Mike Palij wrote, quoting me first: >On Tue, 26 Oct 2010 23:50:01 -0700, Allen Esterson wrote: >>On 26 October Michael Sylvester wrote: >>I saw a program on Jane Goodall where she saw chimps use >>sticks to fetch ants from an ant hill. She was fascinated by their >>tool utilization and alerted the scientific community who initially >>remained skeptical.
>I'm sure there's probably a psychoanalytic explanation for >people's fixation on chimpanzees eating ants but the fact >of the matter is that Goddall observed the chimpanzees eating >TERMITES. >Don't take my word for it, consider the "Jane Goodall Institute of >Canada" as a source, eh? Yep, I got it wrong. But given my interest in Jane Goodall's work, Mike, you might have realised I didn't need a reference to appreciate that fact. It was just a slip, no doubt arising from the fact that I was responding directly to (and quoting from) Michael Sylvester's post in which he referred to ants. So no psychoanalytic explanation (which I'm sure you mentioned jokingly), not even for a slip for want of attention. :-) Allen Esterson Former lecturer, Science Department Southwark College, London allenester...@compuserve.com http://www.esterson.org -------------------------------------------- Re:[tips] Who's on first? Mike Palij Wed, 27 Oct 2010 04:42:51 -0700 On Tue, 26 Oct 2010 23:50:01 -0700, Allen Esterson wrote: >On 26 October Michael Sylvester wrote: >>I saw a program on Jane Goodall where she saw chimps use >>sticks to fetch ants from an ant hill. She was fascinated by their >>tool utilization and alerted the scientific community who initially >>remained skeptical. > >I've been an avid follower of Jane Goodall's work since I read >*In the Shadow of Man* in 1971, and I don't recall that the scientific >community as a whole initially remained sceptical of her observations >about the use of small branches shorn of their leaves to entice ants >out of nests so they could eat them. Nor do I recall anything like this >being said in the recent BBC biographical documentary on Goodall >http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00v9j22 I'm sure there's probably a psychoanalytic explanation for people's fixation on chimpanzees eating ants but the fact of the matter is that Goddall observed the chimpanzees eating TERMITES. Don't take my word for it, consider the "Jane Goodall Institute of Canada" as a source, eh? http://www.janegoodall.ca/about-chimp-behaviour-tool-use.php -Mike Palij New York University m...@nyu.edu ----------------------------------- Re:[tips] Who's on first? Jim Clark Wed, 27 Oct 2010 05:33:08 -0700 Hi Before Mike leads us off into a pseudo-scientific Freudian explanation, how about the more mundane hypothesis that most people in the west probably associate termites with home structures, rather than mounds of dirt, with which we normally associate ants? Actually it might be a fun exercise to present such scenarios to students when talking about Freud, to see what sort of explanations they can generate. Take care Jim James M. Clark Professor of Psychology ------------------------------ Re:[tips] Who's on first? Pollak, Edward Wed, 27 Oct 2010 07:31:50 -0700 1) Chimps are apes. They are NOT monkeys 2) They were eating termites (more closely related to cockroaches than to ants) 3) The young female Japanese macaque who invented potato washing also invented a technique for separating wheat from sand. She was something of a monkey genius. 4) The NOVA program, "Ape Genius," opens with a clip of a population of chimpanzees who have developed the tradition of playing in small pools of water. On a related note, there are recent documented reports of bonobos using spears to catch and kill bush babies. They make the spears and use them to kill bush babies hiding in hollow trees. And as long as we're talking about animal behavior and unusual diets, see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sQOQdBLHrLk. If this hot link doesn't work, try copy/pasting bit into your browser. Ed --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: arch...@jab.org. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=6040 or send a blank email to leave-6040-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
