The Traits Of Non Human Primates

Primates are one of the most interesting mammals on earth, not only because of their complex social structures, but because they hold so many similar characteristics to humans. Primates are often cited as our closest living relatives and on two separate occasions I observed four separate species of primates at the San Diego Zoo that can justify their use of their physical characteristics and behaviors that may be similar as well as different to the other primates and ours.

In the article, “Of Primates and Personhood: Will According Rights and ´Dignity´ to Nonhuman Organisms Halt Research?¨, written by Ed Yong, who explains the moral but unclear delma of granting Great Apes rights. Extending from Spain to the U.S., the Great Ape Project (GAP) fights for these basic sets of moral and legal rights for apes. The problem is that apes, although genetically similar to humans are still viewed as simple animals. Which makes the ability to give these non-human animals, human like rights unnecessary as it would to give rights to dogs or rats. The U.S. has also passes the Great Ape Protection Act, which stop any harmful experience to apes. Consequently also stopping any further understanding of underlying biological mechanisms,

Within this essay, we will study more in depth the behavioral as well as physical traits of two primates at a zoo from their interaction with their peers to their place in the group. This observation would enable us to further understand the possible existing correlation between humans and primates. First, I studied a female chimpanzee with her baby, and then, a dominant male gorilla, in San Francisco Zoo at about noon, on May 23, 2015, for an hour each. Even though they share some similarities such as having a large brain, living for a long time, and being bored in their enclosure, they are still different; when gorillas are the largest, chimpanzees are the smartest. In fact, chimps use tools to catch food, they would not be able to reach

there are many arguments surrounding what defines culture and how it is possible to label all animals, including non-human primates, as exhibiting signs of possessing culture. They may not take in the opera or sip fine wines, but the verdict is in: apes are cultured. Fifty years of research on the apes has shown they use tools, communicate, and sometimes shake their hands just because it’s cool.

The fundamental physical prerequisites of people , just like all organisms , are : water, for various metabolic process; foods, to provide energy, raw materials for developing entirely new living matter, as well as chemical substances required for vital reactions; oxygen, to discharge energy from foods materials; heat, to enhance chemical effects; and also pressure, to enable inhaling and exhaling” This like this article and think that it relates to . To be able to understand how humans evolved from early existence forms, we can quickly take a look at our closest relatives, the primates. Primates consist of us (Homo sapiens), the apes, the monkeys, as well as prosimians, for example, the lemur. We can easily be familiar with primate behavior

Isbell and Wright’s articles both focus on monkey species and their native environments, Africa for Isbell’s (1994) vervet Old World monkey and South America, Peru area, for Wright’s (1994) owl and titis monkeys. The articles main focus is the relationship between these monkeys and their natural predators. Focusing on how the predator aspect of their lives is determined by their environment and adaptations they make to ensure survival. Isbell’s Vervets Year of Doom focuses more on the adaptations that was forced upon the vervets’ because of their changing environment, the death of fever trees. While Wright’s Night Watch on the Amazon focusses more on how the primates way of life affects their relationship with predators and the likelihood of attacks. Both articles have similar aspects however the species way of life, specifically their environment and sleep schedule, are quite different as well as the authors way of observing and studying the primates within their habitats.

Non human primates’ social organization can provide useful information how human social evolution occurs. We will go over main points of how similar and different non human primates such as chimpanzees, orangutans, and gorillas’ society are compared to ours, humans.

During my research of Orangutans and Mandrills I observed them in captivity at the San Diego Zoo. My observations included a 20 minute observation of each primate as it cohabitated with other Primates and with other members of its own species. My findings will support the research of Orangutans and Mandrills through firsthand observations.

On Friday, March 31, a observation study was conducted at the L.A. Zoo. The time of arrival for the observation was at 11:48 am and the end of the observation was at 2:42 pm. The weather condition at the zoo was very sunny with a mild gust of wind every so often, which is a perfect weather condition to conduct a study. The main reason for conducting this observation study was to study and gather information about the many different types of primate that are located at the zoo. To see how different or similar each primate is to one anotherin different aspects.

The rarity of human uniqueness no longer exists in the thoughts of scientists believing that human ability skills lie within the construction and use of tools. As declared by Goodall in which chimpanzees used straight sticks after removing the leaves and branches to collect termites or ants for consumption. (Goodall, 1986) Other species both primate and non-primate demonstrate successful abilities., which include a sense of self as well as the theory of mind, by which other species recognize that other individuals contain different information than themselves. Different species also have the ability to communicate symbolically to one another through the sounds of vocalization. (Sapolsky R. M., 2006)

Animals play a very significant role in medical advancements for human’s sake. Medical researches usually use monkeys as they are popularly known as nonhuman primates (NHPs). This method is used because NHPs has countless similarities to mankind especially in physiology, neuroanatomy, reproduction, development, cognition, and social complexity. Sample of animal research who won a Nobel Prize in 1954 were John F. Enders, Thomas H. Weller, and Frederick C. Robbins. They developed the technique of taking the kidney directly from monkeys and culturing it in the test tube. These cell cultures were then used by Jonas Salk and Albert Sabin on giving cure to polio virus. This is now a vaccine called poliomyelitis. More and more researchers employed monkeys as tests. Without this procedure, there will be no cure for Hepatitis-B and possible treatments of Parkinson’s disease. Moreover, there are aggressive brain experiments conducted in University of Utah, University of California-Scan

Stereotypic behavior is automatic behavior that serves no realistic function but is still retained by an organism. It can be found in many organisms, but typically only in vertebrates. Invertebrates have repetitive behavior, but not stereotypic behavior. It has been scrutinized by many scientists, and there have been a few inconclusive theories produced based on research.

For instance, among the two hours of observation, the lemurs were huddling together without any grooming or other socializing behaviors. This might be attributed to the colder temperature in Madison than that in their native habitation, Madagascar, even with the help of the temperature controlling system in the zoo (though whether this is true or not would need more data collection to testify). The well-known sunbathing behavior of ring-tailed lemurs was also absent during my observation, and this might be due to their lack of access to sunlight in such an environment. Moreover, there are still many uncertain factors that were not included in the results such as the age of the primates, which might have attributed to long amount of time the primates spent resting. Further data would be needed to get a better understand of the differences in behavior between the captive ring-tailed lemurs and their wild

Western Lowland Gorillas are much like humans and like to interact with each other. This is something that was consistent in the zoo. There were no obvious signs of stress or stereotypic behaviors, which are commonly negative behaviors experienced in captivity. The zoo however could modify the exhibit to make the gorillas better for the gorillas. This can be accomplished by adding privacy screens, playing naturalistic,

The observation on langur monkey’s behavior was done specifically in Dharwar, Jodhpur, and Abu. In these studies, the behavior of langur monkeys was observed, some studies kept track of the monkey’s for more than eight months.