The Knife - Monkeys First Tool

J

JDBLADE

Joined
Dec 8, 2003
Messages
1,373
I was watching a show on Capucine Monkeys and was amazed to see this Monkey smash 2 rocks together and take a flake to cut plastic to get to the honey. Could it be that the Knife was not man's first tool but the monkey's? Could this be the beginning of another "monkey trial" on Blade Forums.

PS

Cute and smart little things.
 
To me this stuff is a great little shot to man's ego. We like to see ourselves as the "tool using" wonder species, but truth is lot's of animals use them to.

Monkeys (like you stated)
Chimps (sticks and straws to probe to ants)
Otters (use rocks to open clam shells)
Some birds use rocks to smash open eggs of larger birds to eat.

Lends some credence to the theories that man did not evolve from apes, but that humans and apes evolved from a common ancestor.
 
truth is lot's of animals use them to.

Monkeys (like you stated)
Chimps (sticks and straws to probe to ants)
Otters (use rocks to open clam shells)
Some birds use rocks to smash open eggs of larger birds to eat.
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Yes, but there is a huge and critical difference between picking up a stick (a found object) and using it to pick up ants to eat or using a rock (again, a found object) to smash something else, and actually making a tool for a specific purpose.

If these Capucine Monkeys are actually doing this, then that is, in my opinion, a very significant discovery. It's a significantly-higher level of thinking.

Mr. JDBLADE, you wouldn't happen to remember the name of this documentary or where you saw it, or who made it, or anything, would you? this is all very interesting to me.
 
Gollnick said:
Yes, but there is a huge and critical difference between picking up a stick (a found object) and using it to pick up ants to eat or using a rock (again, a found object) to smash something else, and actually making a tool for a specific purpose.
Click to expand...

Yes, but the ability to recognize the need for the tool and that the available item with work for the specific purpose is not that far off from the next step, fashioning a tool from available items that previously were not suitable. Also these animals tend to try more than one until they find one that works, i.e. right size, lenght, or shape. That is reasoning skills that rival small human children.
 
Here's a link worth looking at involving bird intelligence.

http://www.pbs.org/lifeofbirds/brain/

I don't think there is any question that animal intelligence has been way underestimated. My wife and I were on our way to the Southwest on vacation a few years back and stopped in a small town in northern California to spend the night. We discovered to our surprise that there was a Thai restaurant and decided to eat dinner there. Just outside was a large branch which was occupied by a pair of cockatiels (I think that's what they were). We stopped to admire them and one of them proceeded to sidle toward me one of the branches all the while cocking it's head back and forth and, making cooing sounds and just generally being real cute. When it got to the end of the branch it lifted a leg toward me which I took as a sign it wanted me to put out my arm so it could hop on. So I obliged and as soon as I put out my hand it gave it a hard peck which me me yelp and jerk back, more in surprise than pain as it didn't really hurt. It then launched into this loud piercing noise that could only be described as laughter. The damned thing had played a joke on me! There is no doubt in my mind, or my wife's. And with a beak as big as these things have if it really wanted to hurt me it could have. Probably taken a finger off if it wanted. A sense of humor is definitively, in my mind a sign of higher intelligence.
 
"Lends some credence to the theories that man did not evolve from apes, but that humans and apes evolved from a common ancestor."

As far as I know, nobody (except creationists) claims that scientists say that humans evolved from modern apes.

Chimps don't just use found objects, they modify them to be better tools i.e. by stripping the leaves off of a weed to probe for termites. Crows bend metal to make hooks to better retrieve food... http://www.sciencemag.org/feature/data/crow/
http://edition.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/08/09/crow.betty/
 
I read in a book once about a study where they put a lobster in a glass jar in the same tank as an octopus. The octopus figured out that it had to get the lid off the jar in order to eat the lobster. Not exactly tool use, but pretty impressive for a mollusc I'd say.

Talos said:
Here's a link worth looking at involving bird intelligence.

Just outside was a large branch which was occupied by a pair of cockatiels (I think that's what they were). ...with a beak as big as these things have if it really wanted to hurt me it could have.
Click to expand...

If they were fairly large birds, they were probably Cockatoos (a Cockatiel's beak can pinch but not cause real damage). As you found out, parrots are one of the smartest species in the bird kingdom and they have real personalities.
 
And just remember that the dinasors never realy died out!The ones that survived are now our avarian friends and meals(KFC)!
Humans have adapted and controlled there enviroment by there increased brain size and useage of it to think and solve problems,not by brawn.
Evolution has slow times and fast times!Right now I feel we are in a fast one and who knows can happen?The real winners on this planet so far as the sceme of things goes is the virus and bacteria!
Hmm,I wonder if they use tools at there level?Keep cooking, Doug..........
 
Torz, more impressive than that is that if they train an octopus to open jars like that, then stick another octopus in an adjacent tank where it can watch, it also learns.

Octo see, octo do.
 
FoxholeAtheist said:
Torz, more impressive than that is that if they train an octopus to open jars like that, then stick another octopus in an adjacent tank where it can watch, it also learns.

Octo see, octo do.
Click to expand...

Yes, I can confirm, I've seen all of this too.
(By the way, what Blade Forums "monkey trial" do you speak of?)

There are many cases of animals using tools or learning to do so.

What truly separates humans from the REST of the animal world is how we prepare our food and treat our dead.
 
The show was done by David Attenborough for the BBC (I think) and was shown on our ABC here. I think if you did a google search you would find it.
 
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