Category Archives: Ch.12) Will the Real Proto-Human Please Stand Up

In some circumstances the application of evolutionary-psychology thinking can be as silly as trying to find the primate precursor to the behavior of a piloting an airplane. Did swinging from trees help prepare humans for steering a Boeing 747 through … Continue reading →

While chimpanzees build no churches in which they bow down to an invisible alpha, they do engage in some behaviors that could be considered pre-religious. For example, chimpanzees will make threat displays at an approaching thunderstorm, as if attempting to … Continue reading →

Rather the the apparently more brutish chimpanzee, does the bonobo provide better clues to our innate behavioral heritage? In their monograph, “African Apes As Time Machines,” (7) R. Wrangham and D. Pilbeam point out distinctive bonobo traits, features seemingly shared … Continue reading →

Certainly humans are more civilized than chimpanzees. At times, sure, it doesn’t seem by much. Just prior to typing this I was listening to a blues station that played a song with these lyrics: You can have my husband but … Continue reading →

“The behavior of bonobos, unfortunately, is much less well known than that of chimps, and further study might reveal a darker side to their natures.” – Paul Ehrlich (19) Compared to gorillas and chimpanzees, bonobos have some physical proportions that … Continue reading →

“When relations between human societies are bad, they are worse than between chimps, but when they are good, they are better than between bonobos.” – Franz de Waal (27) Human beings are not “just” another, albeit naked, chimpanzee-like primate. We’ve … Continue reading →

“The consensus is much as Wood concluded, ‘it is at present unclear with which of the two extant species of Pan the modern H. sapiens should be compared.’” Wrangham, R. & Pilbeam, D (35) A number of people have argued … Continue reading →