BONOBOS ARE MUCH NEARER TO HUMANS THAN CHIMPANZEES
BONOBOS CAN WALK UPRIGHT IN A VERY HUMAN WAY. BONOBOS MAKE LOVE NOT WAR INCLUDING IN THE FACE TO FACE POSITION FOR WHICH ONLY HUMANS AND BONOBOS ARE PHYSICALLY DESIGNED.
BONOBOS ARE MUCH NEARER TO HUMANS THAN CHIMPANZEES
BONOBOS CAN WALK UPRIGHT IN A VERY HUMAN WAY. BONOBOS MAKE LOVE NOT WAR INCLUDING IN THE FACE TO FACE POSITION FOR WHICH ONLY HUMANS AND BONOBOS ARE PHYSICALLY DESIGNED.
| As a 23-year-old investigative foreign correspondent, D'Lynn Waldron was with Dr. George Pournelle of the San Diego Zoo on the Congo expedition in 1960 that rescued the bonobo Kakowet in the chaos and violence at the time of the Congo's ill-fated independence. Kakowet, along with Linda, are the progenitors of the San Diego Zoo's famed bonobo colony. Linda's ten children and their descendents are in colonies in America and Antwerp. Belgium. The San Diego bonobos are divided between the Bonobo Road exhibit in the zoo and the San Diego Wild Animal Park, where they can be seen from the monorail. Linda is now a matriarch in the Milwaukee Zoo fostering baby bonobos. |  |
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Elderly Linda
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PHOTOGRAPHER: Marian Brickner <insect1@swbell.net> Marian is now publishing a book on Bonobos that will have her marvelous photographs
PBS NOVA PROGRAM ON BONOBOS http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/bonobos/
Excerpt below the photos is an excerpt BONOBOS: SEX, AND THE GENETICS OF VIOLENCE describing a documentary created by the heroine of the witty, romantic novel "ARIANE" by D'Lynn Waldron, PhD c. 2005
BIBLIOGRAPHY ON BONOBOS xxxx BONOBO WEB LINKS
FRANS DE WAAL BONOBO PHOTO GALLERY
This is part of a chapter from Book I of the Ariane Trilogy of witty romantic novels by Dr. D’Lynn Waldron.
Dr. Ariane Lawrence an irrepressibly mischievous primatologist / evolutionary psychologist who researches how women's choices in men have shaped the evolution of human intelligence and creativity, and also how the peaceable, sex-filled lives of the bonobos, our nearest primate relative, may give us a clue to the genetics of violence. Ariane's television special about how bonobos make love not war proves to be a great embarrassment to her fiancee Sir Marshall Chalfont, a symphony conductor who writes music for the movies and is very concerned to maintain his dignity. http://www.dlynnwaldron.com/writingMovieMusic.html .
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“There are less than 150 bonobos in zoos and ten thousand at most in the wild. Due to the civil war and breakdown of communications in the large area of jungle between the Congo and Kasai rivers that the bonobos inhabit, their actual numbers are not known, but it is feared that their numbers have been greatly reduced by the trade in ‘bush meat’..”
“Bonobos share 99 per cent of their DNA with humans, more than any other primate, and bonobos are much nearer to us in physiognomy than are chimpanzees. Unlike chimps, bonobos have broad shoulders and torsos that are proportioned much like humans. Bonobos can and often do walk upright with a human-like gait.”
— A montage of bonobos walking compared with humans and chimpanzees.
“Bonobos also have other human attributes. Panbanisha at the Georgia State University Language Research Center improvises on the keyboard with two fingers while Peter Gabriel sings. Gabriel said, “ It just felt like jamming with a musician in the sense that there were moments when you knew you had something magical there, and other times it went flat.”
— Peter Gabriel jamming, with Panbanisha the bonobo at the keyboard.
“Unlike other primates, humans and bonobos have separated sex from its reproductive function, and use it as a medium of exchange. Sexual transactions in humans are to obtain something for the individual who grants the favor, whereas. bonobos use sex to defuse social tensions, to maintain a peaceful community.”
— A female bonobo breaking up a squabble between two males with an offer of sex..
“Bonobos not only want peace within their communities, they want peace with other bonobo communities and with all the world. Humans, like chimpanzees, murder their neighbors to expand their territory, kill females and infants in genocide, batter their own females into submission, and commit rape. Chimpanzees hunt for meat and even commit cannibalism within their own social group.”
— Montage of humans and chimpanzees behaving badly.
“Bonobos, to the exact opposite, live in female managed societies where violence is not tolerated, where rape and infanticide do not exist, where other species are not killed, and where a wide variety of enjoyable sexual activities are used to enhance friendships and to resolve conflicts.”
— Bonobos who seem to have read the Kama Sutra and then added some things of their own, such as sex while swinging on vines.
“You will notice that female bonobos, like human women, have large breasts that are not functionally necessary for nursing, but serve for sexual attraction. Like human females, the genitalia of female bonobos are in the front, for face to face copulation, which makes humans and bonobos unique among the primates.”
— The missionary position with passionate French kisses and the female making happy squeals. (photo below on this web page)
“In common only with humans, bonobo females are always receptive to sex, not just when they are in estrus. All other primate females are receptive for just a few days a month, and only if they are not pregnant or nursing.”
— More bonobos having at it.
“Bonobo males solicit sex by swaggering around proudly displaying an erection. Here a male bonobo sweetens his attraction with the offer of a tasty sugarcane.”
— A male bonobo proving candy is dandy.
“Instead of fighting as chimpanzees or humans would, bonobos engage in group sex to resolve conflicts.”
— Bonobos engaged in a group grope.
“Among bonobos, any situation with the potential of conflict causes sexual arousal, which always happens when food is involved.”
— Food going down, male bonobos going up.
“Among all other primates, alpha males try to monopolize access to the females by subjugating, driving off, or murdering rival males. Many primates kill infants fathered by other males. Here an alpha male in a chimpanzee group can only suspect that he is not the father of the infant he snatches from its mother, brutally murders, and then with the other males eats in front of her ”
— A male chimpanzee snatches an infant from its mother, brutally batters it in front of her, then kills the infant by biting off its face, and with the other males in the group, eats the infant in front of its mother.
“To have their infants to survive, these females must mate with whichever male can protect them. Perhaps this is the evolutionary origin of the ‘Stockholm syndrome’ in which victims identify with their captors, and why the Sabine woman married the Roman soldiers who had killed their husbands. How different things are in female managed bonobo society, where there is no murder or infanticide, and the females do not tolerate violence among the males.”
— Female bonobos intervening to prevent a fight between males, after which the situation is defused by the males rubbing their backsides together.
“Male chimpanzees form hunting packs to kill monkeys, using different strategies according to the terrain in which they are hunting. Bonobos live in harmony with their fellow creatures and do not hunt for meat.”
— Bonobos living peacefully with monkeys, compared with chimpanzees hunting, killing, and eating monkeys.
“Like human females, bonobo females show no outward sign when they are fertile, and some primatologists say this means there is nothing to trigger the male instinct to violent competition for females in estrus. However, one must presume that bonobos are like human females in that when ovulating, the woman’s vaginal secretions become clear and slippery and take on a different scent, which men are attracted to, if only subconsciously. Thus, it may be either in the genes or in social control that the bonobo males do not fight over females. Bonobo males do not even object when their females have sex with males of other groups, in their get-togethers.”
— Mate swapping at an intergroup gathering.
“One reason the bonobo male’s Genetic Imperative does not lead to infanticide, may be because they do not know which infants are theirs, since the females have sex with all the males.”
— A female bonobo making the rounds.
“In bonobo society the males and females each establish their own rank order, but the males accept that between the sexes, the females take precedence.”
— A low status male stepping aside from a bunch of bananas for an alpha male, who in turn steps aside for a female.
“Alpha males usually have the largest testicles, which produce more testosterone that urges them to dominate, and can field a larger team of sperm. It only takes one sperm to fertilize an egg, but the number of sperm is important because in addition to the sprinter sperm that race to impregnate, blocker sperm form a barrier against the sperm of other males, and hunter sperm kill these competitors. At this same time, the woman’s body is testing and eliminating sperm all along the way, trying to insure that only that perfect sperm among many millions will reach and then be accepted by the egg. This natural process is very different from what happens with in vitro fertilization.”
— Sperm wars under the microscope.
“Gorilla females are kept in closely guarded harems, therefore the males do not need large testicles, and their small testicles produce a much lower percent of blocker and hunter sperm.”
— A male gorilla with his harem.
“Because female bonobos are promiscuous, the males have very large testicles so they can field a lot of sperm for the competition. Human males have testicles that are midway between bonobos and gorillas, indicating that human females are less promiscuous than bonobos, but not as monogamous as gorillas.”
— Bonobos with big balls.
“Primate females find strangers attractive, which in evolutionary terms keeps a healthy diversity in their group’s gene pool. Even though chimpanzee males keep their females submissive by systematically battering them, male chimpanzees need large testicles because the females still find ways to cheat, especially with males from other troops.”
— A female chimp flirting with a stranger, then cheating with a quickie behind a tree.
“Male bonobos, as we have seen, solicit sex by swaggering about displaying an erection. As befits a society where sex is so important, bonobo males have the largest penises in the primate world, with the exception of some human males. Being sexually active is an essential to bonobo social life, and bonobos remain so all their lives.”
“We share 99 per cent of our DNA with bonobos yet we deal with conflict so differently. Is the reason for that difference in nature or nurture. Is it in our genes, or is it because females manage bonobo society, while males run all other primate societies.”
— A montage of human inhumanity compared with life among the bonobos.
“Each species has its strategies to survive and multiply. In humans, the Genetic Imperative to multiply one’s genes to the maximum has taken the form of competition to the death, winner take all, as exemplified by war and genocide. Among bonobos, multiplying one’s genes is achieved by the females suppressing male violence and using the companionable pleasures of sex to maintain a peaceful society in which they can safely raise their young.”
— Baby bonobos at play.
“Is bonobo society peaceful only because the females have organized to enforce nonviolence? Or did bonobo females create genetic differences by favoring nonviolent males? Or is it a combination of both? Comparing the bonobo and human genomes could be the key to discovering whether patterns of behavior are coded in our genes, and if so, where that information located. Research could also discover how the genes control the biochemistry of the moods and emotions which influence our thoughts and behavior.”
END OF EXCERPT FROM NOVEL
Dear Dr Waldron,
I was interested to recently read your website on bonobos, but I also noticed a couple of critical errors that you may like to amend and other points that you may like to consider.
1. BONOBOS CAN WALK UPRIGHT IN A VERY HUMAN WAY. BONOBOS MAKE LOVE NOT WAR INCLUDING IN THE FACE TO FACE POSITION FOR WHICH ONLY HUMANS AND BONOBOS ARE PHYSICALLY DESIGNED.
Orangutans can, and do, also walk upright in a very human way (I suppose it might depend on exactly what you mean by that). Orangutans also mate in a face to face position, and are perhaps more like humans in that respect in that the majority of their positions for heterosexual encounters are face to face while it is only about 30% for bonobos.
1. “Unlike other primates, humans and bonobos have separated sex from its reproductive function, and use it as a medium of exchange.
Orangutans also separate sex from its reproductive function in that they will engage in sex just for the sake of it and there is some suggestion that it is used as part of the establishment of long term affiliate relationships by adolescent females and sub adult males.
2. Like human females, the genitalia of female bonobos are in the front, for face to face copulation, which makes humans and bonobos unique among the primates.”
I don’t have comparative information on orangutan genitalia, but it certainly allows for face-to-face mating, and one primate biologist has suggested that juvenile female orangutan genitalia are structurally more like humans than any other primate (whereas bonobo genitalia are structurally different).
3. “In common only with humans, bonobo females are always receptive to sex, not just when they are in estrus. All other primate females are receptive for just a few days a month, and only if they are not pregnant or nursing.”
My understanding of human females is that they are not always receptive to sex, although they can be. In that respect orangutans are very like human females. Orangutan females will mate during pregnancy.
4. “Among all other primates, alpha males try to monopolize access to the females by subjugating, driving off, or murdering rival males.
Not true of orangutans. They have a somewhat complicated relationship between dominant males and between dominant and non-dominant males –sometime tolerating, sometimes not.
5. “To have their infants to survive, these females must mate with whichever male can protect them.
Orangtuans do not appear to have this problem.
6. “Like human females, bonobo females show no outward sign when they are fertile,
Bonobos are not like human females in that the period of ovulation is encompassed by an extended period of estrus swelling which does not occur in human females, or orangutan females.
7. “One reason the bonobo male’s Genetic Imperative does not lead to infanticide, may be because they do not know which infants are theirs, since the females have sex with all the males.”
Infanticide is also unknown in orangutans, even though males likely at least sometimes know who their infants are.
8. indicating that human females are less promiscuous than bonobos, but not as monogamous as gorillas
Overall, both chimpanzees and bonobos appear to be more promiscuous than either humans or orangutans.
9. Is it in our genes, or is it because females manage bonobo society, while males run all other primate societies.”
It is not so simple for orangtuan society where female choice seems to play a large role in relatinships with males, and the identify of power is continent and fluctuating. I’ve seen artificial zoo situations of a male with a female and their offspring, and there is no doubt who is boss – the female.
I hope you find thse points of interest.
Sincerely,
John Grehan
Dr. John R. Grehan
Director of Science and Collections
Buffalo Museum of Science
1020 Humboldt Parkway
Buffalo, NY 14211-1193
email: jgrehan@sciencebuff.org
Phone: (716) 896-5200 ext 372
Panbiogeography
http://www.sciencebuff.org/biogeography_and_evolutionary_biology.php
Ghost moth research
http://www.sciencebuff.org/systematics_and_evolution_of_hepialdiae.php
Human evolution and the great apes
http://www.sciencebuff.org/human_origin_and_the_great_apes.php
Chimps have the marvelous Dr. Jane Goodall to publicize their cause. The far more endangered bonobos do not have a popular human to plead for them. Below are some web links
BONOBO WEB SITE www.bonobo.org/home.html
Frans B. M. de Waal article in the March 1995 SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN http://songweaver.com/info/bonobos.html
BIBLIOGRAPHIC SEARCH SOURCE http://bonobo.dynamicapps.com
ARTICLE: Bonobo: Messenger of Peace, Victim of War www.awionline.org/pubs/Quarterly/Spring02/bonobo.htm
PETER GABRIEL JAMMING WITH BONOBOS http://pulse.towerrecords.com/contentStory.asp?contentId=5679
http://williamcalvin.com/portraits/
http://williamcalvin.com/teaching/bonobo.htm
http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/animals/features/325chimp2.shtml
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4080807.stm
http://www.pnews.org/PhpWiki/index.php/EvolutionaryWrongTurn
Peter Gabriel: Renaissance rocker working with bonobos at Georgia State University.
by Bill Forman© in Tower Records Pulse July 12, 2001 http://pulse.towerrecords.com/contentStory.asp?contentId=5679
Below is an excerpt of the bonobo material from an excellent long articleon Peter Gabriel
"Play a grooming song!" says Panbanisha through her human interpreter. "I want to hear a grooming song!"
We're back at the computer in Gabriel's hotel room, watching footage of Kanzi's little sister getting ready for her big duet. "I asked her what she wanted to write about as a subject, and she said, 'Grooming,'" he explains. "These apes actually have about 4,000 English words that they're comfortable with."
Kanzi and Panbanisha are star residents of the Language Research Center in Atlanta, Ga. Yet, Sue Savage-Rumbaugh, the researcher who first tapped their potential, fears that these are likely end times for this most human-like of non-human species: "The last of the African apes to be discovered and the last to be studied scientifically in the field," she writes, "the bonobo may be the first ape species to become extinct as a result of human activity."
"Well, we've just about wiped them all out," says Gabriel, who contacted the center after learning of their activities. "I called up and asked if I could track down some music with these apes, and they said come on down. So I went down about five times. She maybe tried three times before, just playing around with the Casio keyboard. And this is, I think, probably the second session where we improvised together. I asked her to only play on the white notes because I was playing in A minor."
- Onscreen, Gabriel begins playing slow synth pads not unlike something that might appear in one of his soundtracks. Panbanisha listens and begins to pick out delicate single notes on the keyboard, like a beginningand extremely hairyBrian Eno or Erik Satie. It's stunning footage, albeit not the sort of thing that would make the cut on When Animals Attack.
"She likes this note," says Gabriel, as the ape begins repeating a note and its octave. "No one has ever told her about octaves. She finds out for herself. So she's either recognizing the pattern, or it's through what she's hearing."
All of which makes Gabriel's 1982 hit, "Shock the Monkey," seem a bit prescient. "I know a lot of people though it was anti-vivisectionist, but it wasn't," says Gabriel. "It was about jealousy." Which, as it turns out, is something else we share with the bonobo apes. "Kanzi's already had a book written about him, and he was getting sick that his sister here was getting all the attention," says Gabriel of the real impetus behind Kanzi's artistic motivations. "So he sat down at the keyboard and said, you know, basically, 'I'm gonna be great.'
"There's no question about their musicality," says Gabriel. "I mean, that was the first time he sat down at a keyboard. If you took any of us and put us down at a keyboard for the first timeOK, maybe the notes were random, but the rhythm, he's really hitting the triplets really well. So to me, it really shows without question that these apes, and probably a lot of other animals, possess a musical intelligence."
Gabriel confirms that these experiments have impacted his own world view: "Human rights is something I've been involved with, but after beginning to know some of these apes, I have to take on board some of the animal rights issues in a way that I never expected."
For Gabriel, this resonates with his own lifelong learning process, which has found him venturing ever deeper into both inner and outer realms. Up crowns a body of work that comforts as it challenges, one that suggests the way forward is through embracing our entwined personal, cultural and even evolutionary legacies.
"If you can't communicate with other cultures, you think, 'How are we gonna make this work?'" says Gabriel. "But actually, very often, once you start making noises, you find that there's a languagesome sort of emotional languagethat you can use to connect."
BOOKS ABOUT BONOBOS
BONOBO: The Forgotten Ape
F.B.M. de Waal & Fran Lanting (Photographer)
Paperback: 234 pages
U California Press: 1997 List price: $27.50
ISBN 0-520216512
The bonobos are unique in that social interactions and conflict resolution are all mediated by a wide variety of sexual acts, which occur many times a day for each individual. Bonobo females, like human females. do not give any outward sign when they are in estrus, and bonobo females solicit sex from males throughout their monthly cycle, and prefer the ‘missionary position’. In common only with human females, bonobos females have large breasts, with their size unrelated to their milk-producing function.
MY FAMILY ALBUM
Frans de Waal
Hardback: 170 pages
U California Press: 2003
ISBN 0-52023615-7
A book of grayscale photos with short paragraphs, of bonobos and other primates.
DEMONIC MALES: Apes and the Origins of Human Violence
Richard Wrangham and Dale Peterson
Paperback: 350 pages
Houghton Mifflin: 1997 List price: $14.
ISBN 0-395877431
The bonobos are the only one of the Great Apes (which include humans) that do not use violence to establish male domination and to solve social and territorial conflicts. In bonobo society, males and females are co-equals, and females co-operate to prevent male violence. Unique among the Great Apes (and many other creatures) bonobo males do not commit infanticide, perhaps because it is a female controlled society, and perhaps because the males do not have exclusive access to any female and do not know when she might conceive, so any infant might be their own.
PEACEMAKING AMONG THE PRIMATES
F.B.M. de Waal
Paperback: 294 pages
Harvard U. Press: 1989 List price: $18.
ISBN 0-674-65921-X
How various primates settle conflict, with a section on the bonobos.
CHIMPANZEE POLITICS: Power and Sex Among Apes: Revised Edition
Franz de Waal
Paperback: 235 pages
Johns Hopkins U Press: 1982, 1989, 1998 List price: $17.95
ISBN 0-8018-6336-8
This landmark study reveals that our primate cousins engage in politics using many of the same tactics and strategies as humans.
KANZI: The Ape at the Brink of the Human Mind
Sue Savage-Rumbugh
Paperback: 299 pages
Wiley: 1996 List price: $15.95
ISBN 0-7115959X
The story of a bonobo raised from infancy by a human ‘mother’.
KANZI LINKS
http://www.rmi.org/sitepages/pid983.php
http://www.geocities.com/RainForest/Vines/4451/SheTalks.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/science/lifewithkanzi.shtml
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1952976
http://williamcalvin.com/scisurf/column01.htm#kanzi
BONOBO LINKS
http://www.bonobo.org
http://www.bonobo.org/home.html
http://www.gsu.edu/~wwwlrc/
http://www.milwaukeezoo.org/rcenter/cbull/bonobo.html
http://www.sandiegozoo.org/special/zoo-featured/pygmy_chimps.html
Sally Jewell Coxe, President
Bonobo Conservation Initiative
2701 Connecticut Ave., NW #702
Washington, DC 20008
USA
Books about Sex in Evolution
THE ALCHEMY OF LOVE AND LUST: Discovering Our Sex Hormones and How They Determine Who We Love
Theresa L. Crenshaw, M.D.
Hardcover: 342 pages
Putnam1996 List price: $24.95
ISBN 0-399-14041-7
This is absolutely the best book on the subject. It covers the biochemistry, physiology and psychology in very readable, clear and comprehensive way. Putnam printed this hardback book on cheap wood pulp paper that has already turned yellow, and crumbles like an old newspaper, and Putnam no longer offers this book for sale. Please, Dr. Crenshaw, bring out an e-book edition!
ANATOMY OF LOVE: A Natural History of Mating, Marriage, and Why We Stray
Helen Fisher, PhD
Paperback: 432 pages
Fawcett 1994 List price $12.50
ISBN 0-449-90897-6
This well-written book looks at the subject from the point of view of physiology and evolutionary psychology.
THE MATING MIND: How Sexual Choice Shaped the Evolution of Human Nature
Goeffrey F Miller, PhD
Hardcover: 503 pages
Doubleday 2000 List price: $27.50
ISBN 0-385-49516-1
The suppressed half of Darwin’s theory of evolution which says women’s aesthetic preferences in men shaped the evolution of human intelligence and creativity.
THE DANGEROUS PASSION: Why Jealousy is as Necessary as Love and Sex
David M. Buss, PhD
Paperback: 258 pages
The Free Press 2000 List price: $25
ISBN 0-684-485081-8
The many manifestations of jealousy and how they serve evolution and getting one’s genes into the next generation.
THE EVOLUTION OF DESIRE: Strategies of Human Mating
David M. Buss, PhD
Hardcover: 262 pages
Basic Books 1994 List price: $16
ISBN 0-465-402143-3
The differences between the mating strategies of men and women, and how these strategies are carried out in casual and committed sex.
DR TATIANA'S SEX ADVICE TO ALL CREATION: The Definitive Guide to the Evolutionary Biology of Sex
Olivia Judson, DPhil, Oxford
Hardcover: 309 pages
Henry Holt: Metropolitan Books 200 List price: $24
ISBN 0-8050-6331-5
A scientifically sound, absolutely delightful book in which creatures of all kinds write 'Dear Abby' questions about problems in their sex lives, and get replies that explain the evolution and function of their mating behavior, along with amazing 'believe it or not' facts about the sex lives of other species, A great way to learn about the evolutionary biology of sexual behavior, with some very interesting insights to human mating strategies. www.drtatiana.com
SITE COPYRIGHT BY DR. D'LYNN WALDRON 2007