Chimpanzees sharing their food for Sex, a quick reaction

Kimberley:

I actually do have a BA in Anthro/Archaeology even if it is 30 years ago...and my scientific mind put a couple of things together today, you can judge whether or not I'm potentially onto something...perhaps all those hours staring into primate habitats at the San Diego Zoo (circa 1972-77) have paid off!

 

My initial reaction on reading that the chimps were more readily sharing the cultivated food is the following:

The wild food is hoarded because it is more nutritionally valuable in some respect!  (My hypothesis, since cultivated foodstuff have been bred for convenience, sugar, taste, predictable ripening, etc. it only seems reasonable that the nutrition value has suffered...we haven't bred them to increase their nutritional content!)

 

The interesting recent study of women versus men and how well they could point to the highest caloric foods in a market comes to mind...the women were better at pointing out the most high caloric items, and all the food in general!

 

So, the idea that chimps could know what is most nutritious could be part of their nature, as it appears to be part of ours!

 

Here's my blog reference to why women are better shoppers than men, and why they prefer pink, and why those things are related and something called a frishbergism, a word my father coined...he being Frishberg the Elder.

 

http://nonshoppingchannel.blogspot.com/2007/08/frishbergism-word-coined-in-late-1940.html

 

Enjoyed your article, thanks!

http://www.plosone.org/article/fetchArticle.action?articleURI=info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0000886#aff1

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Cheers,

Frish
Michael W. Frishberg