are baboons the most warlike primate
Most primates, including humans, spend their lives in large social groups or communities. In the case of semi-terrestrial species, such as baboons, being in a large community helps provide protection against predatory cats, dogs, and hyenas. It also helps protect scarce food resources. This is especially true for non-human primates when the food is fruit. Previously, the closely related gelada (genus Theropithecus) and the two species (mandrill and drill) of genus Mandrillus were grouped in the same genus, and these Old World monkeys are still often referred to as baboons in everyday speech. They range in size and weight depending on species. The Guinea baboon is 50 cm (20 in) and weighs only 14 kg (31 lb), while the largest chacma baboon can be 120 cm (47 in) and weigh 40 kg (88 lb). 1 Taxonomy and phylogeny. By the time the young baboon is 5 to 6 weeks old it can ride on her back, hanging on by all four limbs; in a few months it rides jockey style, sitting upright. Between 4 and 6 months the young baboon begins to spend most of its time with other juveniles. In the harems of the hamadryas baboons, the males jealously guard their females, to the point of grabbing and biting the females when they wander too far away. Despite this, some males will raid harems for females. Such situations often cause aggressive fights by the males. Back to Episode. John Horgan examines how Americans seem to have a completely different attitude toward war than we did thirty years ago. Strangely, everyone seems to know the answer. Robert Sapolsky brings us farther afield - to eastern Africa, where a population of baboons defies his expectations of violent behavior. John Horgan examines how Americans seem to have a completely different attitude toward war than we did thirty years ago. He takes us on a stroll through Hoboken, asking strangers one of the great unanswerable questions: Will humans ever stop fighting wars?. Strangely, everyone seems to know the answer. The baboon, of all the primates in East Africa, most frequently interacts with people. Apart from humans, baboons are the most adaptable of the ground-dwelling primates and live in a wide variety of habitats. Intelligent and crafty, they can be agricultural pests, so they are treated as vermin rather than wildlife. The two most common baboons occur in East Africa, the olive baboon and the yellow baboon. The larger and darker olive baboon is found in Uganda, west and central Kenya and northern Tanzania. The New Baboon segment suggests that in baboons, behavior is based on culture, and that culture can be changed by changing how adolescent baboons are treated. In the absence of male baboons who were treated aggressively as youth, the female baboons pass on a culture based more on cooperation. Baboons are African and Arabian Old World monkeys belonging to the genus Papio, part of the subfamily Cercopithecinae. The five species are some of the largest non-hominoid members of the primate order; only the mandrill and the drill are larger. There are exceptions to these general patterns. For instance, the vegetarian orangutans lead mostly solitary lives except for mothers with their children before they go off on their own. Most non-human primate communities are more or less closed to contact with members of other communities.
Yes, Robert Sapolsky brings us farther afield - to eastern Africa, where a population of baboons defies his expectations of violent behavior.