Showing your humanity usually refers to an act of kindness orcharity. Treating someone humanely means treating him fairly andwith dignity. But are these traits really unique to humans?Psychologist Sarah Brosnan wants to find out. She argues thattraits like fairness and curiosity are essential for any socialanimals to survive and live together. To show that, Brosnan workswith capuchin monkeys at the Language Research Center, a part ofGeorgia State University. The capuchins here are \"living in anormal social environment,†she says. \"So they spend the vastmajority of their day out here running around playing together, andwe just separate them out for the testing.†The monkeys climb overbranches in the cage, swing from the top of the cage, wrestle witheach other. When it's time for testing, the animals go indoors.Equal Pay For Equal Work On this day Audrey Parrish is testing twocapuchins, Liam and Logan. The test tries to get at the concept offairness in capuchins. It isn't too tricky: Audrey hands Liam agranite token, and he hands it back to get a food reward. Audreyalternates between Liam and Logan. Now here's the twist. Sometimeseach monkey gets the same reward, sometimes not. And there are twodifferent kinds of rewards: a scrumptious, extremely desirablegrape, or a ho-hum piece of only somewhat desirable cucumber. Thinkice cream cone versus celery stick. Logan was perfectly happy toexchange the token for a cucumber when his pal Liam was getting acucumber too. \"The question is now how is Logan going to respond tothat cucumber when Liam is getting a grape?\" says Brosnan. What shefinds is that more often than not, a capuchin offered the lessdesirable reward after his partner gets the good one refuses tohand back the token. \"What we're really testing is how do yourespond when you're the one that gets the lower salary, not how doyou respond when you hear there's a discrepancy between salaries inthe environment,\" says Brosnan. \"So they don't necessarily have tohave an idea of fairness or an idea of the way the world shouldwork. All they have to care about is they got less than someoneelse.\" Curious By Nature Brosnan sees this work as evolutionaryproof that animals have some of the same complex social rules thathumans do. Clive Wynne isn't so sure. Wynne, an animal psychologistat the University of Florida, says you don't have to invoke ideaslike fairness or inequity to explain the capuchins' behavior.There's an older concept, a more basic concept of frustration thathumans share with many other species: \"The tendency to act up ifsomething they were expecting to receive is not given to them,\"says Wynne. \"So if a child is in the habit of receiving a piece ofchocolate for completing their homework, and they don't get theirpiece of chocolate, they may throw a tantrum. And that kind offrustrative behavior is seen in any number of different species.\"Brosnan says whether or not you accept terms like fairness orinequity to explain what the capuchins did in the fairness test,she insists you can see unmistakable echoes of human behaviors inher capuchins. Take curiosity. Brosnan points to what the capuchinsdid the first time they saw me and my recording gear -- they allcame over to have a look. \"They're curious about you,\" she says.\"They haven't seen you; they haven't seen a mic before. So theywant to see what it is. Is it going to do anything to them likegive them food, or is it going to be a threat?\" Brosnan sayscuriosity -- that desire to explore your world -- is key to humanculture. Humans went beyond being curious about food and threatsand began to wonder where we came from and why the stars twinkle inthe night. You can also see beginnings of another important humansocial activity in capuchins: the desire to play -- to do thingsthat have no immediate payoff. \"You're not acquiring food; you'renot mating; you're not defending yourself from a predator,\" saysBrosnan. But saying play is purely social is not to suggest itisn't important -- it helps juveniles learn the limits ofacceptable behavior in their groups. Brosnan doesn't believe playis a behavior inherited from monkeys in a genetic sense \"butinstead is a behavior that all sorts of intelligent, sociallyliving species that live in complex social groups -- and need toknow their ways around [the groups] -- have evolved.\" What humansand their big brains bring to the table is an ability to do morewith these socially learned behaviors, to be curious about morethings in our environment, and to extend concepts like fairness andinequity to make more complex societies. \"That probably explainswhy we're building city-states, and other species are still ingroups of 200,\" she says. In other words, we had the humanedge.
1. Describe this article that you examined?
2.Did it suggest to you anything about how primates use theirthinking ability to guide their social lives?
3. Does this suggest anything to you about human ethics? Why orwhy not?
