Origins of human teamwork found in chimpanzees

Teamwork has been fundamental in humanity's greatest achievements but scientists at the University of Warwick have found that working together has its evolutionary roots in our nearest primate relatives chimpanzees. A series of trials by scientists at Warwick Business School found that chimpanzees not only coordinate actions with each other but also understand the need to help a partner perform their role to achieve a common goal.

"Many animal species cooperate to achieve mutually beneficial goals like defending their territories or hunting prey. However, the levelof intentional coordination underlying these group actions is often unclear, and success could be due to independent but simultaneous actions towards the same goal.
"This study provides the first evidence that one of our closest primate relatives, the chimpanzees, not only intentionally coordinate actions with each other but that they even understand the necessity to help a partner performing her role in order to achieve the common goal. Pairs of chimpanzees were given tools to get grapes out of a box. They had to work together with a tool each to get the food out.Scientists found that the chimpanzees would solve the problem together, even swapping tools, to pull the food out. Source - esciencenews.com...

reply to post by Trackhunter


i am a "watcher". I enjoy people watching immensely, but will watch anything to observe its behavior.

Once I was watching a water droplet on the rim of the car window. inside were really small specks of dirt that were swirling around and around, faster then slower. You could see that within that tiny, calm water droplet there was quite a bit of activity going on.

Observing....its something we don't do very much of anymore as people. We opine quite a bit, but rarely just observe.

Origins of human teamwork found in champanzees eh? You do know that even evolutionists don't believe humans descended from chimps don't you? Evolutionists believe that chimps are cousins rather than grandparents, so how did the connection leap sideways? Typical pro evolution garbage.

Originally posted by sciencebob
Origins of human teamwork found in champanzees eh? You do know that even evolutionists don't believe humans descended from chimps don't you? Evolutionists believe that chimps are cousins rather than grandparents, so how did the connection leap sideways? Typical pro evolution garbage.

I'd say the fault is yours for not recognizing a media-generated sensational headline. It probably would have been more correct to say "human-like teamwork" in the title, but that wouldn't sound as catchy.

In any case, there is nothing in the story to suggest what you seem to believe the story is suggesting, it's just a catchy headline.

If you never read past the headlines, your search for truth will utterly fail. You can't trust headlines. This story is a case in point. But if you ignore the headline, the story itself is fine.

I'm not surprised chimps do this. I'm actually more amazed by the level of cooperation in ant colonies.

reply to post by Arbitrageur


My God! You can find kitties feeding dogs on Youtube. Teamwork? Is that what differentiates monkeys and humans from the rest of God's creation? What kind of darwinian theory are our hard-working tax dollars funding this time for the idiot liberals?