Darwin's Challenge

Dorothy L. Cheney, Robert M. Seyfarth. Baboon Metaphysics: The Evolution of a Social Mind. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007. vi + 328 pp. $27.50, cloth, ISBN 978-0-226-10243-6. Cornelius Medvei. Mr. Thundermug: A Novel. New York: HarperCollins, 2007. 112 pp. $14.95, paper, ISBN 978-0-06-114612-1. Reviewed by Marion W. Copeland Published on H-Nilas (March, 2007) The jacket description makes it clear that social life with the narratives of human "social in‐ Dorothy Cheney and Robert Seyfarth "aim to fully trigue" in novels by Jane Austen and William comprehend [and, one might add, to communi‐ Thackeray. Through these associations, their read‐ cate to human readers] the intelligence that un‐ ers are helped to see and accept that humans too derlies" baboon society and culture. To accom‐ are apes who survive by "predict[ing] the behav‐ plish this requires, the description rightly claims, ior of others and form[ing] those social relation‐ "a scientist's precision and a nature lover's eye," ships that return the greatest benefit" (p. 12). They what the great nineteenth-century naturalist explain that "Baboons are good psychologists: Richard Jeffers called "the eye of the beholder," as they recognize their companions as individuals, well as a novelist's "narrative" or "sympathetic observe their behavior, and create, in their minds, imagination." The authors themselves acknowl‐ a hierarchical representation of society based on edge this complex mix in their second chapter, matrilineal kinship and dominance rank. The so‐ "The Primate Mind in Myth and Legend." Discov‐ cial knowledge of baboons is too varied and com‐ ering that "the domain of expertise for baboons-- plex to be explained by simple learning mecha‐ and indeed for all monkeys and apes--is social nism. Instead ... natural selection has led to the se‐ life" led Cheney and Seyfarth to compare baboon lection of a mind innately predisposed to search H-Net Reviews for patterns and rules that underlie other ba‐ we see the human-animal divide and understand boon's behavior" (pp. 14-15). what it means to be a social primate. This insight leads these scientific researchers Considered as a satire or satyr fgure, Mr. to exactly the main concerns of good animal liter‐ Thundermug automatically echoes the hybrid na‐ ature: (1) "What is thought ... like in a creature ture of the satyr in classical Greek drama and, just without language"? and how can creatures with as automatically, links Medvei's Thundermug with language depict such a "language of thought"? and the underlying ecocentric and animistic message (2) Might other-than-human vocalizations consti‐ of satyr plays. In his foreword to Cary Wolfe's Ani‐ tute language and, if so, how do creatures with mal Rites: American Culture, the Discourse of spoken language translate and depict these other Species, and Posthumanist Theory, W. J. T. languages? In addressing these questions, animal Mitchell concludes that, because we live in a literature raises the issue of nonhuman subjectivi‐ world full of satyr-like reminders of our increas‐ ty as well. ingly unbalanced life, "an age of sensitive apes In the novel Mr. Thundermug, Cornelius Med‐ and talking ants, neurotic Batmen and leather- vei gives his readers a baboon protagonist who loving Catwomen, animated frogs and singing actually speaks, and who is likely able to do so be‐ trout, purring television sets and dinosaurs with cause he (or his mother) had been an experimen‐ family values, ... we need a new term to designate tal subject in both language and more invasive the hybrid creatures that we must learn to think laboratory experiments. Medvei's journalist nar‐ of, a 'human/animal' form predicated on the re‐ rator chooses to begin his story with the report of fusal of the human/animal binary."[3] the death of Dr. Alphonsus Rotz. Rotz, frst "ex‐ It is suggestive that when Edward Bell, an in‐ tend[ing] the theory of total immersion feld terviewer for Scientific American, asked Alan work" by (not unlike Cheney and Seyfarth) be‐ Weisman, author of The World Without Us (2007), coming part of a wild baboon troop on the "If humans were to disappear, could another Ethiopian savannah," returned to human civiliza‐ species evolve into a tool-making, crop-raising, tion nineteen years later. The last of his articles, language-using beast that would dominate the focusing on "a theory on the origin of language, planet?" Weisman's answer proves germane to the and a detailed study of baboon vocal chords," of‐ thesis of Medvei's novel. Bell writes: fer clues to why he returned, as does hisfnal According to Alan Weisman, who may well publication in which he claims to have taught a have read Cheney and Seyfarth's work, baboons particularly intelligent female to speak and "con‐ might have a reasonable shot. They have the sider[s] the possibility of cross-breeding between largest brain of any primate besides Homo sapi‐ humans and baboons" (pp. 4-5). The narrator con‐ ens,[4] and like us, they adapted to living in sa‐ cludes that Mr. Thundermug may well be the vannas as forest habitats in Africa shrank. Writes "walking vindication of [Rotz's] wildest theories" Weisman: "If the dominant ungulates of the sa‐ (pp. 7-8), his "human speech" substantiating the vanna--cattle--disappear, wildebeest will expand life's work of Dr. Alphonsus Rotz (p. 25).[1] Thun‐ to take their place. If humans vanish, will ba‐ dermug's relationship to Angela Young, his teach‐ boons move into ours? Has their cranial capacity er, explores the sexual aspect of Rotz's theory.[2] lain suppressed during the Holocene because we Could Thundermug be the offspring of Rotz and got the jump on them, being frst out of the trees? his extraordinarily intelligent female baboon? With us no longer in the way, will their mental po‐ The possibility suggests a radical change in how tential surge to the occasion and push them into a 2 H-Net Reviews sudden, punctuated evolutionary scramble into emphasized even further by the decision to put every nook and cranny of our vacant niche?"[5] the baboon family in the local zoo. There, unlike Hollywood, with its long series of Planet of other species who have become members of the the Apes movies (1968-73, 2001), seems to agree urban communities humans have created in spa‐ with Weisman. A second out-of-Africa series could ces that were once their natural habitats, the ba‐ play out hundreds of years after the frst. One boons become experimental objects to be ob‐ wonders what the baboon archaeologists of the served, learned from, and used. future would make of the extraordinary human Notes artifacts--sculptures, cutlery, plastic bags--buried [1]. Other than Michael Crichton's Congo just beneath their feet. Weisman guesses that "the (1980), novels that explore language and bio-ex‐ intellectual development of whatever creature periments (including breeding) on primates in‐ digs them up might be kicked abruptly to a higher clude Douglas Preston's Jennie (1994), Peter evolutionary plane by the discovery of ready- Goldsworthy's Wish: A Biologically Engineered made tools."[6] Even as ghosts we could continue Love Story (1995), Peter Hoag's Woman and Ape to shape the future. (1996), and W. Michael Gear and Kathleen O'Neil A novel's narrator determines a good deal of Gears' Dark Inheritance (2001). how readers respond to both storyline and char‐ [2]. The ape as student is an ancient trope. acters and, consequently, to the themes of a novel. The use of "aping" for "imitating" is related. Ch‐ Medvei's narrator is a journalist, someone like Ch‐ eney and Seyfarth point out that the Bavians (Ba‐ eney and Seyfarth, professionally trained as both boons) in Two Noble Kinsmen (1614), a play by observer and reporter.[7] To the extent that the John Fletcher, possibly co-authored by William reporter identifies and empathizes with Thunder‐ Shakespeare, are cast as a student of a human mug's dilemma, caught or captured between Schoolmaster (p. 217). species, Thundermug seems less a satiric than a [3]. W. J. T. Mitchell, "Foreword: The Rights of tragic fgure who shares human isolation from Things," in Animal Rites: American Culture, the other species, even his own. Discourse of Species, and Posthumanist Theory, The cause of his dilemma is his unexplained by Cary Wolfe (Chicago and London: University of ability to speak, but the city's bureaucrats are re‐ Chicago Press, 2003), xiii-xiv. Equally suggestive is sponsible for tangling him in the net of the local Mitchell's term for this phenomenon--"totemism"-- law. "If Mr. Thundermug is an animal," comments a synonym for zoocentrism or animism. reviewer Bernard Kiley, "[the law says] he should [4]. See also Nicholas Wade, "How Baboons be in a zoo. If he is a person, he is committing ani‐ Think (Yes, Think)," New York Times, October 9, mal cruelty by illegally keeping three exotic ani‐ 2007. mals. Mr. Thundermug is 5 human years old, and should be in an orphanage. But he is 378 baboon [5]. Edward Bell, "An Earth Without People: years old and eligible for a pension. It's all very Interview with Alan Weisman," Scientific Ameri‐ Kafka-for-Simians.... It ends, of course, in a tri‐ can, July 2007, 76-81. al."[8] In the process Medvei points out some of [6]. Ibid., 78-79. the obstacles to considering rights for nonhumans [7]. It is interesting that the frst extended re‐ under the laws of human cultures that at present port on baboon behavior comes from Eugene tolerate nonhumans only in captivity of one kind Marais (1872-1936), a journalist who had ob‐ or another (ownership, domestication, entertain‐ served baboons in their natural habitats in Africa ment, or instruction).

Load more