“If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants. » Taken from a letter to his rival Robert Hooke (1635-1703), this quote from Isaac Newton (1642-1727) beautifully illustrates what anthropologists and behavioral biologists call “cumulative culture.” Nobody invents ex nihilo. Even geniuses are inspired by the first thousand steps of their predecessors. In an article published on November 21 in the magazine ScienceA European team has just shown that the same thing happens with chimpanzees. Those of our non-human cousins who have acquired complex cultures have done so by drawing inspiration from their fellow humans in other places who totally or partially mastered these social behaviors.
It is important, first of all, to remember that, contrary to what has long been thought, culture, that is, the social learning of behavior, is not exclusive to humans. Since 1953 and the observation of macaques on the island of Koshima, Japan, washing potatoes before eating them, scientists have understood that other primates, monkeys, are also capable of doing it. Since then, from whales to titmice and even flies, culture has invaded the animal kingdom.
Thus, what remained was cumulative culture, the social learning of behaviors too elaborate for an individual to discover on his or her own. Here too our pedestal has collapsed. Two experimental studies, one with chimpanzees and the other with bumblebees, demonstrated in March the importance of a model for performing complex tasks. Demonstrations carried out in the laboratory, on a peanut dispenser, for the first, or with levers to access sugar water, for the others, which established the abilities of these two species. But what was it like in real life?
Overlapping data sets
To try to find out, the team that brings together British, Swiss, German, Austrian and Spanish laboratories launched an original protocol: crossing behavioral and genetic data accumulated over twenty years to try to find clues. The first tracks female migrations in chimpanzee society. When they reach sexual maturity, young monkeys leave their group and migrate to more or less distant lands. The operation helps avoid inbreeding. But also, the researchers wanted to believe, spread cultural behaviors. To study the latter, they focused on the use of tools in the search for food.
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