As humans, we tend to get pretty boastful about our status on this earth. We put people on the moon, we treat and cure diseases, we invent weapons just in case we want to blow each other into oblivion one day. Clearly, it is our enormous brain power that sets us apart from the pack - or is it? Are we that much smarter than other animals?

A program airing tomorrow night on PBS entitled “Ape Genius” explores that notion, offering a challenge to our cranial cockiness. The show investigates all the different ways our ape cousins - Chimpanzees, Gorillas, Orangutans and Bonobos - have demonstrated amazing intelligence, both in the wild and in captivity and, judging by the preview, you should prepare to be humbled. There’s the chimpanzee group just chilling in a pond after a busy day of hunting with homemade spears and the bonobo who can “talk”, among others.

“Ape Genuis” couldn’t have come at a more appropriate time. Just recently, gorillas were caught doing very human things in the Republic of Congo, a few years after studies confirmed they also use tools. All this from an ape thought to be “less human” than chimpanzees, even. Clearly, there are fewer differences between us and the dwindling ape species of Africa than once thought, but perhaps what is more interesting is that even as we lose ticks in the column of distinctly human traits, we’re still separated from apes by an intelligence gulf miles wide created by just a few tiny dial-turns in our DNA. So what DOES make us human?

This entry was posted on Monday, February 18th, 2008 at 12:28 pm and is filed under Animal Domain, Society, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.