Mama's last hug : animal emotions and what they tell us about ourselves

by F. B. M. de Waal

Hardcover, 2019

Status

Available

Publication

New York : W.W. Norton & Company, [2019]

Description

A whirlwind tour of new ideas and findings about animal emotions, based on De Waal's renowned studies of the social and emotional lives of chimpanzees, bonobos, and other primates. De Waal discusses facial expressions, animal sentience and consciousness, Mama's life and death, the emotional side of human politics, and the illusion of free will. He distinguishes between emotions and feelings, all the while emphasizing the continuity between our species and other species. And he makes the radical proposal that emotions are like organs: we don't have a single organ that other animals don't have, and the same is true for our emotions -- Adapted from publisher's description.

User reviews

LibraryThing member FormerEnglishTeacher
I was drawn to this book because of a viral video on YouTube about the chimp Mama. I got about 1/3 of the wa through the book and decided not to finish it. While mildly fascinating, it dealt much more with animal sciene and behavior that I cared to read at this time. There is a chance I’ll go
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back to it, but I interrupted two other books to read this, and I decided I wasn’t enjoying it well enough to finish it.
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LibraryThing member Beamis12
Animal emotions. Human emotions. Can they, in any way share commanalties? The author makes a convincing and illuminating arguement, that yes they can, and they can also tell us much about ourselves. He shares the relationship between various chimp behaviors, the emotions they have and how they are
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shown in various situations. While most of the book cover this group, their are also sections on birds, horses and even comparisons of human behavior, notably Trump and Spicer, that directly correlates to the animal world.

My favorite parts were the Bonobos, who he calls the hippies of the chimp world. They would rather make love, not war. Plus, a rarity in that it is a female who has the most power. Also enjoyed the bits of humor scattered throughout, such as when the author notes, that chimps are very familiar with each other's derrieres. Parts are sad, such as Mama's passing, but it is also informative and enjoyable. Our human makeup, emotionally, so closely tied to many other animals should make us kinder to those animals who share our environment, or so I hope. Understanding should bring kindness and empathy, which by the way are other emotions we share.

Good book, wonderful delivery and I enjoyed the narrator L. J. Ganser.
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LibraryThing member nbmars
Ethology, the scientific study of animal behavior, can yield insights into similar human behaviors because of the absence of the use of words by animals for verbalizing thoughts or emotions. Thus there is no obfuscation stemming from self-serving explanations or interpretations, lies, manipulation,
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euphemisms, lack of self-awareness, ideological biases, or any other misleading verbal descriptions that may cloud the picture. Unfortunately, many people believe that animal’s lack of a language understandable to humans implies a lack of consciousness and especially, a lack of emotions. Primatologist Frans De Waal reviews evidence showing these are unreasonable assumptions.

De Waal allows that our inability to translate animal sounds precisely means that we cannot always be certain of which emotions are being expressed by other species. But there are plenty of clues, including the ability to measure the hormonal output associated with emotions, such as oxytocin with affection, and adrenaline with aggression.

Scientists are also developing better experiments to assess animal “feelings.” The studies reported by de Waal that I enjoyed the most involved testing a sense of fairness and justice in primates, specifically in capuchin monkeys. Two monkeys were placed next to each other in separate areas divided by mesh, so they could see what was going on with each other. When both got cucumbers as rewards for completing a task, the monkeys seemed content, not acting out in any way. But if one got the preferable reward of grapes, the other rebelled, refusing to do the task and even throwing the cucumber chunks back at the investigators.

(You can watch a video of this experiment on youtube which appears as part of a Ted Talk by de Waal.)

Because of the important role of emotions in cognition, and the plethora of data about animals that would be hard to interpret without acknowledging emotions, de Waal writes “it’s time for us to squarely face the degree to which all animals are driven by them.” Indeed, he maintains, emotions play an adaptive role in evolution for all species in that they induce animals to bond with and protect family units; cooperate to find food and safety; and fight predators.

One of the behaviors de Waal considers is altruism, long considered a puzzle by scientists. He avers:

“I don’t know of a single woman scientist who has got carried away by the puzzle of altruism. Women would find it hard to leave out maternal nurturance and the constant worry and attention that it entails.”

Both scientists and philosophers are finally coming around to the conclusion that human morality is an outgrowth not of particular religious teachings, but of offspring care tendencies. These instincts are boosted by neurological and hormonal adaptations. They are so highly correlated that deficiencies in certain hormones are found in those who eschew affection and nurturing activities. In humans, when we see maternal behavior, we have no qualms in ascribing emtional engagement to both mother and child. With animals, however, we are more reluctant to do so. De Waal calls this intense aversion to antropomorphizing animals “anthropodenial,” which is not only wrong, but misleading about our place in the world, in de Waal’s view.

De Waal notes that whereas altruism seems aberrant and inexplicable to many scientists, selfishness does not, and is seen as the “default” for all species. Yet he cites evidence that selfishness does not in fact drive everything either humans or animals do. Experiments show that providing rewards for helping others actually diminishes the incentives for subjects to offer assistance. Individuals in both animal and human groups, it turns out, want to help others in distress, not only within but also across species, and don’t need or want external prodding to do it.

Besides selfishness, even more negatively-regarded behaviors are also shared among animals, such as the drive for power and dominance. Humans, however, like to style it as a sense of responsibility, or at “worst,” a desire for prestige. As de Waal points out, alluding to the innate hierarchical nature of human beings and its role as a motivating force is anathema to humans, who want to think of themselves as equitable and charitable and not so crass as to crave power and dominance.

De Waal argues, “the rejection of similarity between humans and other animals [is] a greater problem than the assumption of it.” Why do we do it? De Waal suggests it stems from “a desire to set humans apart and deny our animality.” Moreover, a deliberate separation in our minds has the self-serving function of allowing us to justify our mistreatment of animals - for example, in the ways in which we raise, transport, and slaughter them for eating.

De Waal isn’t making a case for eschewing meat. Rather, he advocates a respect for all forms of life that is more easily achieved by an awareness of the sentience of animals. He notes that scientists even used to assume human infants were sub-human organisms incapable of feeling pain. He reminds us:

“Only in the 1980s did medical procedures change, when it was revealed that babies have a full-blown pain response with grimacing and crying. Today we read about these experiments with disbelief.”

Although he doesn’t mention slavery, it is difficult not to consider the fact that whites have historically insisted to themselves as well as anyone needing convincing, that blacks were not as fully human as whites, which justified their mistreatment. Whites even went to war to defend the right to treat blacks as less than human.

So is there a line to be drawn between living beings? Or should we endeavor to accept, as de Waal advocates, that all life forms have much in common, and both their lives and ours would be immeasurably enhanced by that recognition? Whether we are considering other races or other species, it would behoove us to look for similarities as a basis for compassion and connection, rather than trying to establish our own superiority over whomever we can.

Discussion: De Waal joins a long line of scientists of animal behavior who have been trying for decades to convince people that animals are not so different from humans. They form relationships with family and friends, have loves, hates, senses of humor and senses of loss, and deserve respect from humans. Religious people point to the verse in the Bible reading “Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over the cattle, over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” (Genesis 1:26, New King James Version). There is nothing in there however that says “dominion” means we cannot respect other creatures with whom we share the Earth, or even that we cannot recognize that they too have emotions.

Evaluation: This entertaining examination of animal behaviors reveals the evolutionary advantage of emotions, and the folly of not recognizing their ubiquity among other species. It is well worth reading.
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LibraryThing member booktsunami
Quite a fascinating book. I thought as i started that it would be a bit superficial...just a series of stories about how animals seemed to experience a range of feelings and how they communicated. But it is, at a much deeper level, an investigation into our own human-ness and the fact that we are
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on a continuum with the apes as far as emotions are concerned. ......In fact the links go much further back in the animal kingdom. De Waals even briefly flirts with the idea of something like emotions in plants.
He draws a very clear distinction between feelings which are internalised and which presumably drive the emotions. We can't directly get to another's feelings. We can, perhaps, describe out own but we cannot get at an animal's feelings. Emotions, (according to de Waal) are another issue and are on display (generally) for all to see if they take the trouble. anger, fear, envy, empathy, sense of fairness, humour...they are all there. Apes even have virtually the same musculature as humans and wrinkle the same muscles in the forehead when angry.
On the whole he is pretty convincing ..even when much of the labelling comes down to: they act like this under these circumstances and humans would be experiencing this emotion so it's reasonable to assume that the apes are also experiencing the same sort of emotion.
A few good points made: Rawls theory of justice does not deal with envy. De Waal is floored by this because the animal world pretty much runs on envy. (Seems to be a major flaw with Rawls). Pinker, in his book "the better angels of our nature" accepts that the natural state of man is in a state of perpetual war and civilisation and cultural progress are the solution to all our problems. But de Waal suggests that primate societies did not necessarily live in this state of perpetual violence...looking to the bonobo societies and to the Ardipithecus ramidus (an apparently rather gentle 4.4 million year old hominoid) as counter examples of gentle existence.
The smile evolved from an expression of fear and submission whilst the laugh evolved from a play indicator and both expression s have been growing closer in our species. Stand-alone emotional states are rare...so labelling expressions as angry or sad is problematic.
Apes lose interest when they have figured something out ....so might underachieve in tasks...which goes to show that performance and intelligence are not the same thing.
Emotions help us navigate a complex world that we don't fully comprehend. They are our body's way of ensuring that we do what is best for us......minds are useless by themselves: they need bodies to engage with the world.
We don't hear much about selfish genes anymore...Science has confirmed that cooperation is our species first inclination ...at least with members of the in-crowd.
Empathy can be used for good or evil: being an effective torturer requires knowing what hurts most.
More and more {de Waal} believes that all the emotions that we are familiar with can be found one way or another in all mammals....the variation is in the details. (Part of the problem is out language labelling of emotions).
The behaviour of dogs after transgression is best regarded as typical reaction of a hierarchical species in the presence of a potentially annoyed dominant...rather than guilt.
When de Waal looks at a marching army he sees the herd instinct at work rather than aggressive instincts.
An elephant's 4 kg brain has three times as many neutrons as our own...so what proof is there that we are more conscious than elephants?
Behind the debate about animal consciousness lurks an issue that most scientists would rather avoid: what humanity does to animals. 73% of hunter gather cultures worldwide derive more than half their subsistence from anima foods.
Scientific skepticism about pain applies not just to animals but to any organism that fails to talk. But animals never report any feelings. Feelings are clearly less accessible to science than emotions but one day we might be able to measure the private experience of other species but for the moment we have to content ourselves with what is visible on the outside.
In all, quite a powerful and profound book. I give it five stars.
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LibraryThing member steve02476
Wonderfully written book about animal emotions. The main focus is on apes, but lots about other animals as well. He has a good way of labeling some things as not quite facts but as well-supported scientific conjectures.
LibraryThing member A.Godhelm
This is the third de Waal book I've read, following "Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?". Though de Waal says in an afterword he intended the latter to be about cognition and this one to be about emotion, there is a large overlap, even in the examples, studies and anecdotes used. Of
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the two, "Are We Smart Enough" is the superior book; the emotional inner life of animals is - as he admits repeatedly - less testable, and is dependent on the former cognitive ability of animals, which is testable. As a companion piece to "Are We Smart Enough" this is like a dessert to the main dish, sweet but less substantial.
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