• Skip to main content
  • Skip to header right navigation
  • Skip to site footer
  • WordPress
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • LinkedIn
  • YouTube
Science Update

Science Update

Sharing Science | Satisfying Curiosity | Debunking BS

  • Spotlights
  • Reality Check
  • Why Is It?
  • Radio Archives
  • Sciup @ School
Home » Radio Archive » Daily Show » Monkey Archaeology

Monkey Archaeology

July 12, 2016
https://podcast.scienceupdate.com/160712_sciup_tool.mp3

Podcast: Play in new window

800px-Macaco-prego_Sapajus_libidinosus_2012_28066 Tiago Falótico CC BY SA 3.0 via wWikipedia
A Brazilian bearded capuchin monkey, Sapajus_libidinosus. (Tiago Falótico/CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikipedia)

BOB HIRSHON (host):

Monkey archaeology. I’m Bob Hirshon and this is Science Update.

Brazilian capuchin monkeys crack open cashew nuts by placing them on a large flat stone and pounding them with a smaller, harder stone. University of Oxford researcher Michael Haslam explains that the monkeys select the best stones for the task and leave them at what he calls “cashew processing sites”.

MICHAEL HASLAM (University of Oxford):

In the same way that we can find tools lying around, they can find the tools lying around cashew trees. Others are bringing them there; leaving them there. It becomes like a set of cutlery at a restaurant: it’s just sitting there for you.

HIRSHON:

Now, In the journal Current Biology, he and his colleagues report excavating near these sites and finding centuries-old stones underground that bore the unmistakable signs of nut processing. That suggests capuchins have been using tools for at least 700 years. The scientists are trying to understand how tool use develops and gets passed down through generations. I’m Bob Hirshon, for AAAS, the science society.

LEARN MORE

Story by Bob Hirshon

Category: Daily Show, Station DownloadTag: Animal Behavior, Anthropology, Archaeology
Previous Post:Sleeping Penguins
Next Post:Microalgae Digest Themselves

Sidebar

Radio Program Archives

Want to learn more about the brain? The environment? Here you can browse the topics that come up regularly on Science Update.

Search the Archives

Categories

  • Daily Show
  • Station Download
  • Weekly Show

Find By Tag

  • 2020
  • Acoustics & Sound
  • Aging
  • Animal Behavior
  • Anthropology
  • Archaeology
  • Astronomy & Space
  • Biology
  • Brain Science
  • Bugs
  • Chemistry
  • Children & Families
  • cicadas
  • Climate & Weather
  • Communications
  • Computer Science
  • Economics & Business
  • Education
  • Energy
  • Engineering & Technology
  • Environment & Conservation
  • Genetics & Evolution
  • Geology
  • Marine Science
  • Materials Science
  • Mathematics
  • Medicine & Health
  • Microbiology
  • Nanotechnology
  • Nutrition & Food Science
  • Paleontology & Dinosaurs
  • Physics
  • Plants & Agriculture
  • Political Science
  • Reality Check
  • Social & Behavioral Sciences
  • Sports & Fitness
  • spotlight
  • Spotlight Bugs
  • Terrorism & War
  • Why Is It? Questions
  • Wildlife
  • Year in Review

Find By Date

Science Update
  • About Science Update
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of Use

Follow Us

  • Facebook
  • YouTube

Recent Posts

Mayan Honeybee hives
House sparrow wearing top hat rides aboard a red fireworks rocket

Copyright © 2023 · Springtail Media LLC · All Rights Reserved · Powered by Pongos