From tool use to warfare — here are 5 ways Jane Goodall revolutionized our knowledge of chimpanzees
When Jane Goodall left her boat in what is now Gombe National Park in Tanzania on July 14, 1960, she started a trip that would always change science.
Armed with his notepad and his twins, Goodall has perched away from the chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) She had been sent to observe and worked to gradually build their confidence. This patience gave the chimpanzee for the time of “habitation” – the process by which wild animals acclimatize to human presence to the point that they begin to behave normally around them.
Goodall’s first revolutionary discovery was that humans were not unique in the manufacture and use of tools. In October 1960, she spied on David Graybeard – A high -ranking adult man who was the first to relax in his presence – pushing a stick in a mound of termitis to fish his occupants.
Until this point, scientists assumed that only humans had the brain for such behavior. “It’s in manufacturing Tools that man is unique, ” Kenneth Oakleya physical anthropologist and paleontologist of the 20th century, wrote For a conference held at the Natural History Museum in London in 1947. “The shaping of sticks and stones with specific uses was the first recognizable human activity,” he said.
The field of chimpanzee and the use of the wider tool are now a booming field of research, with Chimpanzees across Africa known to fish for termiteswhile West African chimpanzees are experts in the use of stones To crack the hard shell nuts. Primatologists now regularly observe chimpanzees using tools for Infer how hominines May have solved similar problems, especially termital fishing.
Everyone has their
Goodall challenged the agreement by giving each member of the Kasakela Chimpanze community A name, like Flo, Fifi and Goliath, as opposed to a number. At the back of this, she noticed that each individual had his own personality, with David Graybeard, for example, being very soft, while Frid was a known tyrant.
Because of Goodall, Find individual differences In the way chimpanzees act and now think of without surprise, but this discovery has paved the way for a wave of research on How the personality approaches behavior. This is important because differences in behavior can have great evolutionary consequences, especially if it has an impact Evolution by natural selection.
Complex relationships
The birth of a new infant, Flint, in the early 1960s, gave Goodall the opportunity to observe mothers taking care of their newborns. Each interaction she has seen was a new scientific discovery.
For example, Goodall has noticed how, as infants ripen, mothers have started to actively weaned their young people by denying the possibilities of nursing care and rejecting attempts to hitch on their backs, while simultaneously exposing their infants to increasing social interactions.
Scientists now know that Mothers play an essential role In learning periods for complex behavior such as the use of tools. A 2019 study published in the journal PNA noted that mothers of chimpanzee in the Republic of Congo could even actively teach their infants how termites giving them their own stick stems like hands.
Empathy and sorrow
Beyond the mother-child bonds, Goodall also observed that the chimpanzees form solid and long-term links with their family and other members of the group. Research has since revealed that Individual chimpanzees create nearby connections with those apart from their own sex and rank, and share food with their friends.
In addition, primatologists now know that chimpanzees have an exceptional social memory that completes these links, with research in 2023 in the journal PNA Noting that the chimpanzees recognize their former group comrades almost three decades after their last glance.
As such, the discovery of Goodall was essential to unlock the unknown social life of our most living parents and revealed what these relationships can teach us about human social and cultural evolution.
For example, these close relationships and the corresponding social tolerance that this creates are the foundation of learning in chimpanzees – with Chimpanzees acquire a wide range of behavior from others. In fact, being tolerant of your group comrades is considered fundamental For primates, including hominines, evolving to manufacture and use tools.
A taste for blood
Goodall’s time in Gombe also revealed that chimpanzees are not the vegetarians that they were once considered. Instead, omnivores actively hunt meat. Red Colobus Monkeys (genre Piliocolobus) are the main prey of the Kasakela community, but it is now known that chimpanzees through Africa chase a wide range of species.
For example, Chimpined in Ugandan Hunt DuikerA type of antelope, while fungoli chimpanzees in Senegal Fall for spears to kill bush bushes.
Goodall has also discovered violence between members of different groupsWith this discovery opening the way to what is now in -depth research on the chimpanzee border patrols,, Group level cooperation And reconciliation behavior.
We now know that pharmacy – The bond hormone – is involved in post-conflict reconciliationshowing its importance not only in the establishment of relationships, but on repairs.
