one of his (relatively close) relatives. and so are you. (Just getting an obligatory dig in, just in case you're a creationist or god-squaddie of some demented sort ; such retards seem to be worryingly common on Slashdot. Apologies if you're actually a sensible person.)
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
You.. you just verbed verb
... still waiting for this free-as-in-beer free beer I keep hearing about.
It should have read "thinking ahead unlike human beings".
And yet we still keep him, and his relatives, in a cage.
Because , alternating with the stones, he still throws poo
Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.
Please wake me up when humanity gets over itself.