Frans de Waal On The Moral Behaviour Of Animals

Empathy, cooperation, fairness and reciprocity: caring about the well-being of others seems like a very human trait. Frans de Waal has studied primate behavour for many years and has found some surprising data from behavioral tests, on primates and other mammals.  Many animals demonstrate many of these moral traits all of us share.

Dr. de Waal received his Ph.D. in Biology and Zoology from Utrecht University, the Netherlands, in 1977. He completed his postdoctoral study of chimpanzees while associated with Utrecht University, in 1981, and moved the same year to the USA. He has been a National Academy of Sciences member since 2004, and a Royal Dutch Academy of Sciences member since 1993. Time featured him in 2007 as one of the World's One Hunderd Most Influential People. He is currently the Director of Living Links at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center.

In 2007, he was selected by Time as one of The Worlds’ 100 Most Influential People Today, and in 2011 by Discover as among 47 (all time) Great Minds of Science.

de Waal is the author of a number of books on primates and their behaviour including, Bonobo: The Forgotten Ape, Chimpanzee Politics: Power and Sex among Apes and The Age of Empathy: Nature's Lessons for a Kinder Society.

The ideas of de Waal's  book, Chimpanzee Politics in particular have been influential in right-wing parties in the U.S. and Canada.  For instance the work of de Waal has been prominent in Professor Tom Flanagan's bio-politics teachings.  The political scientist was active in bringing Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper to power in Canada and is now working on what will probably be a epochal change in the provincial political map in the Canadian province of Alberta via the Wildrose Party.  Flanagan is currently the campaign manager for the party. 

In the embedded TEDTalk below, de Waal studies primate social behaviour and how they fight and reconcile, share and cooperate.

TED.com


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