1960-1975

Chimpanzees and humans

• In 1960, Jane Goodall and her mother
• settled in at the Gombe Stream Chimpanzee Reserve
• in western Tanzania at the request of Louis Leakey.
• During her years observing chimpanzees in the wild,
• Jane Goodall discovered that almost everything
• that we think is uniquely human is true also of chimpanzees.
• Babies play like human children.
• They cradle dolls and imagine being grownups.
• When they’re glad to see their friends,
• they call loudly, drum on tree trunks, and shake branches.
• Two friends or a small group sit for hours
• combing each other’s hair for dirt or ticks.
• Chimpanzees have personalities.
• They express themselves with touches, gestures, and calls.
• A young one begs with his palms up, as our children do.
• Some people have idealized the chimpanzee,
• but they are not peaceful vegetarians.
• Gombe chimpanzees kill and eat other animals
• and they wage war on competing groups.
• Chimpanzees will find a twig, remove its leaves,
• and carry it around to fish termites from their mounds.

Love for others

• Baby chimpanzees are adorable.
• Their small hands, small noses, beautiful eyes
• make us want to care for them.
• Chimpanzee, puppy, kitten, or human,
• it’s all the same. We can’t help it.
• Instincts call out our love, or love calls our instincts.
• Then tell me why it matters, fundamentally,
• that we have differences. Tell me,
• please, why we aren’t all one family.

99% human

• Recent studies show 98.8% or so similarity
• in DNA between chimpanzees and humans.
• It’s almost as though we were the same
• in body and in spirit. We can still talk
• about our supposed superiority, which
• in practice means we can kill any threat
• to ourselves including ourselves, which
• is not a distant possibility, although it would be
• wise to preserve a shred of humanity
• by honoring its manifestation
• in others—other lives, other tribes,
• other races, distant fathers and mothers.
• What are five to twelve million years
• to distant friends, old lovers?