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The chimpanzees could tear me apart in no time. They're many times stronger than we are.
Frans de Waal
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Frans de Waal
Age: 76
Born: 1948
Born: October 29
Ethologist
Non-Fiction Writer
Primatologist
Psychologist
University Teacher
Zoologist
Den Bosch
Frans B M de Waal
Frans B. M. de Waal
F. de Waal
Tear
Apart
Stronger
Tears
Times
Many
Time
Chimpanzees
More quotes by Frans de Waal
Religion may have become a codification of morality, and it may fortify it, but it's not the origin of it.
Frans de Waal
To neglect the common ground with other primates, and to deny the evolutionary roots of human morality, would be like arriving at the top of a tower to declare that the rest of the building is irrelevant, that the precious concept of tower ought to be reserved for the summit.
Frans de Waal
Dogmatists have one advantage: they are poor listeners.
Frans de Waal
The intuitive connection children feel with animals can be a tremendous source of joy. The unconditional love received from pets, and the lack of artifice in the relationship, contrast sharply with the much trickier dealings with members of their own species.
Frans de Waal
I describe in 'Chimpanzee Politics' how the alpha male needs broad support to reach the top spot. He needs some close allies and he needs many group members to be on his side.
Frans de Waal
Being both more systematically brutal than chimps and more empathetic than bonobos, we are by far the most bipolar ape. Our societies are never completely peaceful, never completely competitive, never ruled by sheer selfishness, and never perfectly moral.
Frans de Waal
You should know as much as you can about the human species if you have a hand in designing human society.
Frans de Waal
The fact that the apes exist and that we can study them is extremely important and makes us reflect on ourselves and our human nature. In that sense alone, you need to protect the apes.
Frans de Waal
There is little evidence that other animals judge the appropriateness of actions that do not directly affect themselves.
Frans de Waal
When we are bad, we are worse than any primate that I know. And when we are good, we are actually better and more altruistic than any primate that I know.
Frans de Waal
In Africa, we have the bush meat trade, which means that, on a very large scale, animals are being killed in the forests and sold in the cities as a luxury food.
Frans de Waal
Humanity is actually much more cooperative and empathic than [it's] given credit for.
Frans de Waal
Studies of reconciliation in primates have demonstrated that if the relationship value increases between two parties they are more willing to make peace.
Frans de Waal
Most exotic animals are not particularly interested in people, which makes it hard to provoke them. Human-rearing gets them used to and sometimes imprinted on humans, which makes them potentially dangerous.
Frans de Waal
The role of inequity in society is grossly underestimated. Inequity is not good for your health, basically.
Frans de Waal
We would much rather blame nature for what we don't like in ourselves than credit it for what we do like.
Frans de Waal
Popular culture bombards us with examples of animals being humanized for all sorts of purposes, ranging from education to entertainment to satire to propaganda. Walt Disney, for example, made us forget that Mickey is a mouse, and Donald a duck. George Orwell laid a cover of human societal ills over a population of livestock.
Frans de Waal
I call the notion that we are nothing but killer apes the Beethoven fallacy. Beethoven was disorganized and messy, and yet his music is the epitome of order.
Frans de Waal
Morality, after all, has nothing to do with selflessness. On the contrary, self-interest is precisely the basis of the categorical imperative.
Frans de Waal
Future benefits rarely figure in the minds of animals.
Frans de Waal
