monkey talk

[Guest guest]

I just read through an article in the UK Vegan magazine.

 

For those of you that don¹t get it or are abroad, I wanted to copy a short

bit from an article on The Great Ape Project. It blew me away, I did not

realise how far this has work has gone. Reading gave me the shivers and

almost made me cry. The answer to the last question is amazing.

 

It was regarding conversations with a Gorilla Koko that had learnt sign

language to show what understanding they had of words.

 

Human: What is an insult?

Koko : Think dirty devil

 

Human : what is crazy?

Koko : trouble surprise

 

Human : What is a stove?

Koko : Cook with

 

Human What can you think of that is hard?

Koko : Rock ... work.

 

I find it amazing that Koko could even distinguish between two different

meanings of the same word. That is really advanced. [ Hell, I know human

beings that cant pick such inferences ! ]

 

They also talked about death and discovered that gorillas not just expressed

sentiments about death on hearing but not seeing about the death of a kitten

it was close to but also had concepts about what death meant. This is surely

edging towards discovering that they have some sort of spiritual belief

system. And the animal could recognise reality from images which connotes a

grasp of symbolism. I remember early anthropologist having a difficulty

getting this across to " savages " in the early days of that discipline.

Savages seems a good name for human beings.

 

The apes were also creative in making up their own words for items they did

not know, e.g. bottle match for lighter, eye hat for mask, used sign

language amongst themselves and even taught their [ adopted ] children.

 

Other notable issue included long term memory over 10 years, of course, and

genetic similarities [ we share more DNA with chimpanzees than Africa

Elephants do with Indian Elephants ].

 

Of course, what is interesting is that it took a long time for scientist to

realise that due to biological differences Apes could not speak as humans do

until hand signalling was attempted. It makes one wonder how long it will

take them to accept other animals can also comprehend and communicate even

though they can neither use vocal or hand signals.

 

www.greatapeproject.org

 

of course, the funny bit was that while the male chimp was interested in

playing games, the female chimp in this story was happiest with anything to

do with cleaning their home; give her a broom and she will engross herself

in sweeping or some water and sponge and she set about cleaning the window.

 

john

 

our own " Good Doctor " [ non medical ] Ian McDonald also had a letter

published about the Barry Horne thing. To be honest, despite the numerous

pro-Barry Horne vegan hunger striker vandalisms near to me home, I cant

remember what the issue were but do remember there was controversy at the

time about it. Did he die? what was it all about? there was some criticism

of him ...

 

I would say a couple of things though. He was not just " a firebomber " .

Even at Law there is a recognised difference between Mens Rea and Mens

Acteus; the intention behind the action and an actual action itself. A

firebomber is just an arsonist or a terrorist - something The Establishment

has always wanted to label societies new leaders or freedom fighters. What

people like him do is not mere arson and unfortunately we cannot rely on The

Establishment to judge such actions fairly.

 

What is the reference regarding a Royal Commission about Ian?

 

I would not have that the vast majority of people becoming vegan would

bother a toss about anything royal - and I would have thought the chance of

any that did bother about Royal Commissions become vegan was nil.

 

It is an uncomfortable truth but it this sort of radicalism does work at a

price. In fact, I would go as far as saying, sadly, that history has proven

time and time again that it is the only thing that works about creating

notable changes, e.g. the use of freedom fighting in the Indian Independence

movement.

 

" It is the squeaky wheel that gets oiled " in politics and one martyr can

squeak uncomfortably loud. To put it into another context, one Arab leader

was asked whether he would rather his country was an ally or an enemy of

America. He replied, " An enemy " . Asked why, he replied, " because America

often appeases its enemies but always betrays its allies " .

 

If you take out America and replace it with the Establishment, you would not

be far wrong.

 

Not the way I would have it but the way it seems to be to me.

 

 

 

As a sweet aside, you guys might like to hear that The Sex Pistols are

reforming for jolly gig to mark the Queen's Jubilee. God saves.