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I spent a lot of time with Chimps in West Africa, getting to play with, carry and interact with them a couple of different times [1] Sitting with a fully-grown

by grecy 7y ago

I spent a lot of time with Chimps in West Africa, getting to play with, carry and interact with them a couple of different times [1] Sitting with a fully-grown chimp on your lap with her face inches from yours while she grooms your beard is a very, very special experience. It's impossible to spent more than 10 minutes with them and not clearly see they are us and we are them. Their facial expressions, they happiness, their playfulness, their grief. Everything about them is like looking in a mirror, or watching a ~5 year old child play. Absolutely amazing. I have no doubt they would dance to music, and do a lot more things that show intelligence and higher thinking. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mfdo3s8tPUk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mfdo3s8tPUk

xixixao 7y ago
I am certain we are them. Emotions and feelings are entirely an animal trait in us. Whether they are us is a more complicated question. What are their language and reasoning abilities? Apparently no animals ask questions, even after being “asked”. Seems that questioning and reasoning is what makes us human (sapient). I’m pointing this out because most people would say that it’s the emotions and feelings that distinguish us. That’s not the case.
- simonh 7y ago
  I think it’s clear mammals and certainly primates exhibit emotional behaviour, in which case it’s clear our common ancestors must have exhibited such behaviour. The question is, is our experience of those emotions similar? I see no reason to doubt it. The question boils down to whether animals have a sense of self and experience a ‘first person’ view of the world. Experimental evidence suggests that several species, including primates do have a sense of self and there’s so evidence they also have a theory of mind [0]. It has been argued that a first person experience of the world is not required for advanced reasoning, language, etc in discussions of AI. That may be the case. In which case our first person experience may be independent of and pre-date our advanced reasoning skills. Even if it is required for reasoning ability that’s also consistent with us having it first. I just don’t see any reason to see them as necessary for each other either way. Finally, if the experience of the world and the basis of our responses to stimulus did undergo such a dramatic shift at some point, that seems like an extremely dangerous transition. An awful lot could go wrong with that, and in fact everything about such a shift would have to go extraordinarily well or the result would be catastrophic failure. All evolutionary transitions have to progress through stages that are each viable at every step. Huge leaps don’t happen, because the odds of success are impossibly low. It seems more likely to me that our emotional responses are similar to closely related species, because the neurological basis for them, and mental experience of them are also similar. Otherwise we need to figure out why a radically different mental experience evolved, and why, and how come it leads to no appreciable difference in emotional behaviour. [0] https://www.discoverwildlife.com/news/theory-of-mind-demonstrated-great-apes/ https://www.discoverwildlife.com/news/theory-of-mind-demonst...
- ivanhoe 7y ago
  > What are their language and reasoning abilities? Apparently no animals ask questions, even after being “asked”. I might misunderstood your statement here, but e.g. dogs can understand a lot of things people say, not just purely pre-learned "commands" but the context of what is going on. They also ask (simple) questions all the time, but they use their body language for that. Most of the time it's some form of "what's going on", but pretty much every dog lover knows the specific "are you taking me with you" pose & look when you dress up to go out, and they're unsure if you'll take them too. Now, obviously it's nothing nearly as complex as "Why do we exists" which are uniquely human type of questions to ask, but IMHO very comparable to the level of my kid when he was 1-2 years old.
vimy 7y ago
>It's impossible to spent more than 10 minutes with them and not clearly see they are us and we are them. You see the similarities even more clearly in bonobos.
- grecy 7y ago
  > You see the similarities even more clearly in bonobos I would have loved to visit them, but on this particular trip around Africa I wasn't geared up to drive into the heart of the DRC, which as I understand is the only place on earth they live in the wild. One day I'll go back and drive right across it.
dmix 7y ago
I watched some of your other videos, I'm curious what drew you to hacker news (I see the account is since 2011 and you started your road trips in 2009), were you a programmer before starting your travels? Or just interested in tech? I'm going to check out your book. as the hardcore road trip thing is something I was really close to doing at one point in my life. Although in terms of pure perspective I'd probably take less of a 'chimps are just like us' view of it, which is just my more skeptical scientific but also cynical nature - but also because I've found this is a common tendency in humans to find such patterns which don't really fit as cleanly as they seem (upon closer analysis). But I haven't played with chimps in person so I should probably not talk without experiencing it.
- grecy 7y ago
  Yep, I studied Software Engineering and worked as that for a few years to pay for the Pan-American highway trip. Then after that I worked again as a developer for 4 years to save up for the Africa trip. I'm toying with the idea of going back to a desk job now to pay for the next adventure that is in the planning stages. I'm usually a skeptical scientist on most topics. Playing with a chimp face to face is a different thing.
  - dmix 7y ago
    What are you thinking next? Asia? Middle East? Eastern Europe? Or keeping it a surprise. I want to do a US road trip with the wifey at some point, mostly down east coast from where I live in Toronto down to Texas. With a lot of stops in the north east because I’m a history nerd and really into early US founding history and there’s lots of small towns with history on the coastal areas.
    - grecy 7y ago
      I don't have anything locked in yet. When I look at the world map, it's really only the middle east, London to Singapore or around Australia that I have not explored. I have to decide how long I want to save money for before I hit the road again, which will dictate how much I have for the trip and therefore which one of the above it becomes. I spent a lot of time exploring the US this summer and had a great time!
blotter_paper 7y ago
I've heard that adult chimps get strong enough to rip chunks of flesh off with their hands. If this is accurate, how old can a chimp get before roughhousing with them like you do with that baby chimp is totally out of the question?Are the adult chimps you've interacted with friendly enough to reliably groom human beards without issue, or is it more of a situation where the humans keep track of which chimps they need to steer clear of?
- grecy 7y ago
  Yep, they could have torn my arms off if they wanted to. People keep track of which ones are OK to play with.

by grecy 7y ago

xixixao 7y ago

I am certain we are them. Emotions and feelings are entirely an animal trait in us. Whether they are us is a more complicated question. What are their language and reasoning abilities? Apparently no animals ask questions, even after being “asked”. Seems that questioning and reasoning is what makes us human (sapient). I’m pointing this out because most people would say that it’s the emotions and feelings that distinguish us. That’s not the case.

simonh 7y ago
I think it’s clear mammals and certainly primates exhibit emotional behaviour, in which case it’s clear our common ancestors must have exhibited such behaviour. The question is, is our experience of those emotions similar? I see no reason to doubt it. The question boils down to whether animals have a sense of self and experience a ‘first person’ view of the world. Experimental evidence suggests that several species, including primates do have a sense of self and there’s so evidence they also have a theory of mind [0]. It has been argued that a first person experience of the world is not required for advanced reasoning, language, etc in discussions of AI. That may be the case. In which case our first person experience may be independent of and pre-date our advanced reasoning skills. Even if it is required for reasoning ability that’s also consistent with us having it first. I just don’t see any reason to see them as necessary for each other either way. Finally, if the experience of the world and the basis of our responses to stimulus did undergo such a dramatic shift at some point, that seems like an extremely dangerous transition. An awful lot could go wrong with that, and in fact everything about such a shift would have to go extraordinarily well or the result would be catastrophic failure. All evolutionary transitions have to progress through stages that are each viable at every step. Huge leaps don’t happen, because the odds of success are impossibly low. It seems more likely to me that our emotional responses are similar to closely related species, because the neurological basis for them, and mental experience of them are also similar. Otherwise we need to figure out why a radically different mental experience evolved, and why, and how come it leads to no appreciable difference in emotional behaviour. [0] https://www.discoverwildlife.com/news/theory-of-mind-demonstrated-great-apes/ https://www.discoverwildlife.com/news/theory-of-mind-demonst...
ivanhoe 7y ago
> What are their language and reasoning abilities? Apparently no animals ask questions, even after being “asked”. I might misunderstood your statement here, but e.g. dogs can understand a lot of things people say, not just purely pre-learned "commands" but the context of what is going on. They also ask (simple) questions all the time, but they use their body language for that. Most of the time it's some form of "what's going on", but pretty much every dog lover knows the specific "are you taking me with you" pose & look when you dress up to go out, and they're unsure if you'll take them too. Now, obviously it's nothing nearly as complex as "Why do we exists" which are uniquely human type of questions to ask, but IMHO very comparable to the level of my kid when he was 1-2 years old.

vimy 7y ago

>It's impossible to spent more than 10 minutes with them and not clearly see they are us and we are them. You see the similarities even more clearly in bonobos.

grecy 7y ago
> You see the similarities even more clearly in bonobos I would have loved to visit them, but on this particular trip around Africa I wasn't geared up to drive into the heart of the DRC, which as I understand is the only place on earth they live in the wild. One day I'll go back and drive right across it.

dmix 7y ago

I watched some of your other videos, I'm curious what drew you to hacker news (I see the account is since 2011 and you started your road trips in 2009), were you a programmer before starting your travels? Or just interested in tech? I'm going to check out your book. as the hardcore road trip thing is something I was really close to doing at one point in my life. Although in terms of pure perspective I'd probably take less of a 'chimps are just like us' view of it, which is just my more skeptical scientific but also cynical nature - but also because I've found this is a common tendency in humans to find such patterns which don't really fit as cleanly as they seem (upon closer analysis). But I haven't played with chimps in person so I should probably not talk without experiencing it.

grecy 7y ago
Yep, I studied Software Engineering and worked as that for a few years to pay for the Pan-American highway trip. Then after that I worked again as a developer for 4 years to save up for the Africa trip. I'm toying with the idea of going back to a desk job now to pay for the next adventure that is in the planning stages. I'm usually a skeptical scientist on most topics. Playing with a chimp face to face is a different thing.
- dmix 7y ago
  What are you thinking next? Asia? Middle East? Eastern Europe? Or keeping it a surprise. I want to do a US road trip with the wifey at some point, mostly down east coast from where I live in Toronto down to Texas. With a lot of stops in the north east because I’m a history nerd and really into early US founding history and there’s lots of small towns with history on the coastal areas.
  - grecy 7y ago
    I don't have anything locked in yet. When I look at the world map, it's really only the middle east, London to Singapore or around Australia that I have not explored. I have to decide how long I want to save money for before I hit the road again, which will dictate how much I have for the trip and therefore which one of the above it becomes. I spent a lot of time exploring the US this summer and had a great time!

blotter_paper 7y ago

I've heard that adult chimps get strong enough to rip chunks of flesh off with their hands. If this is accurate, how old can a chimp get before roughhousing with them like you do with that baby chimp is totally out of the question?Are the adult chimps you've interacted with friendly enough to reliably groom human beards without issue, or is it more of a situation where the humans keep track of which chimps they need to steer clear of?

grecy 7y ago
Yep, they could have torn my arms off if they wanted to. People keep track of which ones are OK to play with.