Observing Primates

Today, we watched a video called "Observing Primates". We were supposed to observe how the gorilla moves about using their arms, legs, hands, and feet and generate questions on how they move. It is a continuation of yesterday's activity.

Here are some of our observations:

- When walking:
   - Hands are partially clenched, knuckles touching the ground
   - Hunched-back
   - Arms were bent at a certain angle
- Generally:
   - Feet look like hands (big toe is very far away from the rest of the toes)
   - Long arms (even longer than their legs)
   - Walk with four limbs sometimes, walk with two limbs sometimes
   - Male gorillas pumping/hitting their chests (once in a while?)

Here are some of our questions:
- Wouldn't their hand hurt if they support themselves with their clenched hands while walking?
- Why must they walk using four limbs when they are able to walk using two limbs?
- Wouldn't it be difficult to move with their 4 limbs in such a position?
- Why do male gorillas pump/hit their chest?
- Why they move on fours sometimes, twos at other times?
- Why is there a large space between the big toe and the rest of the toes?
- Do gorillas swing on trees?
- Why are their arms longer than their leg?
- Why is the skin so rough/horny (cough cough, its a scientific term)?

Since we had so many questions, we narrowed them down based on whether they are testable and we came down to 2 questions:
- Why on fours at time, twos at other times?
- Why are their arms longer than their legs?

To help us understand what does it mean being able to be testable, we carried out a simple exercise using the following 2 questions:
- What is the importance of an opposable thumb for the way in which humans use their hands?
- Without using your thumbs, can you unpin your name tag from your uniform?

The first question was too general as there is a wide variety of objects and items that we can test with. However, for the second question, it was much specific and therefore, testable.


The Chimp Scientist ( Jane Goodall)

A short introduction of who she is. Dr. Jane Goodall started to observe and study the chimpanzees of Gombe Stream in Tanzania, Africa, more than 30 years ago, opening a whole new world of knowledge to science. Because of her investigation, her work is recognized as one of the great contributions to science made during the 20th century.
After reading about her investigation about chimpanzees, I felt that she was very brave to take the first step to scientifically talk about an animal's mind or personality or to give funny names to their subject. She is also very patient as to spend her time just observing each and every move of the chimpanzees and noting them down in her own way in her notebook so that she can write quickly and understand them later. Due to the work of Dr. Goodall and other scientists in related fields, we now recognize that many intellectual abilities once thought to be unique to humans are also present in animals. One such observation is the ability to not only use tools, but also recognize a need for them. She also found that chimpanzees were also very clever. Because of Dr. Goodall's long-term study and careful observations, we are now able to construct our understanding of the true nature of chimpanzees and knowledge about our closest living relative makes it possible to learn more about our common evolutionary heritage.