WEBVTT - Animals Throwing Stuff, Part 3 0:00:03.000 --> 0:00:05.360 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind production of My 0:00:05.480 --> 0:00:14.840 Heart Radio. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:15.040 --> 0:00:17.799 My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick, and 0:00:17.840 --> 0:00:21.040 we're back with part three in our series on throwing 0:00:21.160 --> 0:00:24.880 behavior in animals, especially non human animals. But we'll be 0:00:24.920 --> 0:00:28.639 talking about throwing of the human variety some today. Now. 0:00:28.680 --> 0:00:33.240 In previous episodes, we discussed a paper documenting a kind 0:00:33.280 --> 0:00:35.120 of throwing or what appeared to be a kind of 0:00:35.120 --> 0:00:39.960 throwing in octopuses in Australia, which used their siphons to 0:00:40.240 --> 0:00:43.720 blast clouds of silt in their neighbor's faces when they 0:00:43.760 --> 0:00:46.800 get a little too close. We discussed the ability of 0:00:46.880 --> 0:00:50.080 elephants to throw with their trunks, and we talked about 0:00:50.120 --> 0:00:54.280 mongoose is doing brutal reverse granny shots to bypass the 0:00:54.320 --> 0:00:58.120 defenses of armored millipedes and as Mick Jagger would say, 0:00:58.160 --> 0:01:02.440 get the meat. Uh. Today, our discussion continues with a 0:01:02.520 --> 0:01:06.720 very important consideration. Well, when I told my wife that 0:01:06.920 --> 0:01:09.679 this was the topic we're going to be covering, uh, 0:01:09.760 --> 0:01:12.039 the question she asked was, well, what about air bud? 0:01:12.080 --> 0:01:14.840 Are you going to talk about air bud? Handle the 0:01:14.920 --> 0:01:18.479 air bud question a very important facet of this issue. Yes, 0:01:18.800 --> 0:01:22.720 Airbud is, of course a motion picture about a dog 0:01:23.160 --> 0:01:26.880 that plays competitive basketball based on the At this point, 0:01:26.920 --> 0:01:29.960 I think classic sports movie trope. There's nothing in the 0:01:30.040 --> 0:01:33.240 rule book that says a blank can't play whatever the 0:01:33.280 --> 0:01:35.200 sport happens to be, and you can put into that 0:01:35.240 --> 0:01:40.160 blank basically any animal, whatever animal seems doable from a 0:01:40.200 --> 0:01:44.480 movie making standpoint and acceptable to the human imagination. And 0:01:44.520 --> 0:01:46.600 I guess you could ultimately go beyond the realm of 0:01:46.800 --> 0:01:49.720 humans into other things as long as you could somehow 0:01:49.720 --> 0:01:52.240 cobble together a script around it. Yeah, I don't know 0:01:52.280 --> 0:01:54.400 if I've ever seen another one of these. I think 0:01:54.440 --> 0:01:56.840 I saw air Bud when I was a kid, But uh, 0:01:56.960 --> 0:01:58.960 I know it's a tradition right there. You know, there's 0:01:58.960 --> 0:02:03.760 a million movies like Aramy the Football Horse. Well, yeah, 0:02:03.800 --> 0:02:06.320 I think one of the earliest, if not the earliest, 0:02:06.360 --> 0:02:08.040 examples of this. And I could be wrong, because this 0:02:08.120 --> 0:02:11.000 is not a subgenre that that I have personally explored 0:02:11.000 --> 0:02:12.840 a lot. But I do remember seeing parts of this 0:02:12.840 --> 0:02:16.519 one on TV the nineteen seventy six movie Guts, which 0:02:16.560 --> 0:02:19.120 also had Ed Asner and don not sent it to 0:02:19.120 --> 0:02:22.000 give you an idea of the you know, the caliber 0:02:22.040 --> 0:02:23.679 of talent that was that was involved in this, But 0:02:23.720 --> 0:02:26.200 it was about a terrible NFL team. I think there's 0:02:26.200 --> 0:02:30.359 something like the California Atomics or something, and they end 0:02:30.440 --> 0:02:34.000 up deciding to field a donkey as a kicker in 0:02:34.040 --> 0:02:37.519 the game, and uh, um, I guess it works out 0:02:37.560 --> 0:02:39.959 for them. Again, there's a there's nothing in the rule 0:02:40.000 --> 0:02:43.239 book that says a donkey can't play in NFL. Yeah, 0:02:43.280 --> 0:02:46.560 I I imagine movies like this must just encourage and 0:02:46.880 --> 0:02:49.880 uh an overly stringent form of legalism when it comes 0:02:49.919 --> 0:02:55.040 to professional sports. Yeah, Like does it say games must 0:02:55.040 --> 0:02:58.480 take place on planet Earth and so forth? Yeah? Yeah, 0:02:58.480 --> 0:03:01.040 they will the at this point really the future proof things. 0:03:01.040 --> 0:03:03.320 But if we're going just based on these films, it 0:03:03.320 --> 0:03:06.400 would seem that for a while they didn't have all 0:03:06.440 --> 0:03:09.320 the loopholes filled in on this and um, and people 0:03:09.320 --> 0:03:11.960 were just constantly rolling out new animals, Like it doesn't 0:03:12.000 --> 0:03:14.919 anything about about art varks. So art varks are in 0:03:15.000 --> 0:03:19.880 play in Professional Curly, yes, okay, But outside of Gusts 0:03:20.040 --> 0:03:23.359 and air Bud, you also have movies like two thousand's 0:03:23.440 --> 0:03:26.600 m v P Most Valuable Primate, in which a chimpanzee 0:03:26.600 --> 0:03:31.079 play soccer. There are also I think thirteen additional Air 0:03:31.120 --> 0:03:35.800 Bud sequels and spinoffs. Humans are also primates. All existing 0:03:35.800 --> 0:03:41.040 soccer players are primates. Well, tell the producers of m 0:03:41.120 --> 0:03:44.520 v P Most Valuable Primemate about that. Um, maybe they 0:03:44.560 --> 0:03:46.360 maybe they actually touched on in the scramplay, but I 0:03:46.440 --> 0:03:48.800 doubt it. But I'm sorry you were saying. How many 0:03:48.840 --> 0:03:53.200 air Bud movies are there? Thirteen by my count, that 0:03:53.280 --> 0:04:00.000 includes the Air Buddies uh like spinoff series and interestingly enough, 0:04:00.200 --> 0:04:04.200 two thousands sixes Air Buddies. That was Don Knott's final film. 0:04:04.240 --> 0:04:07.360 He voiced a bloodhound in it. Oh, now, I don't know. 0:04:07.480 --> 0:04:10.080 Does that that means animals talk in Air Buddies. I 0:04:10.080 --> 0:04:13.240 don't know if animals talked in air Bud. Perhaps you remember, 0:04:13.840 --> 0:04:17.240 I don't mean I'm inclined to think not. I think 0:04:17.279 --> 0:04:21.039 the dog in air Bud was silent. But yeah, well, 0:04:21.080 --> 0:04:23.280 by by the time they get into the Buddies movies, 0:04:23.360 --> 0:04:26.360 which by the way, descended into titles like Space Buddies 0:04:26.400 --> 0:04:29.400 and Santa Buddies. As far as I can tell, these 0:04:29.440 --> 0:04:31.760 are just an excuse to have a screen full of 0:04:31.760 --> 0:04:34.640 Golden Retriever Puppies for eighty minutes. I think it is 0:04:35.839 --> 0:04:42.240 absolutely crass mercenary filmmaking. It's just ultimate cute exploitation. Um. 0:04:42.400 --> 0:04:45.719 But this was also the series that in a episode 0:04:45.720 --> 0:04:48.240 long ago, we suggested should do a crossover with the 0:04:48.279 --> 0:04:54.120 Clive Barker verse and create hell Buddies. Now. There's also 0:04:54.279 --> 0:04:57.520 just real quick a few other mentions. There's Soccer Dog, 0:04:57.600 --> 0:05:01.479 the movie, There's two thousand fives the Karate Dog, And 0:05:01.520 --> 0:05:06.320 then there's the movie Ed in which a chimpanzee plays baseball. Oh, 0:05:06.320 --> 0:05:11.080 and then there's Matilda about a boxing kangaroo. That one, Uh, 0:05:11.440 --> 0:05:14.000 that one has interested me because I noticed it stars 0:05:14.000 --> 0:05:17.400 Elliott Gould and it was also one of the films 0:05:17.440 --> 0:05:20.279 you could pull up on the Criterion Collections UH streaming 0:05:20.320 --> 0:05:24.479 service at least several months back. Boxing Kangaroo? Is that 0:05:24.520 --> 0:05:29.719 a waltzing Matilda Joe? Um, I imagine so, and it's 0:05:29.760 --> 0:05:32.960 it's I looked a little bit into this related to 0:05:33.000 --> 0:05:35.400 this podcast episode, and I quickly realized, oh, well, the 0:05:35.400 --> 0:05:39.480 boxing kangaroo is a whole thing unto itself. UM. That 0:05:39.680 --> 0:05:43.400 does have some basis in kangaroo behavior, but often in 0:05:43.560 --> 0:05:47.480 like a misinterpretation of kangaroo defensive behavior, but it has 0:05:47.560 --> 0:05:49.200 kind of like a life of its own outside of 0:05:49.200 --> 0:05:51.600 this particular picture. Might be something to come back to 0:05:51.680 --> 0:05:53.920 in the future. Now, one more thing about the air 0:05:54.000 --> 0:05:56.839 Bud franchise. You know, before they get to air Buddies, 0:05:56.920 --> 0:06:00.200 I think you were saying that the Golden retriever end 0:06:00.320 --> 0:06:02.640 up doing a bunch of different sports, and they've all 0:06:02.680 --> 0:06:04.760 got puns in the titles. So the one where air 0:06:04.800 --> 0:06:09.040 Bud does baseball is called air Bud Seventh Inning Fetch. 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:14.240 You gotta get some puns in there, all right. But 0:06:14.240 --> 0:06:17.320 but bringing it all back around to today's episode, Okay, 0:06:17.760 --> 0:06:19.719 some of these we can just instantly dismissed for now. 0:06:19.839 --> 0:06:22.839 We don't need to concern ourselves with boxing kangaroos or 0:06:23.440 --> 0:06:27.120 karate dogs because these do not involve throwing. You know, 0:06:27.320 --> 0:06:29.719 we're gonna focus on the sports that involve throwing a ball. 0:06:30.279 --> 0:06:34.599 Um Gus, that's impressive, but he's a kicker. Despite just 0:06:34.720 --> 0:06:36.400 participating in a game that has a lot of throwing 0:06:36.400 --> 0:06:38.720 in it doesn't seem to be throwing anything. So we 0:06:38.760 --> 0:06:40.800 really only have to worry about the concept of dogs 0:06:40.800 --> 0:06:44.640 playing scoring games with balls and chimpanzees playing scoring games 0:06:44.640 --> 0:06:49.280 with battles. Real quick, let's talk about dogs, um and 0:06:49.279 --> 0:06:53.400 and you may have additional expertise on this uh to 0:06:53.440 --> 0:06:57.039 throw in here experience uh from being a dog owner. 0:06:57.040 --> 0:06:59.640 But as far as dogs go, they can obviously be 0:06:59.680 --> 0:07:01.600 trained to do a lot of different things, often very 0:07:01.640 --> 0:07:05.479 impressive things, including chasing, after catching, and fetching balls and sticks, 0:07:05.960 --> 0:07:08.640 and as is evident in many videos online, they can 0:07:08.680 --> 0:07:12.000 also be trained to bounce basketballs into baskets off of 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:15.960 their their noses, off of their snouts. That always, I 0:07:16.000 --> 0:07:19.080 don't know, Like a basketball is a fairly massive object. 0:07:19.120 --> 0:07:22.120 I would think booping a basketball in mid flight with 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:26.120 the snout would really kind of hurt. Yeah, I'm not sure, 0:07:26.400 --> 0:07:30.320 but I looked around. And as far as dogs throwing, 0:07:30.960 --> 0:07:33.760 I'm not so certain about this. Drops. Yes, they can. 0:07:33.840 --> 0:07:36.360 You know, you'll see plenty of examples of dogs catching 0:07:36.400 --> 0:07:40.400 things dropping them. Um, But I'm not sure. I'm not 0:07:40.400 --> 0:07:43.560 sure you really have anything like throwing even kind of 0:07:44.280 --> 0:07:46.840 you know, a tossing aside of a stick or a ball, well, 0:07:46.880 --> 0:07:49.760 not targeted throwing. I mean, I think what's quite common 0:07:49.800 --> 0:07:53.680 for dogs is something more like what the mongoose did 0:07:53.720 --> 0:07:58.800 with the millipede. Dogs will especially dogs that have been 0:07:58.800 --> 0:08:02.840 trained in kind of unused torual environments with say a 0:08:02.840 --> 0:08:06.440 a puzzle type treat retrieval toy. You know, so you 0:08:06.520 --> 0:08:10.520 have like some kind of toy where the treat is 0:08:10.600 --> 0:08:13.160 hidden inside, and the dog has to manipulate the toy 0:08:13.200 --> 0:08:16.440 to get the treat out of the middle. In those cases, 0:08:16.440 --> 0:08:19.440 I've seen dogs throwing the toy in order to try 0:08:19.440 --> 0:08:22.720 to extract the treat, but it's very haphazard. They're not 0:08:22.800 --> 0:08:25.120 like hitting a target. They're more just kind of like 0:08:25.240 --> 0:08:28.520 throwing it wildly by tossing their head and it'll bounce 0:08:28.560 --> 0:08:31.000 off the wall or something, and maybe the treat will 0:08:31.040 --> 0:08:34.560 tumble out. Mm hmm. Now, I also found some some 0:08:34.679 --> 0:08:38.480 discussions and some papers about the possibility that a dog 0:08:38.600 --> 0:08:41.719 using a chewing stick is essentially a form of tool use, 0:08:41.840 --> 0:08:43.800 and this would also apply to any other animal that 0:08:43.960 --> 0:08:47.400 uses a stick in such a fashion. Uh So that's 0:08:47.400 --> 0:08:51.040 an interesting idea to consider. Mm hmm. Yeah, you can 0:08:51.120 --> 0:08:52.920 make that argument, I guess by the same token, you 0:08:52.920 --> 0:08:55.360 could say like a bear scratching its butt against a 0:08:55.400 --> 0:08:59.640 tree would be a form of tool use. Chimps, however, 0:09:00.400 --> 0:09:03.760 chimps are a different case entirely so We're not saying 0:09:03.800 --> 0:09:07.320 that chimpanzees should be encouraged to play baseball or soccer 0:09:07.440 --> 0:09:10.280 or any other professional sport, or any sport for that matter, 0:09:10.559 --> 0:09:13.480 but they have certainly demonstrated their use of tools in 0:09:13.679 --> 0:09:17.080 both captivity and in the wild. And this includes the 0:09:17.120 --> 0:09:20.760 targeted use of throwing objects. Now, one of the objects 0:09:20.840 --> 0:09:23.600 or or substances I guess observed to be thrown a lot, 0:09:23.800 --> 0:09:26.400 and this is something that is of course well documented online. 0:09:26.440 --> 0:09:29.840 In fact, when we were researching other aspects of animals 0:09:29.840 --> 0:09:32.360 throwing things, some of the search engines I I was 0:09:32.440 --> 0:09:36.760 using were very excited to give me content of animals 0:09:36.760 --> 0:09:41.520 throwing feces, potentially particularly chimps throwing feces. I was not 0:09:41.640 --> 0:09:44.360 looking for this information at the time, by the Internet 0:09:44.480 --> 0:09:47.439 really wanted to serve it to me. Now, this kind 0:09:47.440 --> 0:09:49.280 of goes back into something we talked about earlier though, 0:09:49.320 --> 0:09:51.559 the question if you're doing something with something that came 0:09:51.600 --> 0:09:54.199 from your own body, is it truly tool use? I 0:09:54.240 --> 0:09:55.920 don't know. I mean, I guess when I was thinking 0:09:55.920 --> 0:09:58.680 about substances that come out of an animal's own body, 0:09:59.360 --> 0:10:02.280 I was thinking about like things like spider silk, or 0:10:02.520 --> 0:10:06.920 like the urdicating hairs that come off of a tarantiala's back. 0:10:07.600 --> 0:10:12.080 Where the ways in which these substances are used are 0:10:12.200 --> 0:10:15.959 not very generalized, They're not very free form. Instead, they 0:10:15.960 --> 0:10:22.959 seem to be pretty tightly controlled, instinctually determined behavioral patterns, 0:10:23.360 --> 0:10:25.480 whereas I don't know, you could say, maybe like a 0:10:25.559 --> 0:10:28.640 chimpanzee pooping and then throwing its poop at someone or 0:10:28.679 --> 0:10:32.200 something that that seems to be a little more free form. Yeah, 0:10:32.280 --> 0:10:34.560 I guess also, and this is not something that any 0:10:34.559 --> 0:10:36.520 of the papers I looked at got into, but I 0:10:36.520 --> 0:10:41.040 guess there there's a difference between poop directly delivered to 0:10:41.080 --> 0:10:43.600 the hand and then thrown, and like poop that is 0:10:43.640 --> 0:10:46.520 just like say, in a creature's habitat or in its 0:10:46.520 --> 0:10:49.520 general area that it then picks up. Uh maybe not 0:10:49.559 --> 0:10:52.880 even its own poop. Um, So I guess we'd have 0:10:52.920 --> 0:10:55.120 to consider that as well. Now, I do think we 0:10:55.120 --> 0:10:57.599 should be clear that feces are not the only objects 0:10:57.679 --> 0:11:01.240 that that apes like chimpanzees throw, but is a feces 0:11:01.240 --> 0:11:04.880 are often observed to be thrown, especially in captivity. I 0:11:04.920 --> 0:11:09.240 think yes, yeah, definitely. Uh, the sources I was looking at, 0:11:09.240 --> 0:11:14.679 they're definitely mentioning this because in captivity, especially historically, there 0:11:14.679 --> 0:11:17.800 are often less things for the animal to interact with. 0:11:18.240 --> 0:11:21.280 The poop is something that will happen eventually, will be 0:11:21.320 --> 0:11:24.720 in the enclosure, and therefore is available to pick up, manipulate, 0:11:24.720 --> 0:11:27.760 and throw if desired, whereas in the wild there are 0:11:27.960 --> 0:11:31.199 other competitors out there, the other things that could pick up, 0:11:31.320 --> 0:11:34.600 like sticks, like rocks that could be thrown, and we 0:11:34.640 --> 0:11:37.680 have seen them throw such objects both in captivity but 0:11:37.800 --> 0:11:40.480 also in the wild, and so it seems to be 0:11:40.520 --> 0:11:43.880 a situation where they're they're far more incidents of poop 0:11:43.920 --> 0:11:46.440 throwing in captivity versus the wild, though they have been 0:11:46.440 --> 0:11:48.960 observed to throw poop in the wild as well. So yeah, 0:11:48.960 --> 0:11:52.400 I guess I would not disqualify something from counting as 0:11:52.440 --> 0:11:55.920 tool used just because it consists of an animal's own 0:11:55.960 --> 0:11:58.199 excreta or something that came out of their body. I mean, 0:11:58.320 --> 0:12:00.720 you could use poop, I suppose a tool for all 0:12:00.800 --> 0:12:04.840 kinds of things. Yeah, yeah, this is kind of a tangent, 0:12:04.920 --> 0:12:08.439 but I was looking around and back in seventeen, a 0:12:08.480 --> 0:12:10.960 team from the University of Calgary hosted a competition to 0:12:11.000 --> 0:12:14.280 make use of astronaut waste, and the winning submission was 0:12:14.320 --> 0:12:19.440 titled Astroplastic from Colon to Colony, in which the d 0:12:19.600 --> 0:12:23.200 n A of an E. Coli bacteria was modified so 0:12:23.240 --> 0:12:26.880 that it removed acids from human feces and they did 0:12:26.880 --> 0:12:29.160 not use actual poop in the experiment, used like a 0:12:29.200 --> 0:12:32.880 mixture of things to simulate poop. But the idea was 0:12:32.920 --> 0:12:36.560 here that this, uh, this, this modified E. COOLi would 0:12:36.679 --> 0:12:40.160 produce a plastic that can then be used in a 0:12:40.200 --> 0:12:43.080 three D printer to produce simple tools like wrenches and 0:12:43.080 --> 0:12:46.480 screw drivers. So the aim here would be sort of twofold. 0:12:46.760 --> 0:12:49.840 So say you're going to Mars on an extended mission. 0:12:50.240 --> 0:12:52.240 This way you don't have to bring those tools with you, 0:12:52.240 --> 0:12:54.439 you don't have to pay for the cost of getting 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:58.680 those tools into orbit and then two Mars and then 0:12:58.720 --> 0:13:02.240 likewise you have to worry less about getting rid of 0:13:02.320 --> 0:13:06.680 human waste on the journey. Uh. That that's quite brilliant. Yes, 0:13:06.840 --> 0:13:09.360 I one day hope to have all kinds of plastic 0:13:09.400 --> 0:13:14.079 tools and toys made out of poop. Now, um, this 0:13:14.120 --> 0:13:15.760 is this is sort of another aside, but this is 0:13:15.800 --> 0:13:19.559 goods Back to chimps specifically, Uh, you might even get 0:13:19.559 --> 0:13:24.280 into the question of why did chimps throw poop um specifically, 0:13:24.320 --> 0:13:27.679 even if they have a choice of their objects to throw. 0:13:28.000 --> 0:13:31.199 And I found this rather fascinating older paper. This from 0:13:32.240 --> 0:13:36.280 it is UM, a Russian paper titled UM a neglected 0:13:36.320 --> 0:13:39.720 form of quasi aggression in apes Possible relevance for the 0:13:39.720 --> 0:13:43.319 origins of humor. This is the current anthropology and I'm 0:13:43.360 --> 0:13:45.720 just going to read a quote from it here. According 0:13:45.800 --> 0:13:48.400 to people working at the Pavlov Center, at least four 0:13:48.440 --> 0:13:51.760 adult chimpanzee mails and one adult female would also throw 0:13:51.800 --> 0:13:55.079 feces at people, expressing joy when the target was hit 0:13:55.120 --> 0:13:59.600 by making a playface, hooting, clapping, and stamping around. They 0:13:59.600 --> 0:14:02.920 did not, however, throw feces at persons of whom they 0:14:02.960 --> 0:14:06.360 were afraid. We have received the same information from people 0:14:06.360 --> 0:14:09.400 in charge of chimpanzees at the St. Petersburg and Moscow 0:14:09.520 --> 0:14:12.640 zoos at the Moscow Zoo. The same behavior was observed 0:14:12.640 --> 0:14:18.440 in orangutanks. So at least in these cases, the chimpanzees 0:14:18.440 --> 0:14:21.400 seem to get a real hoot out of hitting somebody 0:14:21.440 --> 0:14:25.160 with some poop. Yeah, And and again this is older research, 0:14:25.280 --> 0:14:27.920 and I detect at least a little bit of anthropomorphizing here, 0:14:27.960 --> 0:14:32.040 But the distinction about fear was very interesting. So maybe 0:14:32.080 --> 0:14:34.880 in this we do see the roots of something like humor. 0:14:35.520 --> 0:14:40.040 But elsewhere primatologists do seem to agree that throwing poop, stones, sticks, 0:14:40.280 --> 0:14:43.280 et cetera in primates is often a an act of 0:14:43.320 --> 0:14:46.200 communication which matches up with some of the things we've 0:14:46.200 --> 0:14:49.360 been discussing elsewhere in this series, and that we will 0:14:49.400 --> 0:14:51.280 get to in a little bit when we talked about 0:14:51.360 --> 0:14:56.080 human evolution. Yeah, and with chimps, it's not even uh, 0:14:56.120 --> 0:14:59.440 it's it's not even a case of like necessarily purely 0:14:59.480 --> 0:15:01.920 spontane is communication. Like it's easy to I think, to 0:15:01.960 --> 0:15:03.880 make that leap. You think of like an animal trying 0:15:03.920 --> 0:15:07.800 to say something, not having the ability to say it, 0:15:08.040 --> 0:15:11.080 or having difficulty relaying that message, and then sort of 0:15:11.120 --> 0:15:13.720 sort of spontaneously picking something up and throwing it, or 0:15:13.720 --> 0:15:15.440 perhaps it already has something in his hand and it 0:15:15.520 --> 0:15:18.640 throws it. And this would still be very fascinating. I mean, 0:15:18.720 --> 0:15:21.520 even if you think of like a zoo environment, for example, 0:15:21.880 --> 0:15:25.800 the chimp is attempting interspecies communication. Uh, even if that 0:15:25.880 --> 0:15:29.480 interspecies communication consists of throwing a rock or some poop 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:32.800 at somebody, But it's not always spontaneous. Sometimes it is 0:15:32.880 --> 0:15:37.080 premeditated in the case of of stone throwing that's been observed. 0:15:37.120 --> 0:15:40.200 One of the the more famous examples of this was 0:15:40.720 --> 0:15:45.440 Santino the chimpanzee born in nine eight, who made headlines 0:15:45.840 --> 0:15:48.760 multiple times, and I think sometimes the news cycle would 0:15:48.760 --> 0:15:51.720 come back around to him because in addition to being 0:15:52.120 --> 0:15:56.600 a pretty talented artist, he also has some issues with people, 0:15:57.280 --> 0:16:00.520 like to collect stones ahead of time so that he 0:16:00.520 --> 0:16:05.960 could throw them at visitors to the Fruvik Zoo in Sweden. 0:16:06.320 --> 0:16:09.440 Now that's really interesting that the collecting of stones in 0:16:09.520 --> 0:16:12.120 advance aspect, because of course that indicates some kind of 0:16:12.160 --> 0:16:17.120 forethought or premeditation or planning, like seeing the stone as 0:16:17.160 --> 0:16:20.560 a tool for future use in a moment when it 0:16:20.680 --> 0:16:25.160 is not currently needed for that use. Yeah, and apparently 0:16:25.240 --> 0:16:28.280 wasn't an isolated incident. It said that he planned hundreds 0:16:28.320 --> 0:16:31.680 of stone throwing attacks on zoo visitors over the years. 0:16:32.120 --> 0:16:36.720 Um Sadly, he escaped from his enclosure in December two 0:16:37.080 --> 0:16:39.720 and was subsequently shot along with some other escape piece, 0:16:39.720 --> 0:16:44.120 which was a pretty controversial incident. Recently, there's a fair 0:16:44.120 --> 0:16:46.720 amount of coverage about that, but not I don't think 0:16:46.720 --> 0:16:50.040 everybody necessarily connected that this was the same chump that 0:16:50.080 --> 0:16:52.640 had made headlines in the past for the throwing of 0:16:52.760 --> 0:16:56.000 rocks and for art apparently and for our Yeah, you 0:16:56.040 --> 0:16:59.880 can find videos of him online doing some uh some painting, 0:17:00.240 --> 0:17:03.240 manipulating of pigments on the on on a on a 0:17:03.280 --> 0:17:07.280 canvas to create some interesting works. Well, sad in for Santino, 0:17:07.440 --> 0:17:19.919 but let an interesting life. Thank thank Now There's another 0:17:20.119 --> 0:17:23.399 interesting wrinkle in stone throwing with chumps that I was 0:17:23.440 --> 0:17:26.880 reading about, because in the wild, chimps will also engage 0:17:26.880 --> 0:17:30.760 in what is called accumulative stone throwing, as reported by 0:17:30.760 --> 0:17:34.440 cool at All in Nature Scientific Reports back in twos sixteen, 0:17:35.000 --> 0:17:40.119 Modern chimpanzees will will actually create stone accumulation sites that 0:17:40.200 --> 0:17:45.000 are reminiscent of human cairns, of of human um assemblages 0:17:45.080 --> 0:17:49.840 of stone, something that we often associate with like deliberate 0:17:50.880 --> 0:17:54.880 cultured acts of of human behavior, uh something. And this 0:17:54.960 --> 0:17:59.200 is both from from an archaeological standpoint, when archaeologists find 0:17:59.200 --> 0:18:02.080 examples of domes that have been gathered together in one area, 0:18:02.560 --> 0:18:05.919 and also I think we just individually encountered this as well, 0:18:06.160 --> 0:18:09.320 whether you see piles of stones that are put there 0:18:09.359 --> 0:18:11.320 for a purpose, like perhaps you're on a nature walk 0:18:11.359 --> 0:18:14.600 and these stones are are gathered together to help mark 0:18:14.680 --> 0:18:17.480 the path you're supposed to be on, or you often 0:18:17.480 --> 0:18:22.879 see this done out of for for pure amusement. Um 0:18:23.119 --> 0:18:25.479 At times you'll just find places where humans have been 0:18:25.480 --> 0:18:28.160 around multiple stones and there's like kind of this irresistible 0:18:28.240 --> 0:18:32.120 urge to arrange them or stack them up. Yeah, and 0:18:32.200 --> 0:18:35.120 so it's interesting, but I also am hesitant to make 0:18:35.400 --> 0:18:37.800 the speculative leap here. I mean, I know, I was 0:18:37.840 --> 0:18:40.119 reading about this paper, and I know what some people 0:18:40.200 --> 0:18:43.719 have said about the you know, the accumulation of stones, 0:18:43.760 --> 0:18:46.600 like throwing stones into the into a hollow tree or 0:18:46.640 --> 0:18:50.440 something until they really pile up. That suggests, well, maybe 0:18:50.440 --> 0:18:54.119 they're creating some kind of like ritual monument, like you know, 0:18:54.200 --> 0:18:56.280 like humans would create a care and for some kind 0:18:56.320 --> 0:18:59.879 of purpose to be observed and to mean something. I 0:19:00.320 --> 0:19:02.720 don't think there's really evidence present to jump to that 0:19:02.800 --> 0:19:05.280 kind of conclusion, because that seems like a different order 0:19:05.320 --> 0:19:09.199 of uh, that symbolic behavior that, as far as I know, 0:19:09.359 --> 0:19:12.520 is probably only the province of humans. But I guess 0:19:12.560 --> 0:19:14.359 we could always be surprised. It seems kind of a 0:19:14.359 --> 0:19:18.199 speculative leap to me, but it's still really interesting behavior. Nonetheless, 0:19:18.240 --> 0:19:21.760 I mean, the the the chimpanzee is piling up the 0:19:21.800 --> 0:19:25.600 stones for some interesting reason, even if it's not to 0:19:25.720 --> 0:19:31.080 like create a symbolic marker for other chimpanzees to see. Yeah. Yeah, 0:19:31.480 --> 0:19:35.280 So this particular paper they're drawing on various surveys and accounts, 0:19:35.280 --> 0:19:37.879 and they found four populations in West Africa where chimps 0:19:37.960 --> 0:19:41.480 quote habitually bang and throw rocks against trees or toss 0:19:41.520 --> 0:19:45.560 them into tree cavities, resulting in conspicuous stone accumulations at 0:19:45.600 --> 0:19:49.000 these sites. Um. They point out that chimps, along with 0:19:49.080 --> 0:19:52.080 capuchin monkeys and long tailed macaques, are known to use 0:19:52.119 --> 0:19:55.880 stones as hammers to crack open encased foods. Uh. They 0:19:55.920 --> 0:19:58.959 point out that stone throwing and chimpanzees was first described 0:19:58.960 --> 0:20:02.439 by Jane Goodall documented aimed throwing of sticks and rocks 0:20:02.480 --> 0:20:07.199 by male chimpanzees during agonistic displays, and this behavior was 0:20:07.320 --> 0:20:10.359 later described by researchers for other non human primates as well, 0:20:10.400 --> 0:20:15.440 including Japanese macaques, wild baboons, and capuchin monkeys. Yeah. Female 0:20:15.440 --> 0:20:17.840 bearded capuchins have also been observed to throw rocks during 0:20:17.880 --> 0:20:21.439 courtship interactions. Um, which I guess this is would be 0:20:21.440 --> 0:20:24.760 like tenderly throwing pebbles against a window to get their 0:20:24.800 --> 0:20:29.520 lover's interest at night without awakening the parents downstairs, or 0:20:29.560 --> 0:20:33.040 maybe not I like it, but human metaphors aside, I mean, like, 0:20:33.200 --> 0:20:36.040 it is interesting that they would throw rocks at each 0:20:36.040 --> 0:20:40.480 other for apparent purposes other than threats or intimidation. Yeah, again, 0:20:40.520 --> 0:20:44.240 coming back into like the communication aspect of it. Um. 0:20:44.280 --> 0:20:47.600 Now I mentioned the using using some sort of nutcracking 0:20:47.880 --> 0:20:51.720 um behavior with rocks that can sometimes lead to those 0:20:51.800 --> 0:20:55.000 rocks accumulating in certain places, which is a different type 0:20:55.040 --> 0:20:58.879 of accumulation versus what we're talking with the chimps here um. Also, 0:20:59.040 --> 0:21:02.360 the paper points out that Japanese macaques engage in stone handling, 0:21:02.640 --> 0:21:06.960 which isn't tool of use but solitary object play behavior, 0:21:07.520 --> 0:21:10.680 and it actually results in use wear patterns on the stones, 0:21:11.240 --> 0:21:14.800 and the stones will then end up accumulating at quote 0:21:14.840 --> 0:21:19.879 unquote PlayStations. So just sort of like handling manipulating a stone, 0:21:19.960 --> 0:21:23.960 not really doing anything in particular with it. Yeah, yeah, 0:21:24.480 --> 0:21:26.200 which is I get. You know, it's like the monolith 0:21:26.240 --> 0:21:30.080 hasn't really kicked in yet, but but they're but they're 0:21:30.119 --> 0:21:34.520 handling the stone. But chimpanzees are well beyond all of 0:21:34.520 --> 0:21:37.720 these like, the chimpanzees are second only to humans in 0:21:37.760 --> 0:21:40.679 the variants of their tool usage. They make use of 0:21:40.720 --> 0:21:44.359 simple sticks, stone hammer, stone cleavers, to linked to to 0:21:44.480 --> 0:21:48.800 cut foods. Uh. They've even been observed to hunt sleeping 0:21:48.840 --> 0:21:52.040 bush babies with wooden spears. So this is I think 0:21:52.040 --> 0:21:57.680 only been observed in female chimpanzees. But they'll take take 0:21:57.720 --> 0:22:00.119 a stick and sort of sort of sharpen it at 0:22:00.119 --> 0:22:02.600 their their teeth or chew on it, you know, to 0:22:02.640 --> 0:22:06.040 get a something like a point, and then use that 0:22:06.080 --> 0:22:08.520 stick to stab into the hollows of trees where there's 0:22:08.520 --> 0:22:11.240 a sleeping bush baby and spirit and pull it back 0:22:11.240 --> 0:22:15.000 out to eat. There's so many surprising little little cases 0:22:15.040 --> 0:22:17.000 of of tool uisu pro to a tool used to 0:22:17.000 --> 0:22:22.879 behavior in chimpanzees like this. Now, this this paper basically 0:22:22.920 --> 0:22:27.560 comes down to two hypotheses about why the chimps do this. 0:22:28.440 --> 0:22:30.760 The first, and I think the main hypothesis is that 0:22:30.840 --> 0:22:35.760 they accumulate stone throwing behavior as a modification of male 0:22:35.880 --> 0:22:39.240 chimpanzee display. This would make it mean that it would 0:22:39.280 --> 0:22:42.480 be kind of like a an addition to their hand 0:22:42.520 --> 0:22:46.760 and foot drumming, uh, which is you know, ritualized behavior 0:22:46.800 --> 0:22:50.000 found in all known chimpanzee populations and the use of 0:22:50.040 --> 0:22:53.600 the stones. Throwing the stones um into a pile, into 0:22:53.640 --> 0:22:55.600 the hollow of the tree, et cetera, would be a 0:22:55.640 --> 0:23:00.800 way of enhancing um this particular activity. That's and oh yes, 0:23:00.920 --> 0:23:03.200 so like hitting a pile of stones with a stone 0:23:03.240 --> 0:23:05.960 would probably make a louder sound than just throwing a 0:23:06.000 --> 0:23:09.320 stone off into the dirt. Yeah, I I don't think. 0:23:09.960 --> 0:23:12.040 I don't. I would not feel comfortable going as far 0:23:12.080 --> 0:23:15.360 to say that they're making music, uh, though I think 0:23:15.400 --> 0:23:19.880 I saw some headlines that that we're going in that direction. Uh. 0:23:19.880 --> 0:23:23.440