An orangutan builds a hammock.
January 4, 2016 4:21 PM   Subscribe

 
The Adjustening!
posted by bird internet at 4:30 PM on January 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


planet of the apes is quickly becoming a prophesy rather than just stories.
posted by numaner at 4:32 PM on January 4, 2016


This orangutan has just surpassed the skill set required to be a Canadian senator in that it also actually made the hammock.
posted by jimmythefish at 4:34 PM on January 4, 2016 [10 favorites]


Poor thing, held in such terrible conditions. Not just the physical, but from the looks of it, the one thing they have given a tremendously intelligent animal to play with is a scrap of rag.
posted by tavella at 4:35 PM on January 4, 2016 [16 favorites]


I had no idea that orangutans could tie knots, let alone test out the positioning of a hammock and readjust it to their liking.

I wish the cage it was held in wasn't so noisy. If it's always like that, it must be just torture to be there all the time.

I do hope that's just its "bad weather space" or something. Because that is one of the most remarkable things I've ever seen any animal do.
posted by hippybear at 4:40 PM on January 4, 2016 [11 favorites]


That was basically me on the overnight Greyhound from Toronto to NYC.
posted by bonobothegreat at 4:46 PM on January 4, 2016 [12 favorites]


Bonobos can tie knots too? I'm learning a lot today.
posted by hippybear at 4:53 PM on January 4, 2016 [4 favorites]


if that orangutan had to share the hammock with his or her SO, you know the SO would have been all, "No it's fine. Do you really have to restring it okay you're doing it. Now you would be fine if you would stop wiggling around. No, I don't want to hear what Wanda did in the break room today. Go to sleep."
posted by angrycat at 4:54 PM on January 4, 2016 [4 favorites]


I, for one, welcome our long-limbed ginger overlords.
posted by blurker at 4:58 PM on January 4, 2016


jesus wept
posted by the bricabrac man at 5:03 PM on January 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


Obligatory, "Just don't read the comments..."
posted by Chuffy at 5:07 PM on January 4, 2016


I get the impression that it was pretty good to be an orangutan before humans came along.
posted by InsertNiftyNameHere at 5:10 PM on January 4, 2016 [8 favorites]


Too bad it couldn't teach those stupid humans to shoot in landscape mode.
posted by PareidoliaticBoy at 5:19 PM on January 4, 2016 [13 favorites]


Interestingly, this orangutan is polling significantly higher than Jeb Bush in Iowa.
posted by 4ster at 5:22 PM on January 4, 2016 [5 favorites]


I always called them "granny knots."

My kids call them "monkey knots."

They may be onto something.
posted by bricksNmortar at 5:23 PM on January 4, 2016


Could your grandmother make a hammock?
posted by justsomebodythatyouusedtoknow at 5:24 PM on January 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


The Chillularity!
posted by CynicalKnight at 5:53 PM on January 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


I do hope that's just its "bad weather space" or something. Because that is one of the most remarkable things I've ever seen any animal do.

Here is a crow making a tool.

(Less impressively, here is a squirrel trying to hide a nut in a dog.)
posted by mhoye at 6:05 PM on January 4, 2016 [9 favorites]


Get that Orang a tall glass of lemonade!



and out of that horrible cage....
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 6:05 PM on January 4, 2016 [3 favorites]


Man, my dog has fifty times more toys than that orangutan and he does nothing more intellectual than throw and pounce them.

Poor orangutan. How can we send him toys?
posted by winna at 6:17 PM on January 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


An orangutan builds a hammock in orangutan jail, apparently.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 6:31 PM on January 4, 2016 [3 favorites]


Too bad it couldn't teach those stupid humans to shoot in landscape mode

After watching this video. How can you be so sure it's a human behind the camera?
posted by [insert clever name here] at 6:37 PM on January 4, 2016 [3 favorites]


also I would like hand-feet please. geneticists get on that.
posted by [insert clever name here] at 6:38 PM on January 4, 2016 [6 favorites]


In the next episode of Oz-rangutan, the gang leaders of the Primate Brotherhood and the Bonobo Guerrilla Family try to peacefully settle their dispute before the threatened riot over monkey chow erupts.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:47 PM on January 4, 2016 [1 favorite]


Oook*



* sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
posted by JohnFromGR at 6:48 PM on January 4, 2016 [7 favorites]


Well said, that ape!
posted by monotreme at 6:52 PM on January 4, 2016 [3 favorites]


Nest making is a really important behavior for orangutans (and other great apes) - as horrible as this enclosure is, I'm glad that she can make herself a nest (and it is pretty horrible. I haven't been able to bring myself to watch it in its entirety. My guess is that it's a nighttime enclosure, but even still. It is rough).

I just discovered recently that the Orangutan Foundation gives out "The Sir Terry Pratchett Oook Award for the Conservation of Orangutans and Their Habitat," and that seemed so wonderfully fitting it made me cry.

And, finally, to repeat myself from the last orangutan thread, orangutans are in the middle of a truly desperate conservation situation. They are at significant risk due to habitat loss as Indonesian forests are converted to palm oil plantations. This, coupled with the recent really devastating fires in Indonesia, plus general hunting, hardwood logging, the pet trade, and so forth, means that orangutans are at serious risk of extinction (pdf, 4.2 mb).
posted by ChuraChura at 7:05 PM on January 4, 2016 [26 favorites]


I wish the cage it was held in wasn't so noisy. If it's always like that, it must be just torture to be there all the time.

I think this every time I visit the primate building in Lincoln Park Zoo. I always walk out wondering if the position on the evolutionary tree of life is correct because the people looking at the gorillas are such monstrously loud and belligerent jerks while the gorillas are just serenely scratching their itches, sleeping or slowly eating something.
posted by srboisvert at 7:05 PM on January 4, 2016


This orangutan has just surpassed the skill set required to be a Canadian senator in that it also actually made the hammock.

The orangutan declared a second hammock as her primary residence.
posted by sebastienbailard at 7:10 PM on January 4, 2016 [6 favorites]


Well, I am permanently astounded. I knew apes were dexterous, but...tying knots? With this particular intention? I'm assuming this creature must have seen hammocks before, and perhaps is aping (sorry) the process as s/he has seen it...if not I would be more than astounded; I would be fucking gobsmacked.
posted by kozad at 7:11 PM on January 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


I am wondering if this was a trained behavior or a self-learnt/emergent behavior. I have some suspicion, the orangutan has been trained to do this "trick".

If it was a self learnt behavior, it shows an astounding leap of capabilities in terms of recognizing the purpose of knots, getting the ability to build a knot, recognizing a rag as a nesting tool and then combining everything together. I doubt many human kids would have ability to self learn this.
posted by TheLittlePrince at 7:32 PM on January 4, 2016 [2 favorites]


It is most likely a trick taught to the Orangutan. She is called Nemo and is part of a Zoo in Korat in Nakhon Ratchasima, thailand.

There is another video where she is shown riding a bicycle.

Thailand zoos have a tradition of training Orangutans for sports/entertainment purposes.
posted by TheLittlePrince at 8:00 PM on January 4, 2016 [4 favorites]


When dealing with higher primates, I don't think there's all that much light between a trick and a skill. Most of us humans don't have any innate ability to make beautiful stone tools. It's a skill passed down.

As a species, we have generally very high cognitive capabilities but as individuals, we're lacking in lots of areas. Take visual arts for example; plenty of highly intelligent university graduates can't draw a representative image with any more skill or understanding than a six year old.
posted by bonobothegreat at 8:18 PM on January 4, 2016 [10 favorites]


I and most other humans I know had to be taught to tie our shoes. Skill or trick?
posted by Daily Alice at 8:23 PM on January 4, 2016 [4 favorites]


I have seen a young gorilla at the Woodland Park Zoo get a piece of fabric and spread it out very deliberately on the ground, smoothing it with her hands, and reaching out with thumb and forefinger to flick down one corner that had been folded over, exactly the way a human would have done. And I've seen weaver birds at another zoo tying knots in grass fibers as they make their nests. The idea that an orangutan (a species known for being very clever with tools) could tie a knot in a piece of cloth, without having to be trained by a human, is completely believable to me. Very intelligent brain, left with nothing to entertain itself except a scrap of cloth, you bet she's going to manipulate that cloth in every single permutation she can-- and a knot is going to be one of those.
posted by The otter lady at 9:04 PM on January 4, 2016


Argh, they promised they weren't going to post this. That's no orangutang. This is actually a video of me after a shift at work getting ready to take a nap.

Ok, maybe I am an orangutang.
posted by loquacious at 5:27 AM on January 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


I saw it described (probably on QI, but I won't swear to that) thus:

A chimpanzee would take your camera off you and smash it on a rock.
A gorilla would take your camera off you and take it apart meticulously.
An orang utan would take your camera, take it apart, put it back together and take your picture with it.
posted by The Ultimate Olympian at 6:17 AM on January 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


As [humans...] we're lacking in lots of areas.
posted by bonobothegreat

I find myself developing certain suspicions here.....
posted by suddenly, and without warning, at 7:20 AM on January 5, 2016 [2 favorites]


Heidegger had a very low opinion of the cognitive capacities of animals (he had many obnoxious views about the world). So he would have objected to the idea that this orangutan has access to technology. But let's put this video in H's terms of how technology works: the hammock is indebted to the cloth sack for its existence, and it is indebted to the aspect [eidos] of hammockness. Without the latter, the sack could have been turned into a rope, for example. Then the orangutan could have hanged itself to escape from its inhumane confinement in a barred cage and constant surveillance by yahoos such as ourselves.
posted by laterreason at 9:14 AM on January 5, 2016


While I admire that knot, I don't like it one bit.

At least prehensile feet makes for a decent insurance policy.
posted by maniabug at 9:50 AM on January 5, 2016 [1 favorite]


I find it absolutely bizarre that so many people find this astonishing. Orangutans are known to be highly intelligent, like all apes. They live in trees, relaxing. Why is this so shocking? Shows how people discount animal intelligence from the get.
posted by agregoli at 10:01 AM on January 5, 2016


Orangutans are intelligent .... I dont doubt that. But lets not use this case as a support for the argument.

Using this "cute" video to proclaim intelligence is an attempt to enable us to connect with the animal. We connect better when we feel that the animal is showing some form of intelligence.

But, in this attempt, we forget that the animal is, most probably, being harassed to learn and perform these tricks and is not allowed to use its intelligence the way that it wants/needs to.
posted by TheLittlePrince at 9:02 AM on January 6, 2016


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