Question

Outline the evidence supporting the proposition that chimpanzee have culture and present the arguments opposing this view too. Which view do you suspect is correct and why do you think this? How could this information color our thinking of early hominid evolution?

Answer 1

Kibale Forest chimpanzees use sticks to get at the honey, whereas Budongo Forest chimpanzees rely on leaf sponges -- absorbent wedges that they make out of chewed leaves.

"The most reasonable explanation for this difference in tool use was that chimpanzees resorted to preexisting cultural knowledge in trying to solve the novel task," said Klaus Zuberbühler of the University of St Andrews in Scotland. "Culture, in other words, helped them in dealing with a novel problem."

"Culture" in this sense refers to a population-specific set of behaviors acquired through social learning, such as imitation, Zuberbühler explained. That's in contrast to an animal or human learning something on his or her own through trial and error, without taking into account what others around them do, or behaviors that are "hard-wired" and require no learning at all.

Behavioral differences among animal populations have been taken as evidence of culture, the researchers said, but it's a notion that has remained controversial. Some think that other explanations -- differences in the environment or in genetics -- seem more likely.

Perhaps the strongest evidence for animal culture has come from studies on wild chimpanzees in Africa, Zuberbühler said. For instance, 15 years of field observation has shown that Kibale chimps habitually use sticks as tools, whereas Budongo chimps never do. Both groups make use of leaf sponges to access water from tree holes.

The question is, are those differences really cultural? That's been a hard question to answer because scientists couldn't rule out all of the possible ecological or genetic explanations for those behavioral differences. Scientists have seen social transmission of behaviors among chimpanzees living in captivity, with good evidence that the chimps can socially learn arbitrary behavior. It still wasn't clear whether those findings were relevant to chimps in the wild.

To help get around earlier limitations in the new study, Zuberbühler and his colleague Thibaud Gruber presented the two well-known chimpanzee groups with something that they hadn't seen before, in this case, honey trapped inside a narrow hole drilled into a log.

Perhaps the strongest evidence for animal culture has come from studies on wild chimpanzees in Africa, Zuberbühler said. For instance, 15 years of field observation has shown that Kibale chimps habitually use sticks as tools, whereas Budongo chimps never do.

Why chimpanzee don't have culture

The findings suggest that chimpanzees are less motivated by social information than humans, he said. This, in turn, could explain chimps' relative lack of culture; they just aren't as interested in learning from others. But more work remains, van Leeuwen added

In my opinion I support that chimpanzee have culture various examples described above clearly suggest that they developed a culture and this is also associated with the han evolution as the behavior and culture formation of chimpanzee helped in social behaviours and evolution of humans.

Many believe that chimpanzees have not evolved culture on the scale of human beings due to their lack of advanced language. Continued research may produce new findings that not only change how we think of culture, but how it has been used to define us as superior beings of the animal kingdom.