This is “Santino” a male chimpanzee at Furuvik Zoo in Sweden. Santino was famous for throwing rocks and other projectiles at visitors who annoyed him. Now he has improved his technique, which requires spontaneous innovation for future deception.
Researcher Mathias Osvath, lead author of a paper about Santino in PLoS ONE, explained what the clever chimp did: ”After a visitor group had left the compound area, Santino went inside the enclosure and brought a good-sized heap of hay that he placed near the visitor’s section, and immediately after that he put stones under it,” Osvath said. ”He also appeared to have placed projectiles behind, just before he went in after the hay. After this, he sat down beside the hay and waited. When the visitors came back, he waited until they were close by and, without any preceding display, he threw stones at the crowd.”
Osvath, who is the scientific director of the Lund University Primate Research Station Furuvik, and colleague Elin Karvonen noticed the behavior while studying the elderly chimp, who is the dominant male in his exhibit at the Swedish zoo. The calculated surprise attacks on visitors demonstrate very advanced thinking usually only associated with humans. Osvath said, “What is interesting is that he made these preparations when the visitors were out of sight, and also that he incorporated innovations into the behavior.” ”What makes this a bit special is that he actually had not experienced before what he seemed to anticipate,” Osvath added. “He, in a sense, produced a future outcome instead of just preparing for a scenario that had previously been re-occurring reliably.”
The researchers believe that the recombination of previous experiences coupled with innovation “is a good sign of the rather sophisticated foresight abilities in chimps.” This comes very close to what is known as “theory of mind,” which is the ability to attribute mental states to oneself and others, and to understand that others have thoughts, desires and more that are different from one’s own. Empathy, deception (as for Santino) and other qualities usually only reserved for humans can be linked to this process.
In terms of why the chimp wants to bother human zoo visitors, Osvath said that’s nothing new. ”A lot of great apes, especially dominant males, throw stuff at people at zoos,” he said. “And I would think that this is something that comes naturally to them when performing their dominance displays. These are often aimed at making other apes move out of the way and, in effect, accept him as the boss.” ”Humans at zoos don’t move out of the way, unless they get thrown at,” he continued. “Some apes throw sticks or feces, but Santino doesn’t have access to any good sized sticks, and he really dislikes putting his fingers on gooey stuff, including feces.”
After observing the chimp for days, the scientists also suspect that Santino just also “finds it fun” to bug humans. He even appears to target certain people that perhaps really get on his nerves. The attacks are all the more successful because Santino plays it cool, holding back on posturing before whipping out the stone or other projectile.
Michael Huffman of Kyoto University’s Primate Research Institute has also studied chimp stone throwing, which he believes “may serve to augment the effect of intimidation displays.” He further thinks that research on the behavior could shed light on the evolution of stone tool use in humans. Osvath additionally believes that the phenomenon taps into “one of the hardest questions in science: how matter (in this case the brain) can appear to be influenced by something that does not exist (the future). This is far from trivial.”
MORE PHOTOS: How Santino Attacks Visitors
February 6th, 2012 in Mexico City, Mexico: Activists from the animal rights group AnimaNaturalis walk covered in red paint mimicking blood, after a protest against bullfighting.
Photograph: Claudia Daut/Reuters
Truck full of dogs crammed into tiny cages and bound for Chinese restaurants is intercepted by animal lovers.
Crammed into tiny cages, unable to stand and deprived of food and water, these dogs endured terrible suffering on a truck bound for a chain of restaurants. The harrowing pictures show the cruel conditions in which 1,500 of the animals were found when the truck was stopped at a toll gate by highway police and animal rescue volunteers in Chongqing, south-west China. The truck was stacked high with cages, each containing several dogs in pitiful condition.
The animals were moved to a nearby farm by volunteers from the Chongqing Animal Protection Association who gave them food, water and emergency treatment. Sadly some of the dogs were already dead and rescue workers were unable to save other who were dying.
Volunteer Xiao Lu said: ‘When they [the dogs] saw us they were groaning, but some were so exhausted and dying that they didn’t even have the strength to make a sound. He said: The dog peddler said his truck was only loaded with 700 dogs, but there are at least 1500.
Dog continues to be a popular meal in the Far East, with many in China favouring the meat, particularly during the winter. The incident comes just months after police in Thailand rescued more than 1,000 dogs that were being transported to Vietnam. The dogs were being taken across the Mekong river in Laos as prices for stray dogs and pets in rural Thai villages can reach as much as $33 an animal.
11 COUNTRIES WHICH STILL EAT DOG MEAT
Eleven countries around the globe still eat dog meat. They are: China, Indonesia, Korea, Mexico, Philippines, Polynesia, Taiwan, Vietnam, the Arctic and Antarctic and two cantons in Switzerland.
China: Although the Chinese were the first to domesticate the dog and keep them as pets, dog meat has been a source of food from at least the time of Confucius, and possibly even before.
Indonesia: Eating dog meat is usually associated with people from the Batak Toba culture, who cook a traditional dish named saksang that is like a dog-meat stew.
Mexico: Dogs were historically bred for their meat by the Aztecs. These dogs were called itzcuintlis, and were often pictured on pre-Columbian Mexican pottery.
Philippines: In the capital city of Manila,the law specifically prohibits the killing and selling of dogs for food except in certain circumstances including research and animal population control.
Polynesia: Dogs were historically eaten in Tahiti and other islands of Polynesia at the time of first European contact in 1769.
Taiwan: Dog meat in Taiwan is particularly eaten in the winter months, especially black dogs, which are believed to help retain body warmth.
Korea: Gaegogi literally means ‘dog meat’ in Korean. Gaegogi, however, is often mistaken as the term for Korean soup made from dog meat, bosintang. The distaste felt by dog lovers, particularly from the West, has made this dish very controversial.
Switzerland: According to a Swiss newspaper report in 1996, the Swiss rural cantons of Appenzell and St. Gallen are known to have had a tradition of eating dogs, curing dog meat into jerky and sausages, as well as using the lard for medicinal purposes.
Vietnam: Dog meat is eaten throughout Vietnam. To many Northerners, it is a popular, if relatively expensive, dinnertime restaurant meal.
Arctic and Antarctic: Dogs have historically been an emergency food source for various peoples in Siberia, Alaska, northern Canada, and Greenland. Sled dogs are usually maintained for pulling sleds, but occasionally are eaten when no other food is available.
