Page 17 - Dainfern Precinct issue 3 2022
P. 17
NATURE
his Year of the Gorilla (1965). He scientific, said, “For centuries now, development of the young. Judging
also used names but only in his book male priests, doctors and scientists by the volume of books on animal
in which he drew attention to the have declared . . . creatures have behaviour since the ‘80s, it is evident
irrefutable similarities between human no soul, no capacity for pain, or that female scientists approached the
society and that of other mammals. emotion”. subject with an understanding and
Schaller and Douglas-Hamilton drew empathy that was understated before.
attention to the fact that mammals, But “female scientists were replacing
like humans, display emotion and the hard, objective eye of the past Many respected male scientists
altruism. with one of a softer sight, replacing remain sceptical about emotions
a concept of anthropomorphism with existing among animals, yet it is
But ethology was still male-orientated one of empathy”. difficult to deny the significance of, for
and, unsurprisingly, researchers were instance, Dutch ethologist, Frans de
still inclined to concentrate on the role More and more women were now Waal’s experience described in his
of the male as the dominant sex. 2019 book, Mama’s last hug.
roughing it in the wilds, the Goodall
An anthology published in 1998 - way. They wanted to be as close and The ‘Mama’ referred to was a big
Intimate Nature: the bond between unobtrusive as possible to the animals chimpanzee matriarch who formed
women and animals, referred to they were studying. It was inferred a deep bond with Dutch biologist,
“ground-breaking field studies by that men, by default rather than Jan van Hooff. Van Hooff knew her
women scientists (which have) intent, paid too little attention to the for half-a-century and, knowing she
changed the way the world sees fundamental influences that female must be dying, went to visit her after
animals”. animals had on the social behaviour a long absence. A cell phone video
of their species. This was despite the showed the dying chimp curled
fact that most of the higher mammal
The book’s American editors, Linda societies they were studying were in up, unresponsive, and refusing all
food as van Hoof, unannounced,
Hogan, Deena Metzger and Brenda
WOMEN Peterson, came to the conclusion Among the fundamental topics that approaches.
fact matriarchal.
that we have become increasingly
De Waal wrote: “He is calling, softly
male researchers tended to overlook
separated from animals and from the
to her. She remains curled up,
were motherhood, social bonds, and
natural world in general. Their book,
HAVE IT. OK? intended to be more literary than the vital role of female animals in the showing no sign of recognising his
voice. Then an eyelid opens. Then
both. Suddenly Mama’s face erupts
into the broadest, fleshiest grin one
can imagine in an ape. Her feeble
arm uncurls from her chest and
Photo: Francesco Ungaro, Unsplash
reaches out and finds her old friend’s
greying hair and begins to stroke it.
Her fingers tremble in his hair. The
smile remains splitting her ancient
face. She pulls him towards her and
tries to hug.”
Daphne Sheldrick, in her 2012
autobiographical Love, Life and
Elephants, suggested that science
had reached a stage where, by
inference, it had become neurotic
in precluding researchers from
interpreting animal behaviour in an
anthropomorphic way. Sheldrick
wrote how science tended to impose
its “own complicated explanations
as to why an animal was behaving
in a certain way, when, in fact, the
answer was pretty simple. One
simply had to compare it to the
likely response of the human animal
if subjected to the same set of
circumstances.”
In a lecture, American ecologist, Carl
Safina, put it more circumspectly,
“. . . people who know animals know
this word – anthropomorphism – and
know ‘You must never project human
feelings and emotions on other
animals’. But I am here to tell you I
think that projecting human emotions
and human thoughts on other animals
is the best first guess about what they
are doing and why.”
Photo: Satya Deep, Unsplash
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