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Personhood For Chimpanzees

Courts Should Reject Lawsuit Seeking Personhood for Chimpanzees

I have been receiving media calls and emails about the wholly expected lawsuits by the Non Human Rights Project to obtain writs of habeas corpus for chimpanzees. Ref. Source 2

Chimpanzees Personhood

Group Wanting Personhood for Chimps Allowed Them to be Mistreated for Lawsuit

I recently posted about the lawsuits that have been filed seeking writs of habeas corpus for chimpanzees. I promised I would write at greater length. It just came out.

While researching for my piece, I read the on-line boasting by the Nonhuman Rights Project about how the lawsuits came to be filed at this particular time. And I noticed something very interesting. The group apparently allowed chimps to be mistreated (At a roadside zoo) for an extended period because it served their ideological purposes. Ref. Source 5

Personhood For Chimpanzees UFO & Writing Art Education Sciences

Why do chimpanzees throw stones at trees?

Newly discovered stone tool-use behavior and accumulation sites in wild chimpanzees are reminiscent to human cairns, report researchers. Chimpanzees are proficient tool-users, using sticks to fish for termites, to dip for ants, to extract honey, and even using stone or wooden hammers to crack open nuts. Outside the foraging context male chimpanzees sometimes throw branches and stones during displays, or leaf-clip to solicit sex from females. This research has therefore been fundamental for providing insights into natural chimpanzee behavior and most importantly into the differences between populations. Ref. Source 5v.

Chimpanzees Personhood

These laws are kind of weird for me. I mean I agree with animals being treated properly but giving them the same rights as everyone means they can make decisions on the same level as everyone and they can't.

Edited: Wizard on 5th Mar, 2016 - 6:52pm

Chimpanzees Personhood

Wild chimpanzee mothers teach young to use tools

The first documented evidence of wild chimpanzee mothers teaching their offspring to use tools has been captured by video cameras set to record chimpanzee tool-using activity at termite mounds in the Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park in the Republic of Congo, according to new research from anthropologists. Ref. Source 9q.

Personhood For Chimpanzees

This issue is one heck of a can of worms. In case anyone becomes offended, please bear in mind the following is mostly speculation.

The initial problem, as I see it, is that personhood requires responsibility and understanding. Chimpanzees simply aren't capable of stepping up to the plate as humanity's equals in a modern society. They're tantalizingly close, but not quite there. Failing to acknowledge that in an issue like this is a bit like abolishing the divide between adults and children and expecting an average five year old boy to cope with the world like an average 30 year old man.

Ok, so maybe in the interest of fairness, we can create a four category system. Nonsapient nonsentient creatures, who have no particular protections other than those related to environmental concerns. Nonsapient but sentient creatures (IE most advanced animals), who are protected by reasonable anti suffering laws but have no particular rights otherwise. The last two groups would be Underdeveloped Sapients, and Fully developed sapients, with both groups having various rights and protections, but only the latter having the rights associated with full responsibility. (Just as an example, the specifics aren't incredibly relevant)

For the moment, the last category would be populated exclusively by sane humans who are past their personal age of reason (Or just some arbitrary age number if one must keep using that crude method). Children, the senile. And the insane, would inhabit the second to last category, and be joined by Chimpanzees, Dolphins, and any other sapient creatures we deem worthy of inclusion by whatever method of determining sapience is chosen.

Ok, so we have this system, everyone has a category, and (Presumably) a reasonable level of rights and responsibilities. Now, how the heck do you keep it fair and reasonable? It can't be by species, as we already have one group with individuals in multiple categories. But if we go by mental capacity, we start running into problems like classifying entirely brain dead humans in the same category as dandelions. And then if and when Chimps or other such creatures develop further, what are we going to tell them if they don't meet the standards we've arbitrarily set? "Oops, sorry, you're still 0.5 sap points below the threshold, go back to the reservation and think deep thoughts."

Edited: daishain on 21st Oct, 2016 - 1:45am

Personhood Chimpanzees

One thing to keep in mind is that this is about person hood and not responsibility. To illustrate my point, if a human baby is born with e mental deficit that makes them like a one year old in an adult body should we say they are no longer a person?

Personhood Chimpanzees Sciences Education Art Writing & UFO

Genome sequencing reveals ancient interbreeding between chimpanzees and bonoboss

For the first time, scientists have revealed ancient gene mixing between chimpanzees and bonobos, humankind's closest relatives, showing parallels with Neanderthal mixing in human ancestry. The study showed that one percent of chimpanzee genomes are derived from bonobos. Ref. Source 1i.