How has DNA and other technologies improved Jane Goodall’s, and other primate research?
New technologies and advancement in the area of field research has allowed biologist and primatologist to analyze information more effectively and efficiently. Through the non-invasive collection of fecal samples, researchers are able to extract and analyze DNA to help determine individual attribute, as well as population dynamics. In addition to DNA, fecal samples also contain hormones and parasites that help in determining the overall health of the depositor (Newton-Fisher NE, 2010). Other technologies include the use of Geographic Information Systems allows for mapping the ranges of chimpanzees, and satellite imagery is used to view the deforestation of select areas (Goodall, 2002).
Did Jane Goodall’s research find the evidence about chimp’s tool making? Is the human the only species able to make the tool? How do you correlate this with human culture?
Humans are not the only species with the ability of making tools. Early on in her research, Jane Goodall observed an older male chimp, she called him David Greybeard. Through her observation of David, she witnessed two forms of the use of tools. The first was the use of grass as a tool to extract termites from their mounds. The second was the making of a tool by stripping the leaves off a twig, modifying it for the same purpose. When Louis Leakey heard this, he wrote her “Now we must redefine tool, redefine man, or except chimpanzees as humans” (Goodall, 2002). There is a definite correlation between man and chimps in this respect. Human culture involves learned behaviors through observation, imitation and practice, the use of tools with chimpanzees show the same ability for learned beh...
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...urnal of Phsical Anthropology, 417-428.
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Dr. Goodall is a well-known British primatologist who has discovered a substantial amount about primates in her many years of research. She has written numerous books, including one that we will be going into depth about called, “Through a Window.” Her book contains personal experiences, research findings, and even pictures to help the readers visualize her scientific breaking moments from her thirty years with the chimpanzees of Gombe. She states that there is are minor differences, and several similarities between humans and the chimpanzees. We will discuss these differences and similarities through their social behavior, intellectual ability, and emotions. To conclude, examine Goodall’s research to adopt what her findings can tell us about our early ancestors, and whether or not her study coincided to the steps of scientific methodology.
There are contrasts in tool kits used by different groups of chimpanzees, which seem to be a result of the environment in which they live as well as information that is shared by the group. For example, in 1973 it was reported that chimpanzees in Gombe did not use hammer stones, but those of Cape Palmas did. We will explore the tool use of Chimpanzees from the wild, including Gombe, Tai National Forest, and the Congo Basin---and contrast those with Chimpanzees in captivity in locations of Zoo’s both in the United States and abroad.
As our neighboring living families, chimpanzees as well as bonobos have been extensively used as prototypes of the behavior of early hominids. However, In modern years, as statistics on the social behaviors or conduct and ecosystem of bonobos has evidently come to light, a lot of interspecific assessments have been done. Chimpanzees have been described in terms of their intercommunity struggle, meat eating, infanticide, anthropogy, male position-striving, and supremacy over females. Bonobos, for the meantime, have been depicted as the ‘‘creator of love, but not a war’’ ape, categorized by female power-sharing, a deficiency of hostility between either characters or groups, expounded sexual behavior that happens without the restraint of a thin window of fruitfulness, and the usage of sex for communicative determinations. This paper evaluates the indication for this contrast and reflects the reasons that distinct portrayals of the two great apes have advanced.
Every few years, Hollywood releases a new Planet of the Ape movie, which is always a blockbuster hit. Moviegoers flock to see these movies of how apes rise together and how they are actually more intelligent than meets the eye. Most people do not know the premise behind these movies of how smart and closely related apes are to humans. This is because people probably have never taken a physical anthropology class and have not done research on apes –our closet kins. Known for his immense studies in the fields of apes and monkeys, his long term research in the behavior of chimpanzees and mountain gorillas, and his experience in the forests with the apes, the co-director of the Jane Goodall Research Center and writer of our textbook, primatologist
When it comes to interacting with the environment tool use by chimpanzees is very vital to differentiating their intelligent within their culture. Chimpanzees are some of the very few unique primates that use a variety of tools which makes them stand out as very proficient tool users besides humans. According to David Watts chimpanzees use the tools to enhance their way of living. “Chimpanzees at several well documented sites mostly use tools in extractive foraging, and extractive tool use can substantially increase their foraging efficiency. They also use tools for hygiene and for several other purposes, including attracting the attention of conspecifics, as in leaf-clipping” (Watts 2008, 83). Subsequently chimpanzees are intellectual enough to alter an object to create a tool, and then use the tool for a precise purpose. Then on the other hand chimpanzees use tools to overcome everyday obstacles. As expressed by Watts chimpanzee toolkits mak...
Using a scanning electron microscope Shipman studied several types of marks left on the fossil remains of prey animals. Two of these marking she determined came from stone tools. These stone tools were used in two different ways leaving two different sets of marks. The first set of marks where located around joints and suggested disarticulation, and the second set removing flesh from bone. She then compared bones from the Olduvai to the Neolithic. Discovering Olduvai hominids did not practiced disarticulation as often as Neolithic hominids. But both Olduvai and Neolith...
Vision plays a huge role in the lives of non-human primates. Non-human primates have exceptional binocular vision, due to forward-facing eyes with overlapping visual fields (Prescott). This binocular stereoscopic color vision allows primates to see the world in terms of height, width, and depth, also known as three-dimensional vision (Haviland et al. 2010). Highly developed vision allows the later arboreal primates to judge depth, distance, and location when moving at speed from branch to branch (Haviland et al. 2010). This bino...
The human DNA closely resembles that of chimpanzees, sharing over ninety-six percent of our DNA. For some perspective, the difference between humans and chimpanzees is ten times smaller than the genetic gap between rats and mice. Both human beings and chimpanzees are considered intelligent beings, partially due to their ability to create and use tools. But as the years have passed, like seconds on a clock, the gap between these two animals has increased an almost inconceivable, with the starting at the point at which we evolved from. Today the tools humans use are created in order to make our everyday lives easier. But at some point we as a species has to ourselves some questions: How much technological advancement
According to National Geographic, scientists have sequenced the genome factor of the chimpanzee and found that humans are 98.5% similar to the ape species. The chimpanzee is our closest relative in the animal kingdom; however, some people are not aware of our resembling traits with chimpanzees. Jane Goodall’s, In the Shadow of Man, describes some similar traits humans and chimpanzees have such as their facial expressions and emotions, use of tools, and diet.
Apes have over and over again surpassed other primates in comprehension tests carried out in the laboratory. They are capable of reacting to stimuli in an appropriate manner. Researchers have measured intelligence in primates in a number of situations in an effort to determine the level of cognition these primates possess. Russon and Begun, researchers who have explored ape intelligence state, “In the physical domain, great apes do use tools in ways that require their grade of cognition but they devise equally complex manual techniques and solve equally complex spatial problems” (Russon and Begun 2004). Apes have the abilit...
The first person to see a chimpanzee use a tool was Jane Goodall in 1960. She saw David Greybeard a chimpanzee she named and saw him get a piece grass and used it for fishing termites. The chimpanzee inserted the piece of grass into the hole it made on a termite mound. David Greybeard did the process a couple of times until he got full then Jane Goodall went to the mount to figure out what the chimpanzee was doing. Over a couple of days, David and other chimpanzees were observed using a piece of a twig to get termites out of the mount. The chimpanzees removed the leaf and straighten the twig before inserted it into the mount. When chimpanzees find a hard dirt mound, they use their foot to penetrate the piece of wood, so they can reach the bottom of the mount. The use of rock as a tool among chimps is unique feature among primates. Scientists have discovered chimpanzees use rocks as tools. Chimpanzees sharpen rocks by hitting them to a tree or another rock, so it got strong, enough and durable. The sharpen rocks is for breaking food apart into little proportions, so the babies can eat the food easier. When the monkeys hit the rocks on another rock, little chips come off and it becomes sharp. Scientist studied chimpanzees in the Nimbia Mountains of Guinea, Africa the chimps were seeing using the rocks and wooden cleavers to break hard nuts into smaller proportions eat. There have been many instances where a scientists have seen chimps use sharp rocks to kill other animals when they’re on the hunt. The rocks are used as defense weapons when they’re under attack and the chimpanzees use male dominance to show who’s responsible. Chimpanzees in the captive have to find new ways to use the tools that are made. Chimpanzees in captivity ...
Knowing the diet of extant primate taxon opens up the possibility of predicting a good deal about its morphology and natural history. Morphology and natural history of extant primates is also important in making accurate inferences regarding their dentition and diet. However, when it comes to extinct primate taxon making dentition and dietary inferences are challenging and the evidence available is indirect (Cuozzo, 2008). The purpose of this research is to address the inferences that can be made about dentition and diet of extinct great apes from the Miocene by looking at dentition and diet of extant great apes including the bonobo, chimpanzee and gorilla. These diverse groups of vanished Miocene apes first existed millions of years ago and later diversified into various forms before they became extinct around 1.4 million years ago (Teaford, 2002).
“…molecular machines of nanotechnology will increase, by orders of magnitude, our individual and collective capacity to transform desires into material reality”
The increase in brain size may be related to changes in hominine behavior (See figure 3). The third major trend in hominine development is the gradual decrease in the size of the face and teeth. According to the Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia ’98, the fossil evidence for direct ancestors of modern humans is divided into the category Australopithecus and Homo, and begins about 5 million years ago (See figure 1). Between 7 and 20 million years ago, primitive apelike animals were widely distributed on the African and, later, on the Eurasian continents (See figure 2). Although many fossil bones and teeth have been found, the way of life of these creatures, and their evolutionary relationships to the living apes and humans, remain matters of active discussion among scientists.
This era of early tool development took place during the Lower Paleolithic, and was known as Oldowan tool tradition. Anthropologists suspect that a feedback loop between brain size, behavior, and language began to develop during the time of Homo habilis, due to a proposed correlation between the gradual increase in brain complexity and size as well as the development of more complex cultural aspects of their society, such as the various tools developed during the era of the species habilis. The arrival of Homo erectus, about 2 million years ago, marked another noteworthy progression of biological and cultural adaption, as well as further evidence supporting the feedback loop