Our Inner Ape, a book recommendation

[Mita Moni]

This book is entertaining, enlightening, and has given me hope that we will work things out here on planet earth. The author, Frans de Waal, is a Dutch primatologist who now lives in the USA working at a primate center in Atlanta Georgia. In this book he talks about power, violence, kindness as it occurs mostly in chimpanzees and bonobos, but also refers to other monkey and ape species, including humans. His descriptions of ape behavior are amazingly like what I see humans doing. His point of view is optimistic, that the great apes closest to us are all very social animals, that both enjoy and depend upon eachother, who live mostly in peace, and we can too.

After reading this book I feel more hopeful. It seems to be written for the intelligent general reader, not for other scientists in his field. I checked it out from the library.

Barrie