Benign biologism

"Our Inner Ape" is a popular science book by leading primatologist Frans de Waal. It attempts to uncover human nature by taking a closer look at chimpanzees and bonobos, our closest living relatives. The book contains chapters on power, sex, violence and kindness.

De Waal's book is interesting and well worth reading. Sometimes, it's even entertaining. The author often mentions his own encounters with apes...and with humans who were perhaps acting out their inner ape just a little bit too much!

Many popularized books on human evolution portray us as "killer apes". They emphasize our violent, manipulative and hierarchical streaks. Naturally, they then connect this behaviour to that of apes and monkeys, usually the chimpanzee. Indeed, chimpanzees can be extremely violent. In the wild, they have been observed to attack, kill and even eat members of their own species. The conclusion: we are descended from murderous, aggressive beasts and cannot be counted on to ever mend our ways. Some literature of this type is anti-feminist and regards male dominance over females as a good thing.

De Waal doesn't deny the darker sides of humans, but his book is nevertheless unusual in its emphasis on the positive traits of our nature. He points out that these, too, have parallels among the apes.

Chimpanzees may be fiercely hierarchic, but their hierarchies are nevertheless unstable. Coalitions of subordinates can overthrow the alpha male if he gets to overbearing. Is this the origin of our democracy? And while chimpanzees can be aggressive, they have also evolved methods of peace-keeping and reconciliation. De Waal describes how one old female played the role of arbiter in disputes among dominant males in a flock at the Arnhem zoo in the Netherlands. As for male dominance, chimpanzees are "patriarchal" in the wild, but flocks kept in captivity have a more even balance of power between the sexes, since the females can build more effective coalitions among themselves.

De Waal also believes that aggression among primates is to a large extent a learned behaviour. He reports an intriguing experiment with rhesus monkeys, which are usually aggressive. After spending months in the same cage with the larger but less aggressive stumptail macaques, the rhesus monkeys developed more reconciliation skills and became less aggressive themselves. This continued even after the two species had been separated again. De Waal also reports a curious case in Africa, where a flock of olive baboons became more peaceful and even "matriarchal" after the aggressive and dominant males had all died of poisoned food. A decade later, the flock was still relatively peaceful. Somehow, the females had managed to "indoctrinate" new males who had joined the flock into accepting the new norms.

The author further believes that human morality also comes from our primate ancestors. Apes have developed empathic skills, even towards members of other species. De Waal's favourite example is a bonobo in a zoo, which tried to help a wounded bird, and even defended it against other bonobos in the flock. Monkeys don't have empathy, but they can show tolerance towards handicapped members of their flocks. Human morality is a kind of highly evolved ape empathy or monkey tolerance. Or at least that's De Waal's take on it.

Another obvious difference between "Our Inner Ape" and most other books on this subject, is the author's emphasis on the bonobo. The bonobo is as closely related to humans as the chimpanzee, yet it's often left out of discussions about human evolution. Why? Obviously because it doesn't fit the picture of patriarchal, aggressive "killer apes". Bonobos are much less aggressive than common chimpanzees, they live in flocks dominated by females, and they frequently resolve disputes by having sex! When two flocks of chimpanzees meet in the jungle, violent confrontation is the rule. When two flock of bonobos meet, they socialize with each other at the boundaries of their respective territories, and then depart in peace. But what really bugs most people is the "matriarchy" of the bonobos. For instance, bonobo males must beg for food from the females, and they lack effective coalitions among themselves. De Waal tells a funny anecdote about a man at a lecture who essentially snapped when De Waal told him about bonobos, shouting: "What on earth is wrong with these males?!". Since bonobos are promiscuous and have casual sex all day long, one cannot help wondering whether the males of this "hippie ape" aren't actually better off than most...

Despite all these positives, I nevertheless found myself in frequent disagreement with De Waal. There is still too much emphasis on violence, power and hierarchy among humans. Perhaps subliminally, the author still sees this as the "natural" state. Both anthropology and archaeology suggests otherwise. Egalitarian, peaceful and non-patriarchal societies have existed. At least one advanced high culture, the Indus Valley Civilization, had curious egalitarian traits. Another, the Minoan culture, was probably hierarchic but seems to have been peaceful and had a religion centred on goddesses. De Waal further believes that the nuclear family and monogamy are somehow "natural" to our species, at least as an "ideal". This is unconvincing, especially since De Waal himself references studies of polyandrous cultures which lack our concept of "fathers". Of course, he mentions polygyny as well.

The cross-cultural (and individual) variation among humans makes all comparisons between humans and apes problematic, especially since chimpanzees and bonobos are so vastly different from each other. Which human is being compared to which ape? In an unguarded moment, De Waal admits that our ancestors may have been very different from the great apes (surely a trivial observation outside the ivory tower of biology), but his entire book is based on the idea that you can get real insights by comparing us with chimps, although we have evolved along different lines for at least six million years. It seems you cannot take the ape out of the biologist!

If there is any insight to be gained by comparing humans to other primates, it's that the flexibility and intelligence typical of humans exist in some form already among apes and monkeys. This is why I found De Waal's experiments with rhesus monkeys so fascinating, not to mention his observations on "girl power" among usually "patriarchal" chimpanzees and olive baboons. The real lesson from our primate relatives is that a certain evolutionary lineage developed more and more intelligence, flexibility and empathy. A larger part of their behaviour became acquired through learning than through instinct. Finally, this lead to the emergence of Homo sapiens, the only species that can socially construct its reality, leading to the immense cultural variation within our species.

Perhaps De Waal would agree with this, as far as it goes. However, I still think he's too "biologist", although it's a more good natured biologism than orthodox sociobiology, since it takes into account the "flower power" bonobos alongside common chimpanzees.

That being said, I nevertheless recommend this and other books by Frans de Waal. They are interesting, relatively well written, and give much food for thought.