Chimps or Humans: Where Did We Take a Turn?
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Chimps or Humans: Where Did We Take a Turn?
Charles Darwin, the father of evolution who also coined the term quoted, “A moral being is one who is capable of reflecting on his past actions and their motives – of approving of some and disapproving of others.” Reflecting from his wisdom, humans can agree with Darwin considering the fact that we evolve in todays society by reading reviews for schools to be admitted to all the way through choosing what to eat for lunch according to others recommendations. Based on the film “The Human Spark” Alan Alda was able to give us significant reasons how humans and chimps relate and differ along with why understanding chimps is valued for the comprehension of humans. Throughout the film, these ideas are explored and reasonable conclusions have been formulated through valid experimentations.
In the beginning of the film, we discover that even though we look and behave a lot different from chimps, our DNA only differs that of a chimp by one 1%. Today, chimps live as our ancestors did in Africa, however the only difference is that they are struggling to survive and are close to the brink of extinction. Humans are not quite helping their remains by abandoning the forests, making it harder for them survive and colonize with limited resources. On the other hand, chimps traits continue regardless as they use dominance to gain political power amongst their group. For instance, in the video, the chimp took a watermelon and distributed it himself to earn brownie points from those around him. Yet, chimps are closer related to humans compared to gorillas even though they share many characteristics and look very much alike.
Several experimentations were conducted in the film to show how closely related and different humans are from chimps. Humans and chimps distinguish the concept of heavy and light objects very differently. It takes a chimp hundreds of tries to get it right compared to a human where it takes them only a few tries. Humans can also apply skills and observe actions of others before making decisions as to chimps cannot grasp that concept as rapidly. Chimps usually have their own concept of doing things by building a representation of the world themselves. Also, even though monkeys are similar to chimps, they are surprisingly not as closely related. When humans become political, we speak or persuade other humans to think our way such as something simple as selling someone a car. Although, children were able to interpret and save moving objects as well as chimps, humans observe methods and follow procedures while chimps like to do procedures in their own way. Chimps do not understand that when they receive the help, they do not know how to accept it when us humans seek the help as much as we can.
While seeking for help, we use the understanding of chimps as a significant resource to understand human actions, speaking