July 31, 2007

• 90% of all ape behaviour is play. The violence & wild aggressive displays in apes focussed on by the media is a minority of their behaviour, even in Chimps. That Bonobos are relatively less aggressive than Chimps gives an insight on their nature, but from what I have read, nobody but fruity new-age loonies say that Bonobos are without violence or aggression altogether. I don't think even de Waal says this, but I haven't read much about or by him. Thinking that Bonobos are these peaceful hippy apes is silly, but compared to their cousins they certainly are much less violent. Chimps in general are pretty scarily aggressive. Anyone who reads Goodall knows this, she's never been reticent in describing their violence. She is the one who broke the news that they were warlike & cannibalistic. That this article seems to paint her as a naive habituator indicates where the author's intent lies: iconoclasm. The rest of the conclusions about finger biting & murder are anecdotal or rely upon captive populations that are thus stressed & not indicative of nature. The beginning of the piece's fluff on mocking new-agers shows where the author is really coming from, I think. There are also clear inaccuracies; it says female Hyenas have penises. They do not. They have an extended urogenital display organ - an elongate clitoris that mimics a penis visually only. They still have all the internal female organs normal in mammals. It is just an extended clitoris with a partial urinary canal, erectile, but all clitorises are erectile. This cavalier comment makes the article's overall accuracy pretty suspect, imho. Hohmann's apparent conclusion that Bonobo genital rubbing is not sexual seems absurd, given the higher ratio of nerves in genital tissues, & their relation to sexual response in the brain, but maybe this is the author's spin on his actual statement. Hohmann does not sound super credible, frankly, but he's far more credible than de Waal. The actual evidence proving that Bonobos are much more monstrous than their reputation is actually lacking in the piece. We get a few anecdotes about captive individuals mutilating a male, mentions of meat eating (not unusual at all in chimps, even the disemboweling of a live animal - as if they have any concept of humane killing of prey or the ability to do so), a single apparent attack on a single male without followup, & a report of infant killing that doesn't have any corroborative evidence. Nothing new or earthshattering. I'm not meaning to dis your post, EarWax, because it's an excellent one. I encountered someone on another forum quote this article to me the other day using it to present Bonobos as baby-murdering mutilators, which got my goat, & I felt like getting to the bottom of it.
• MonkeyFilter: Not just sex and smiles MonkeyFilter: much more monstrous than their reputation
• MonkeyFilter: an extended urogenital display organ
• Thanks for your thoughts, Hank. I appreciate your perspective.
• So.. can I have some money?
• damn begging ape!