# Monkeys
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [August 15, 2010, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308 "2010-08-15T05:22:49Z")
**Posts on this page:** 16
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)
#### Post date: [August 17, 2010, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/21 "2010-08-17T22:46:57Z")
**Little Nemo** said:
> [@](#):
>
> So the criticial point is whether monkeys who were never sprayed would join in on beating up monkeys who are attempting to climb the stairs. These unsprayed monkeys have no reason to associate any unpleasant experience with another monkey climbing the stairs. The issue seems to be whether monkeys will beat up on another monkey just because the crowd is doing it or do they need a personal incentive for joining in.
So you are the new monkey who never experienced water spraying, you see a banana and think, “Time for a tasty snack”. _BAM_, the rest of the monkeys start beating you up. Okay, you’re slow, you get over it and try again. _BAM_ “Clearly I’m not getting this banana.” _Huff_
Now along comes the next new monkey. Your thought: “Hey, if I can’t have that banana, I’m damned sure not going to let _you_ get it.” _BAM_
It’s not just that the crowd is doing it, it’s a personal incentive as well.
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### Author:  [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)
#### Post date: [August 17, 2010, 11:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/22 "2010-08-17T23:39:42Z")
What if the monkey was never beaten up itself but only saw other monkeys doing the beating?
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### Author:  [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2010, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/23 "2010-08-18T22:18:46Z")
So why did that monkey not try to get the banana? Did it decide that watching another monkey get beat up was enough for it to not want to get beat up?
Aren’t we beginning to speculate a little far? Isn’t that like asking “What if the monkey was given a suit of armor? Would it then succeed in getting the banana?”
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### Author:  [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)
#### Post date: [August 18, 2010, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/24 "2010-08-18T23:19:33Z")
> [@Irishman](#):
>
> **Little Nemo** said:
>
> > [@](#):
> >
> > So the criticial point is whether monkeys who were never sprayed would join in on beating up monkeys who are attempting to climb the stairs. These unsprayed monkeys have no reason to associate any unpleasant experience with another monkey climbing the stairs. The issue seems to be whether monkeys will beat up on another monkey just because the crowd is doing it or do they need a personal incentive for joining in.
>
> So you are the new monkey who never experienced water spraying, you see a banana and think, “Time for a tasty snack”. _BAM_, the rest of the monkeys start beating you up. Okay, you’re slow, you get over it and try again. _BAM_ “Clearly I’m not getting this banana.” _Huff_
>
> Now along comes the next new monkey. Your thought: “Hey, if I can’t have that banana, I’m damned sure not going to let _you_ get it.” _BAM_
>
> It’s not just that the crowd is doing it, it’s a personal incentive as well.
I don’t think preventing somebody else from obtaining something I can’t obtain counts as an incentive.
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### Author:  [@griffin1977](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/griffin1977)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2010, 12:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/25 "2010-08-19T00:20:16Z")
Is seems the main cognitive leap needed for the monkeys to act that way is to go from “thing X happening means thing Y is about to happen” (which plenty of animals alot dumber than monkeys can do), to “I must proactively intervene to stop thing X happening so that thing Y won’t happen”. I have never heard of on any animal being smart enough to do that, but I’ve never spent much time around monkeys.
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### Author:  [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2010, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/26 "2010-08-19T00:58:01Z")
Once again, nothing like this experiment ever happened, it appears. Speculating about why a monkey would act like the ones did in this supposed experiment is useless. We have no reason to think that monkeys act this way.
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### Author:  [@Cheshire\_Human](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cheshire_Human)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2010, 1:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/27 "2010-08-19T01:16:50Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#):
>
> > [@Irishman](#):
> >
> > It’s not just that the crowd is doing it, it’s a personal incentive as well.
>
> I don’t think preventing somebody else from obtaining something I can’t obtain counts as an incentive.
It does for monkeys. Just go to the zoo and watch them for a while. They’re mean, selfish little shits! 😃
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### Author:  [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2010, 1:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/28 "2010-08-19T01:22:29Z")
> [@Cheshire\_Human](#):
>
> > [@Little\_Nemo](#):
> >
> > I don’t think preventing somebody else from obtaining something I can’t obtain counts as an incentive.
>
> It does for monkeys. Just go to the zoo and watch them for a while. They’re mean, selfish little shits! 😃
Animals rarely fight unless they have a reason. Any fight, even one where a gang is attacking an individual, carries some risk of injury. And all fights consume energy. An animal won’t fight unless it feels it’s gaining something from it.
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### Author:  [@Freudian\_Slit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Freudian_Slit)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2010, 1:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/29 "2010-08-19T01:30:52Z")
Is this thread making anyone else really hungry?
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2010, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/30 "2010-08-19T01:59:37Z")
This sounds a lot like the bucket of crabs story. You can keep a bunch of crabs in a bucket without a lid, and none will escape. Every time one of the crabs manages to get a claw on the rim of the bucket to pull himself up, the other crabs will latch onto him, trying to escape themselves, and pull him down. I don’t know if that actually happens, but it isn’t a learned response.
The behavior described for the monkeys makes no sense. First the monkeys attempt to stop an innocent from climbing the stairs out of empathy. Then they turn to beating him up, why? Out of empathy? Then, if the monkeys can reason well enough to understand that going up the stairs is harmful, why are they so stupid that they’ll beat up another monkey for no known reason? Then of course, the most ludicrous part of the story, the monkeys are in a cage. Why would they use the stairs at all? As soon as you hang the banana from a string they’ll scamper up the cage and grab the string.
So you might say the cage was electrified, in that case after the water spraying the monkeys that aren;t electrocuted will probably just cower on the ground and be scared of the new monkeys put in the cage.
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### Author:  [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2010, 8:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/31 "2010-08-19T20:27:44Z")
**Little Nemo** said:
> [@](#):
>
> I don’t think preventing somebody else from obtaining something I can’t obtain counts as an incentive.
Selfishness isn’t an incentive?
**TriPolar** said:
> [@](#):
>
> The behavior described for the monkeys makes no sense. First the monkeys attempt to stop an innocent from climbing the stairs out of empathy. Then they turn to beating him up, why? Out of empathy? Then, if the monkeys can reason well enough to understand that going up the stairs is harmful, why are they so stupid that they’ll beat up another monkey for no known reason? Then of course, the most ludicrous part of the story, the monkeys are in a cage. Why would they use the stairs at all? As soon as you hang the banana from a string they’ll scamper up the cage and grab the string.
Who said their motive was empathy? The motive was at first self-preservation, later selfishness. Who proposed empathy?
Second, you misunderstand. They aren’t trying to protect the other monkey who is climbing the stairs, they are trying to protect themselves from getting hosed down.
Also, just because it is a “cage” doesn’t mean it is made of metal bars. Maybe it’s a sealed concrete room with plexiglas windows.
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### Author:  [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2010, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/32 "2010-08-19T22:59:46Z")
> [@Irishman](#):
>
> **Little Nemo** said:
>
> > [@](#):
> >
> > I don’t think preventing somebody else from obtaining something I can’t obtain counts as an incentive.
>
> Selfishness isn’t an incentive?
Selfishness would be if you were getting the banana for yourself. But that’s not what’s happening here.
How does Monkey #1 benefit from preventing Monkey #2 from getting a banana (when Monkey #1 already knows he can’t get the banana himself)?
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### Author:  [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)
#### Post date: [August 19, 2010, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/33 "2010-08-19T23:14:43Z")
> [@Irishman](#):
>
> Who said their motive was empathy? The motive was at first self-preservation, later selfishness. Who proposed empathy?
>
> Second, you misunderstand. They aren’t trying to protect the other monkey who is climbing the stairs, they are trying to protect themselves from getting hosed down.
>
> Also, just because it is a “cage” doesn’t mean it is made of metal bars. Maybe it’s a sealed concrete room with plexiglas windows.
You are right, I misread the story, but the point is the same, they are supposed to be intelligent enough to detect the cause and effect, but then stupid enough to continue the behavior without it. The story doesn’t imply enough repitition to create a conditioned response. There are only 5 monkeys altogether, one new-comer, one who saw this happen 4 times, one who saw it 3 times… Doesn’t sound like real behavior to me.
Yes, it could be a smooth walled room, typically called a ‘room’, not a ‘cage’.
My general point is this does not sound like an actual experiment. It sounds like a story made up to elicit an emotional response from people, and distract them from using reason when considering the political comment that followed. The particulars of the political comment are irrelevant, as the OP stated, but any political comment preceded by a story about animal behavior, IMHO puts the story in the category of fiction, and the comment in the category of lies.
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### Author:  [@Karen\_Lingel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Karen_Lingel)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/34 "2010-08-20T02:13:22Z")
I would make a terrible monkey. If I were in the experiment, I would come to the conclusion that the stairs are the only place safe from cold water. When one of my fellow monkeys started for the stairs, I would make sure I hit the stairs the same exact time.
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### Author:  [@Shmendrik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shmendrik)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/35 "2010-08-20T03:04:36Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#):
>
> Is this thread making anyone else really hungry?
Yup. I could go for some monkey right about now.
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### Author:  [@Just\_Ed](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Ed)
#### Post date: [August 20, 2010, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/monkeys/550308/36 "2010-08-20T03:08:58Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Start with a cage containing five monkeys. Inside the cage, hang a banana on a string and place a set of stairs under it. Before long, a monkey will go to the stairs and start to climb towards the banana.
>
> As soon as he touches the stairs, spray all the other monkeys with cold water.
Wait right there. OK - does this first monkey get the banana or not? 'Cause it sounds like he does - all the _other_ monkeys get the water spray. So you’ve got a cage of four wet, pissed off monkeys and one very dry, sated, presumably amused monkey at the top of the stairs. So I guess he eventually goes back down the stairs and you replace your banana-bait? Then what?
> [@](#):
>
> After a while another monkey makes the attempt with same result, all the other monkeys are sprayed with cold water.
All right then, this is _another_ monkey, presumably one of the wet, pissed off, hungry ones. So now your dry, sated, amused monkey is part of the crowd that gets doused, along with three other now _really_ wet, super-pissed monkeys. Oh, and a semi-dry, now-sated, and presumably suitably amused monkey at the top of the stairs. OK. Then?
> [@](#):
>
> Pretty soon when another monkey tries to climb the stairs, the other monkeys will try to prevent it.
Er . . . why? At this point you’ve got three soggy angry primates, and two semi-dry sated primates. Seems to me if the soggy angry ones have any sense they’ll be fighting over who gets to the next banana first, if anything.
So . . . yeah. I don’t get it at all. But then, that’s just because these “learning moment” fables aren’t at all the way things have always been done around here . . .
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