The End of Monkeying Around...

Do you, like many people, occasionally procrastinate and put off to tomorrow what could be done right away?  I do it regularly at the end of the month, when bills need to be paid or when the oven needs cleaning or simply when instead of studying or working I'd rather watch reruns of old shows or play fetch with my dogs.
Well, it turns out that this procrastination business is not just human.  Our fellow primates experience bouts of laziness too.

In a recent study by researchers at the National Institute of Mental Health near Washington DC, Dr. Barry Richmond and his team have succeeded the impossible.  They are putting lazy chimps at work and turning them into super heroes by giving them a chemical that blocks dopamine production.

When I heard about it I had visions of Brave New World and human robots attached to their desks - working for nothing, never asking for vacation...

For details, check out this article from the BBC News .

Comments

  1. The BaxteriaSeptember 12, 2009 at 3:35 AM

    As they say, work and no play makes a dumb man kill himself lol. Actually I just invented that :) Nice post.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

November Primate Scoops

Read in the National Geographic News - On November 14, the Congolese Institute for the Conservation of Nature (ICCN) in Goma successfully rescued Mapita, a baby chimpanzee, from Congolese army soldiers who were mistreating her. For more information on the story, go the Virunga National Park blog at: http://gorilla.cd/category/chimpanzees/ ----------- Most touching - Chimpanzee Takes Care of White Tiger Cubs http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DuzUigpHjMU http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/bizarre&id=6501487 http://www.firstcoastnews.com/news/strange/news-article.aspx?storyid=123437&catid=82 ----------- Read in Wired Science - How Biology and Technology Shape Sex and War - see link below.  http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/11/qa-how-biology.html ----------- Jane Goodall's visit to Taiwan on November 24.  This article found in Taiwan News.   http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=796235&lang=eng_news
Read more

Sharing - Natural Instinct or Learned Behavior? Bonobos Like to Share Their Grub

Bonobos at the Lola ya Bonobo Sanctuary for orphaned bonobos in the DRC were part of a recent study led by Dr. Hare of Duke University (NC) and Suzy Kwetuenda from the sanctuary. In this study, a bonobo was given access to food, while another was in an adjacent room. The bonobo with access to the food had two choices: eat the food alone or open the door and let the other bonobo join in to share the food.  Test subjects preferred to voluntarily open the door and share their food. Chimpanzees (and some humans I know) would rather stuff their faces than share with a friend. In his book entitled "Our Inner Ape", Franz De Waal relates an experiment he led.  He introduced two juvenile rhesus macaques (not a species known for peace making skills) among stumptail monkeys for five months. During their stay with the stumptail monkeys, the two rhesus monkeys learned to engage in reconciliation and grooming.  At the end of the experiment, these two juveniles continued to be more...
Read more

Gorillas: Skating on Thin Ice

As we had indicated earlier in this blog, 2009 is the Year of the Gorilla. On January 15, humans dressed in gorilla costumes performed a dance on ice at the Natural History Museum of London.  This was part of the UNEP launch of the Year of the Gorilla. This year will be marked by a number of initiatives to educate and raise awareness on the plight of one of our closest relatives.  More research will also be done in Cameroon and Nigeria to improve community-based conservation efforts aimed at protecting the Cross River Gorilla. Check out this UNEP link to read more about the Projects to Save Africa's Rarest Ape and see pictures of the skating gorillas .
Read more