Taxacom: systematics bias once again

[Richard Zander]

Right on, John. Also, the study compared human children to adult African apes. Quite possibly, human children are more curious or perhaps more random than human adults, who have been schooled in helping get food (grapes!) for the family and their random-acting children. Sure, there are lots of poor studies out there.

Not to bring up the Schwartz controvery again, but genetics is a poor way to compare our fellows in the larger lineage, as are lousy psychology studies. We are not alone.

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Richard H. Zander
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-----Original Message-----
From: Taxacom <taxacom-bounces at lists.ku.edu> On Behalf Of John Grehan via Taxacom
Sent: Thursday, June 01, 2023 11:52 AM
To: taxacom <taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu>
Subject: Taxacom: systematics bias once again

In a recent press release titled "Temptation to Open Pandora's Box Could Set Us Apart From Other Apes"

it was stated:

Compared to apes, human children are more likely to open a mystery 'box'
over one with known contents, a new study finds. This suggests that one thing that makes us unique as a species might be our innate sense of curiosity.

Children "explored the uncertain options before the alternatives were presented, showing a higher degree of curiosity than the great apes,"
psychologist Alejandro Sánchez-Amaro from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Germany and cognitive scientist Federico Rossano from the University of California San Diego write in their published paper.

Groups of 15 to 29 captive apes – a mix of chimps, gorillas, and bonobos – were tested using opaque and transparent upside-down cups containing juicy grape treats.

There you have the obfuscation. The 'science' result was not about apes, but just African Great Apes. Never mind the orangutan which is in some respects smarter than African apes. All that can be said from the science is that in this experiment, human children are more likely to open a mystery box than African apes.Otherwise there is not much cognition going on, on the part of the researchers at least :)

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