Frans de Waal famous quotes

The possibility that empathy resides in parts of the brain so ancient that we share them with rats should give pause to anyone comparing politicians with those poor, underestimated creatures.
-- Frans de Waal

#Giving #Empathy #Brain

The hamadryas baboon is a harem holder where one male mates with multiple females.
-- Frans de Waal

#Males #Female #Baboons

We start out postulating sharp boundaries, such as between humans and apes, or between apes and monkeys, but are in fact dealing with sand castles that lose much of their structure when the sea of knowledge washes over them. They turn into hills, leveled ever more, until we are back to where evolutionary theory always leads us: a gently sloping beach.
-- Frans de Waal

#Beach #Sea #Castles

If you want to design a successful human society, you need to know what kind of animal we are. Are we a social animal or a selfish animal? Do we respond better when we're solitary or living in a group?
-- Frans de Waal

#Selfish #Successful #Animal

To endow animals with human emotions has long been a scientific taboo. But if we do not, we risk missing something fundamental, about both animals and us.
-- Frans de Waal

#Animal #Long #Missing

You should know as much as you can about the human species if you have a hand in designing human society. I'm not saying that you can derive moral rules from nature - that's deriving an ought from an is, as the philosophers say - but you do need to know what kind of animals we are if you want to design a stable society.
-- Frans de Waal

#Animal #Hands #Design

The enemy of science is not religion... . The true enemy is the substitution of thought, reflection, and curiosity with dogma.
-- Frans de Waal

#Reflection #Curiosity #Enemy

If you are a cooperative animal, you need to watch what you get. If you, or even a whole community, invest in something but then a few individuals receive a much larger return, it's not a good arrangement. If it happens consistently, it's time to look for an arrangement that is more beneficial. That's why we're so sensitive to how rewards are being divided.
-- Frans de Waal

#Animal #Community #Watches

If we look straight and deep into a chimpanzee's eyes, an intelligent self-assured personality looks back at us. If they are animals, what must we be?
-- Frans de Waal

#Eye #Animal #Intelligent

We justify the inequalities by saying some people are just better and smarter than others and the strong should survive and the poor can die off.
-- Frans de Waal

#Strong #People #Poor

I sometimes try to imagine what would have happened if we’d known the bonobo first and the chimpanzee only later—or not at all. The discussion about human evolution might not revolve as much around violence, warfare and male dominance, but rather around sexuality, empathy, caring and cooperation. What a different intellectual landscape we would occupy!
-- Frans de Waal

#Caring #Empathy #Intellectual

If both parties have a stake in the other, the chances of them killing each other are going to be reduced.
-- Frans de Waal

#Party #Chance #Killing

Perhaps it's just me, but I am wary of any persons whose belief system is the only thing standing between them and repulsive behavior.
-- Frans de Waal

#Belief #Behavior #Persons

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

#Party #Two #Study

Humanity is actually much more cooperative and empathic than [it's] given credit for.
-- Frans de Waal

#Humanity #Credit #Given

As far as the environment is concerned, I am becoming pessimistic because I do not see anybody stepping up and taking the long view approach. It seems like we're stuck in a tragedy of the commons where everyone is trying to contribute as little as possible to get out of this situation.
-- Frans de Waal

#Views #Long #Tragedy

Although elephants are far more distantly related to us than the great apes, they seem to have evolved similar social and cognitive capacities.
-- Frans de Waal

#Elephants #Apes #Social

Empathy as a complex emotion is different. It requires awareness of the other person's feelings and of one's own reactions. The appropriate reaction may not be to cry when another person cries, but to reassure them, or even to leave them alone.
-- Frans de Waal

#Empathy #Feelings #Different

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

#Animal #People #Exotic

If I were God, I'd work on the reach of empathy.
-- Frans de Waal

#Compassion #Empathy

Unlike the primate hand, the elephant's grasping organ is also its nose. Elephants use their trunks not only to reach food but also to sniff and touch it. With their unparalleled sense of smell, the animals know exactly what they are going for. Vision is secondary.
-- Frans de Waal

#Animal #Hands #Elephants

After World War II it was decided that, in order to prevent the Germans and the French from having another war, it would be better to tie them together into one economic pact so they would invest in each other and have mutual stakes. Until now, that has worked to prevent warfare between the two.
-- Frans de Waal

#War #Order #Two

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

#Mean #Animal #Cities

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

#Animal #Ducks #Entertainment

It is well known that apes in the wild offer spontaneous assistance to each other, defending against leopards, say, or consoling distressed companions with tender embraces.
-- Frans de Waal

#Leopards #Apes #Spontaneous

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

#Children #Unconditional Love #Animal

As in a Russian doll, however, the outer layers always contain an inner core. Instead of evolution having replaced simpler forms of empathy with more advanced ones, the latter are merely elaborations on the former and remain dependent on them. This also means that empathy comes naturally to us. It is not something we only learn later in life, or that is culturally constructed.
-- Frans de Waal

#Mean #Empathy #Dolls

You need to indoctrinate empathy out of people in order to arrive at extreme capitalist positions.
-- Frans de Waal

#Order #People #Empathy

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

#Credit #Blame

Religions have a strong binding function and a cohesive element. They emphasize the primacy of the community as opposed to the individual, and they also help set one community apart from another that doesn't share their beliefs.
-- Frans de Waal

#Strong #Community #Atheism

The thinking is that we started evolving language not by speaking but by gesturing.
-- Frans de Waal

#Thinking #Language #Evolve

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

#Primates

I've argued that many of what philosophers call moral sentiments can be seen in other species. In chimpanzees and other animals, you see examples of sympathy, empathy, reciprocity, a willingness to follow social rules. Dogs are a good example of a species that have and obey social rules; that's why we like them so much, even though they're large carnivores.
-- Frans de Waal

#Dog #Animal #Empathy

I have often noticed how primate groups in their entirety enter a similar mood. All of a sudden, all of them are playful, hopping around. Or all of them are grumpy. Or all of them are sleepy and settle down. In such cases, the mood contagion serves the function of synchronizing activities.
-- Frans de Waal

#Groups #Sleepy #Mood

Why not assume that our humanity, including the self-control needed for livable societies, is built into us? Does anyone truly believe that our ancestors lacked social norms before they had religion? Did they never assist others in need, or complain about an unfair deal? Humans must have worried about the functioning of their communities well before the current religions arose, which is only a few thousand years ago.
-- Frans de Waal

#Believe #Self #Years

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

#Peaceful #Bipolar #Selfishness

If you look at national economies today, for example, the American economy, the European economy, the Indians, the Chinese, we're all tied together. If one of them sinks, the rest are going to sink with them and if one floats, the rest are lifted up. I find that very interesting.
-- Frans de Waal

#Interesting #Chinese #Together

I was raised Catholic. Not just a little bit Catholic, like my wife, Catherine. When she was young, many Catholics in France already barely went to church, except for the big three: baptism, marriage, and funeral. And only the middle one was by choice.
-- Frans de Waal

#Wife #Choices #Funeral

Male bonobos really don't fit the human male ideal.
-- Frans de Waal

#Males #Fit #Bonobos

I'm personally a nonbeliever, so I'm struggling with if we really need religion.
-- Frans de Waal

#Struggle #Needs

There is little evidence that other animals judge the appropriateness of actions that do not directly affect themselves.
-- Frans de Waal

#Animal #Judging #Littles

I think we need to start thinking about grounding our moral systems in our biology.
-- Frans de Waal

#Thinking #Needs #Moral

Chimpanzees, typically, kiss and embrace after fights. They first make eye contact from a distance to see the mood of the others. Then they approach and kiss and embrace.
-- Frans de Waal

#Distance #Eye #Fighting

Humans have a lot of pro-social tendencies.
-- Frans de Waal

#Social #Tendencies #Humans

Future benefits rarely figure in the minds of animals.
-- Frans de Waal

#Animal #Mind #Benefits

Female bonobos form a strong sisterhood. They rule through female solidarity.
-- Frans de Waal

#Strong #Sisterhood #Female

Exclusive homosexuality is not very common in nature.
-- Frans de Waal

#Common #Homosexuality

Dogmatists have one advantage: they are poor listeners.
-- Frans de Waal

#Poor #Advantage

A chimpanzee who is really gearing up for a fight doesn't waste time with gestures but just goes ahead and attacks.
-- Frans de Waal

#Fighting #Gestures #Waste

Male chimpanzees have an extraordinarily strong drive for dominance. They're constantly jockeying for position.
-- Frans de Waal

#Strong #Males #Dominance

People want to work with somebody who feels shame, who worries about the perceptions of others. Dishonesty is something we don't like in others.
-- Frans de Waal

#People #Worry #Perception

Human morality is unthinkable without empathy.
-- Frans de Waal

#Empathy #Morality #Unthinkable

I am personally not against keeping animals at zoos, as they serve a huge educational purpose, but treating them well and with respect seems the least we could do, and with 'we' I mean not just zoo staff, but most certainly also the public.
-- Frans de Waal

#Zoos #Educational #Mean

Darwin wasn't just provocative in saying that we descend from the apes - he didn't go far enough. We are apes in every way, from our long arms and tailless bodies to our habits and temperament.
-- Frans de Waal

#Long #Body #Arms

Empathy probably started out as a mechanism to improve maternal care. Mammalian mothers who were attentive to their young's needs were more likely to rear successful offspring.
-- Frans de Waal

#Mother #Successful #Empathy

Bonobo studies started in the '70s and came to fruition in the '80s. Then in the '90s, all of a sudden, boom, they ended because of the warfare in the Congo. It was really bad for the bonobo and ironic that people with their warfare were preventing us from studying the hippies of the primate world.
-- Frans de Waal

#Hippie #People #Ironic

The sturdiest pillars of human morality are compassion and a sense of justice.
-- Frans de Waal

#Compassion #Justice #Pillars

The role of inequity in society is grossly underestimated. Inequity is not good for your health, basically.
-- Frans de Waal

#Roles #Underestimated

The primate laugh is given in playful contexts, and as such has a strong similarity to the human laugh.
-- Frans de Waal

#Strong #Laughing #Primates

The more self-aware an animal is, the more empathetic it tends to be.
-- Frans de Waal

#Animal #Self #Empathetic

Science is not inherently good.
-- 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

#May #Morality

Personally, I think it is possible to build a society that is moral on a nonreligious basis, but the jury is still out on that.
-- Frans de Waal

#Thinking #Moral #Bases

It is hard to get animals which normally pay little attention to each other to do things together. One can teach dolphins to jump simultaneously out of the water precisely because they show similar behavior spontaneously, but try to make two domestic cats jump together and you will fail.
-- Frans de Waal

#Cat #Animal #Two

The original form is the contagion of fear and alarm. You're in a flock of birds. One bird suddenly takes off. You have no time to wait and see what's going on. You take off, too. Otherwise, you're lunch.
-- Frans de Waal

#Lunch #Bird #Waiting

You should know as much as you can about the human species if you have a hand in designing human society.
-- Frans de Waal

#Hands #Design #Should

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

#Support #Allies #Males

War is evitable if conditions are such that the costs of making war are higher than the benefits.
-- Frans de Waal

#War #Cost #Benefits

Contrary to general belief, humans imitate apes more than the reverse. The sight of monkeys or apes induces an irresistible urge in people to jump up and down, exaggeratedly scratch themselves and holler in a way that must make the primates wonder how this otherwise so intelligent species has come to depend on such inferior means of communication.
-- Frans de Waal

#Communication #Mean #Intelligent

It is not only visitors to the zoo who are fascinated but uneasy in the presence of chimpanzees; the same is true of scientists. The more they learn about these great apes, the deeper our identity crisis seems to become. The resemblance between humans and chimpanzees is not only external. If we look straight and deep into a chimpanzee’s eyes, an intelligent, self-assured personality looks back at us. If they are animals, what must we be?
-- Frans de Waal

#Zoos #Eye #Animal

There's actually a lot of evidence in primates and other animals that they return favors.
-- Frans de Waal

#Animal #Favors #Return

If you ask anyone, what is morality based on? These are the two factors that always come out: One is reciprocity, … a sense of fairness, and the other one is empathy and compassion.
-- Frans de Waal

#Compassion #Two #Empathy

Robin Hood had it right.Humanity's deepest wish is to spread the wealth.
-- Frans de Waal

#Humanity #Wish #Robins

Octopuses have hundreds of suckers, each one equipped with its own ganglion with thousands of neurons. These 'mini-brains' are interconnected, making for a widely distributed nervous system. That is why a severed octopus arm may crawl on its own and even pick up food.
-- Frans de Waal

#Octopus #Brain #Neurons

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

#Important #Needs #Apes