Hominoidea Temporal range: Late Oligocene - Recent
Lar Gibbon (Hylobates lar)
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	Primates
Suborder:	Haplorrhini
Infraorder:	Simiiformes
Parvorder:	Catarrhini
Superfamily:	Hominoidea Gray, 1825
Families
†Pliopithecidae †Proconsulidae Hylobatidae †Oreopithecidae Hominidae

Apes are Old World anthropoid mammals, more specifically a clade of tailless catarrhine primates, belonging to the biological superfamily Hominoidea. The apes are native to Africa and South-east Asia. Apes are the largest primates and the orangutan, an ape, is the largest living arboreal animal. Hominoids are traditionally forest dwellers, although chimpanzees may range into savanna, and the extinct australopithecines are famous for being savanna inhabitants, inferred from their morphology. Humans inhabit almost every terrestrial habitat.

Hominoidea contains two families of living (extant) species:

• Hylobatidae consists of four genera and sixteen species of gibbon, including the lar gibbon and the siamang. They are commonly referred to as lesser apes.
• Hominidae consists of orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos and humans.^[1][2] Alternatively, the hominidae family are collectively described as the great apes.^[3][4][5][6]

Members of the superfamily are called hominoids (not to be confused with "hominids" or "hominins").

Some or all hominoids are also called "apes". However, the term "ape" is used in several different senses. It has been used as a synonym for "monkey" or for any tailless primate with a humanlike appearance.^[7] Thus the Barbary macaque, a kind of monkey, is popularly called the "Barbary ape" to indicate its lack of a tail. Biologists have used the term "ape" to mean a member of the superfamily Hominoidea other than humans,^[3] or more recently to mean all members of the superfamily Hominoidea, so that "ape" becomes another word for "hominoid".^[6][8] See also Primate: Historical and modern terminology.

Except for gorillas and humans, hominoids are agile climbers of trees. Their diet is best described as vegetarian or omnivorous, consisting of leaves, nuts, seeds and fruits, including grass seeds, and in most cases other animals, either hunted or scavenged (or farmed in the case of humans), along with anything else available and easily digested.

Most nonhuman hominoids are rare or endangered. The chief threat to most of the endangered species is loss of tropical rainforest habitat, though some populations are further imperiled by hunting for bushmeat.

Historical and modern terminology[link]

"Ape", from Old English apa, is possibly an onomatopoetic imitation of animal chatter. The term has a history of rather imprecise usage. Its earliest meaning was a tailless (and therefore exceptionally human-like) nonhuman primate.^[7] The original usage of "ape" in English might have referred to the baboon, an Old World monkey.^{[citation needed]} Two tailless species of macaque have common names including "ape": the Barbary ape of North Africa (introduced into Gibraltar), Macaca sylvanus, and the Sulawesi black ape or Celebes crested macaque, M. nigra.

As zoological knowledge developed, it became clear that taillessness occurred in a number of different and otherwise unrelated species. The term "ape" was then used in two different senses, as shown in the 1910 Encyclopædia Britannica entry. Either "ape" was still used for a tailless humanlike primate or it became a synonym for "monkey".^[7]

Sir Wilfrid Le Gros Clark was one of the primatologists who developed the idea that there were "trends" in primate evolution and that the living members of the order could be arranged in a series, leading through "monkeys" and "apes" to humans. Within this tradition, "ape" refers to all the members of the superfamily Hominoidea, except humans.^[3] Thus "apes" are a paraphyletic group, meaning that although all the species of apes descend from a common ancestor, the group does not include all the descendants of that ancestor, because humans are excluded.^[9] The diagram below shows the currently accepted evolutionary relationships of the Hominoidea,^[2] with the apes marked by a bracket.

The "apes" are traditionally divided further into the "lesser apes" and the "great apes":^[10]

In summary, there are three common uses of the term "ape": non-biologists may not distinguish between "monkeys" and "apes", or may use "ape" for any tailless monkey or nonhuman hominoid, whereas biologists traditionally used the term "ape" for all non-human hominoids as shown above.

In recent years biologists have generally preferred to use only monophyletic groups in classifications,^{[citation needed]} that is only groups which include all the descendants of a common ancestor.^[11] The superfamily Hominoidea is one such group (or "clade"). Some then use the term "ape" to mean all the members of the superfamily Hominoidea. For example, in a 2005 book, Benton wrote "The apes, Hominoidea, today include the gibbons and orang-utan ... the gorilla and chimpanzee ... and humans".^[6] The group traditionally called "apes" by biologists is then called the "nonhuman apes".

See the section History of hominoid taxonomy below for a discussion of changes in scientific classification and terminology.

Biology[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

The "lesser apes" are the gibbon family, Hylobatidae with sixteen medium-sized species. Their major differentiating characteristic is their long arms, which they use to brachiate through the trees. As an evolutionary adaptation to this arboreal lifestyle, their wrists are ball and socket joints. The largest of the gibbons, the siamang, weighs up to 14 kg (31 lb). In comparison, the smallest "great ape" is the common chimpanzee at 40 to 65 kg (88 to 143 lb).

The "great apes" were formerly treated as the family Pongidae. As noted above, this definition makes the Pongidae paraphyletic, and does not show that orangutans, gorillas, chimpanzees and humans are all more closely related to one another than any of these four groups are to gibbons. Further, current evidence implies that humans share a common extinct ancestor with the chimpanzee line, from which we separated more recently than the gorilla line.

The superfamily Hominoidea falls within Catarrhini, which also includes the Old World monkeys of Africa and Eurasia. Within this group, both families (Hylobatidae and Hominidae) can be distinguished from Old World monkeys by the number of cusps on their molars (hominoids have five—the "Y-5" molar pattern, Old World monkeys have only four in a bilophodont pattern). Hominoids have more mobile shoulder joints and arms due to the dorsal position of the scapula, broad ribcages that are flatter front-to-back, and a shorter, less mobile spine compared to Old World monkeys, with caudal (tail) vertebrae greatly reduced, resulting in complete tail loss in living species. These are all anatomical adaptations to vertical hanging and swinging locomotion (brachiation), as well as better balance in a bipedal pose. However, there are also primates in other families that lack tails, and at least one (the pig-tailed langur) that has been known to walk significant distances bipedally. The front skull is characterised by its sinuses, fusion of the frontal bone and post-orbital constriction.

Although the hominoid fossil record is far from complete, and the evidence is often fragmentary, there is enough to give a good outline of the evolutionary history of humans. The time of the split between humans and other living hominoids used to be thought to have occurred 15 to 20 million years ago. Some species occurring within that time period, such as Ramapithecus, used to be considered as hominins, and possible ancestors of humans. Later fossil finds indicated that Ramapithecus was more closely related to the orangutan, and new biochemical evidence indicated that the last common ancestor of humans and other hominins occurred between 5 and 10 million years ago, and probably in the lower end of that range.

Behaviour and cognition[link]

This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (July 2011)

Although there had been earlier studies, the scientific investigation of behaviour and cognition in nonhuman members of the superfamily Hominoidea expanded enormously during the latter half of the twentieth century. Major studies of behaviour in the field were completed on the three better-known "great apes", for example by Jane Goodall, Dian Fossey and Birute Galdikas (field work on gibbons and the bonobo is still relatively underdeveloped). These studies have shown that in their natural environments, the nonhuman hominoids show sharply varying social structure: gibbons are monogamous, territorial pair-bonders, orangutans are solitary, gorillas live in small troops with a single adult male leader, while chimpanzees live in larger troops with bonobos exhibiting promiscuous sexual behaviour. Their diets also vary; gorillas are foliovores while the others are all primarily frugivores, although the common chimpanzee does some hunting for meat. Foraging behaviour is correspondingly variable.

All the nonhuman hominoids are generally thought of as highly intelligent, and scientific study has broadly confirmed that they perform outstandingly well on a wide range of cognitive tests – though there is relatively little data on gibbon cognition. The early studies by Wolfgang Köhler demonstrated exceptional problem-solving abilities in chimpanzees, which Köhler attributed to insight. The use of tools has been repeatedly demonstrated; more recently, the manufacture of tools has been documented, both in the wild and in laboratory tests. Imitation is much more easily demonstrated in "great apes" than in other primate species. Almost all the studies in animal language acquisition have been completed with "great apes", and though there is continuing dispute as to whether they demonstrate real language abilities, there is no doubt that they involve significant feats of learning. Chimpanzees in different parts of Africa have developed tools that are used in food acquisition, demonstrating a form of animal culture.^[12]

Distinction from monkeys[link]

Apes do not possess a tail, unlike most monkeys. Monkeys are more likely to be in trees and use their tails for balance. Apes are considerably larger than monkeys, with the exception of gibbons, which are smaller than some monkeys. Apes are considered to be more intelligent than monkeys, which are considered to have more primitive brains.^[13] Unlike female monkeys which go through the estrous cycle, great apes, including humans, go through a menstrual cycle.

History of hominoid taxonomy[link]

The history of hominoid taxonomy is somewhat confusing and complex. The names of subgroups have changed their meaning over time as new evidence, from fossil discoveries and comparisons of anatomy and DNA sequences, has changed understanding of the relationships between hominoids. There has been a gradual demotion of humans from a special position in the taxonomy to being one branch among many. This history illustrates the growing influence of cladistics (the science of classifying living things by strict descent) on taxonomy.

As of 2006, there are eight extant genera of hominoids. They are the four genera in the family Hominidae (Homo – humans, Pan – chimpanzees and bonobos, Gorilla, and Pongo – orangutans), and the four genera in the family Hylobatidae or gibbons (Hylobates, Hoolock, Nomascus and Symphalangus).^[1] (The genus for the hoolock gibbons was recently changed from Bunopithecus to Hoolock.^[14])

In 1758, Carolus Linnaeus, relying on second- or third-hand accounts, placed a second species in Homo along with H. sapiens: Homo troglodytes ("cave-dwelling man"). It is not clear to which animal this name refers, as Linnaeus had no specimen to refer to, hence no precise description. Linnaeus named the orangutan Simia satyrus ("satyr monkey"). He placed the three genera Homo, Simia and Lemur in the order of Primates.

The troglodytes name was used for the chimpanzee by Blumenbach in 1775 but moved to the genus Simia. The orangutan was moved to the genus Pongo in 1799 by Lacépède.

Linnaeus's inclusion of humans in the primates with monkeys and apes was troubling for people who denied a close relationship between humans and the rest of the animal kingdom. Linnaeus's Lutheran archbishop had accused him of "impiety." In a letter to Johann Georg Gmelin dated 25 February 1747, Linnaeus wrote:

It is not pleasing to me that I must place humans among the primates, but man is intimately familiar with himself. Let's not quibble over words. It will be the same to me whatever name is applied. But I desperately seek from you and from the whole world a general difference between men and simians from the principles of Natural History. I certainly know of none. If only someone might tell me one! If I called man a simian or vice versa I would bring together all the theologians against me. Perhaps I ought to, in accordance with the law of Natural History.^[15]

Accordingly, Johann Friedrich Blumenbach in the first edition of his Manual of Natural History (1779), proposed that the primates be divided into the Quadrumana (four-handed, i.e. apes and monkeys) and Bimana (two-handed, i.e. humans). This distinction was taken up by other naturalists, most notably Georges Cuvier. Some elevated the distinction to the level of order.

However, the many affinities between humans and other primates — and especially the "great apes" — made it clear that the distinction made no scientific sense. Charles Darwin wrote, in The Descent of Man:

The greater number of naturalists who have taken into consideration the whole structure of man, including his mental faculties, have followed Blumenbach and Cuvier, and have placed man in a separate Order, under the title of the Bimana, and therefore on an equality with the orders of the Quadrumana, Carnivora, etc. Recently many of our best naturalists have recurred to the view first propounded by Linnaeus, so remarkable for his sagacity, and have placed man in the same Order with the Quadrumana, under the title of the Primates. The justice of this conclusion will be admitted: for in the first place, we must bear in mind the comparative insignificance for classification of the great development of the brain in man, and that the strongly marked differences between the skulls of man and the Quadrumana (lately insisted upon by Bischoff, Aeby, and others) apparently follow from their differently developed brains. In the second place, we must remember that nearly all the other and more important differences between man and the Quadrumana are manifestly adaptive in their nature, and relate chiefly to the erect position of man; such as the structure of his hand, foot, and pelvis, the curvature of his spine, and the position of his head.^[16]

Changes in taxonomy[link]

Until about 1960, the hominoids were usually divided into two families: humans and their extinct relatives in Hominidae, all other hominoids in Pongidae.[17]
The 1960s saw the application of techniques from molecular biology to primate taxonomy. Goodman used his 1964 immunological study of serum proteins to propose a division of the hominoids into three families, with the "great apes" in Pongidae and the "lesser apes" (gibbons) in Hylobatidae.[18] The trichotomy of hominoid families, however, prompted scientists to ask which family speciated first from the common hominoid ancestor.
Within the superfamily Hominoidea, gibbons are the outgroup: this means that the rest of the hominoids are more closely related to each other than any of them are to gibbons. This led to the placing of the "great apes" into the family Hominidae along with humans, by demoting the Pongidae to a subfamily; the Hominidae family now contained the subfamilies Homininae and Ponginae. Again, the three-way split in Ponginae led scientists to ask which of the three genera is least related to the others.
Investigation showed orangutans to be the outgroup, but comparing humans to all three other hominid genera showed that African "apes" (chimpanzees and gorillas) and humans are more closely related to each other than any of them are to orangutans. This led to the placing of the African hominoids in the subfamily Homininae, forming another three-way split. This classification was first proposed by M. Goodman in 1974.[19]
To try to resolve the hominine trichotomy, some authors proposed the division of the subfamily Homininae into the tribes Gorillini (African "apes") and Hominini (humans).
However, DNA comparisons provide convincing evidence that within the subfamily Homininae, gorillas are the outgroup. This suggests that chimpanzees should be in Hominini along with humans. This classification was first proposed (though one rank lower) by M. Goodman et al. in 1990.[2] See Human evolutionary genetics for more information on the speciation of humans and "great apes".
Later DNA comparisons split the gibbon genus Hylobates into four genera: Hylobates, Hoolock, Nomascus, and Symphalangus.[1][14]

Classification and evolution[link]

As discussed above, hominoid taxonomy has undergone several changes. Genetic analysis shows that hominoids diverged from the Old World monkeys between 29 million and 34.5 million years ago.^[20] The gibbons split from the rest about 18 mya, and the hominid splits happened 14 mya (Pongo), 7 mya (Gorilla), and 3-5 mya (Homo & Pan).^{[citation needed]}

The families, genera and extant species of hominoids are:

• Superfamily Hominoidea^[1]
  • Family Hylobatidae: gibbons ("lesser apes")
    • Genus Hylobates
      • Lar gibbon or white-handed gibbon, H. lar
      • Bornean white-bearded gibbon, H. albibarbis
      • Agile gibbon or black-handed gibbon, H. agilis
      • Müller's Bornean gibbon or grey gibbon, H. muelleri
      • Silvery gibbon, H. moloch
      • Pileated gibbon or capped gibbon, H. pileatus
      • Kloss's gibbon or Mentawai gibbon or bilou, H. klossii
    • Genus Hoolock
      • Western hoolock gibbon, H. hoolock
      • Eastern hoolock gibbon, H. leuconedys
    • Genus Symphalangus
      • Siamang, S. syndactylus
    • Genus Nomascus
      • Black crested gibbon, N. concolor
      • Eastern black crested gibbon, N. nasutus
      • Hainan black crested gibbon, N. hainanus
      • Southern white-cheeked gibbon N. siki
      • White-cheeked crested gibbon, N. leucogenys
      • Yellow-cheeked gibbon, N. gabriellae
  • Family Hominidae: hominids ("great apes", including humans)
    • Genus Pongo: orangutans
      • Bornean orangutan, P. pygmaeus
      • Sumatran orangutan, P. abelii
    • Genus Gorilla: gorillas
      • Western gorilla, G. gorilla
      • Eastern gorilla, G. beringei
    • Genus Homo: humans
      • Human, H. sapiens
    • Genus Pan: chimpanzees
      • Common chimpanzee, P. troglodytes
      • Bonobo, P. paniscus

Cultural aspects of apes[link]

This unreferenced section requires citations to ensure verifiability.

Often, "apes" (nonhuman hominoids) are said to be the result of a curse—a Jewish folktale claims that one of the races who built the Tower of Babel became apes as punishment, while Muslim lore says that the Jews of Eilat became apes as punishment for fishing on the Sabbath. Some sects of Christianity have folklore that claims that these apes are a symbol of lust and were created by Satan in response to God's creation of humans.^{[citation needed]} It is uncertain whether any of these references are to any specific apes. All of these concepts date from a period when neither the distinction between apes and monkeys, nor the fact that humans are closely related to chimpanzees, was widely understood, if understood at all.

See also[link]

Mammals portal

• Chimp Haven
• Declaration on Great Apes from the Great Ape Project
• Human
• List of human evolution fossils
• List of apes (for notable non-fictional apes)
• List of fictional apes

Notes and references[link]

External links[link]

Find more about Ape on Wikipedia's sister projects:
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	Images and media from Commons
	Learning resources from Wikiversity
	News stories from Wikinews
	Quotations from Wikiquote
	Source texts from Wikisource
	Textbooks from Wikibooks

Wikispecies has information related to: Ape

The Wikibook Dichotomous Key has a page on the topic of Hominoidea

• Pilbeam D (September 2000). "Hominoid systematics: The soft evidence". Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 97 (20): 10684–6. DOI:10.1073/pnas.210390497. PMC 34045. PMID 10995486. http://www.pnas.org/cgi/pmidlookup?view=long&pmid=10995486.  Agreement between cladograms based on molecular and anatomical data.

v t e Ape-related articles Ape species Human Bonobo Common chimpanzee Gorilla Orangutan Gibbon Ape study Ape language Great Ape Trust Dian Fossey Birutė Galdikas Jane Goodall Chimpanzee genome project Human genome project Neanderthal genome project Willie Smits Lone Drøscher Nielsen Borneo Orangutan Survival Legal and social status Personhood Research ban Kinshasa Declaration Great Ape Project Survival Project See also List of apes (non-human) Bushmeat Ape extinction List of fictional primates Human evolution Mythic humanoids Hominid

Jane Goodall
Goodall in September 2011
Born	Valerie Jane Morris-Goodall (1934-04-03) 3 April 1934 (age 78) London, England, U.K.
Residence	UK, Tanzania
Alma mater	Darwin College, University of Cambridge
Doctoral advisor	Robert Hinde
Known for	Study of chimpanzees, conservation, animal welfare
Notable awards	DBE (2004)

Dame Jane Morris Goodall, DBE (born Valerie Jane Morris-Goodall on 3 April 1934)^[1] is a British primatologist, ethologist, anthropologist, and UN Messenger of Peace.^[2] Considered to be the world's foremost expert on chimpanzees, Goodall is best known for her 45-year study of social and family interactions of wild chimpanzees in Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania.^[3] She is the founder of the Jane Goodall Institute and has worked extensively on conservation and animal welfare issues.

Early years[link]

Jane Goodall was born in London, England in 1934 to Mortimer Herbert Morris-Goodall, a businessman, and Margaret Myfanwe Joseph, a novelist who wrote under the name Vanne Morris-Goodall.^[1] As a child she was given a lifelike chimpanzee toy named Jubilee by her father; her fondness for the toy started her early love of animals. Today, the toy still sits on her dresser in London. As she writes in her book, Reason For Hope: "My mother's friends were horrified by this toy, thinking it would frighten me and give me nightmares."^[4] Goodall has a sister, Judith, who shares the same birthday, though the two were born four years apart.

Africa[link]

Goodall had always been passionate about animals and Africa, which brought her to the farm of a friend in the Kenya highlands in 1957.^[5] From there, she obtained work as a secretary, and acting on her friend's advice she telephoned Louis Leakey, a Kenyan archaeologist and paleontologist, with no other thought than to make an appointment to discuss animals. Leakey, believing that the study of existing great apes could provide indications of the behaviour of early hominids,^[6] was looking for a chimpanzee researcher though he kept the idea to himself. Instead, he proposed that Goodall work for him as a secretary. After obtaining his wife Mary Leakey's approval, Louis sent Goodall to Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania, where he laid out his plans.

In 1958, Leakey sent Goodall to London to study primate behavior with Osman Hill and primate anatomy with John Napier.^[7] Leakey raised funds, and on 14 July 1960 Goodall went to Gombe Stream National Park becoming the first of "Leakey's Angels".^[8] She was accompanied by her mother whose presence was necessary to satisfy the requirements of David Anstey, chief warden, who was concerned for their safety; Tanzania was "Tanganyika" at that time and a British protectorate.^[5]

Leakey arranged funding and in 1962 sent Goodall, who had no degree, to Cambridge University where she obtained a Ph.D degree in Ethology.^[5][9] She became only the eighth person to be allowed to study for a Ph.D there without first obtaining a BA or B.Sc.^[1] Her thesis was completed in 1965 under the tutorship of Robert Hinde, former master of St. John's College, Cambridge, titled "Behavior of the Free-Ranging Chimpanzee," detailing her first five years of study at the Gombe Reserve.^[1][9]

Personal life[link]

Goodall has been married twice. On 28 March 1964, she married a Dutch nobleman, wildlife photographer Baron Hugo van Lawick, at Chelsea Old Church, London, and she became known during their marriage as Baroness Jane van Lawick-Goodall. The couple had a son, Hugo Eric Louis, affectionately known as "Grub," who was born in 1967. They divorced in 1974. In 1975, she married Derek Bryceson (a member of Tanzania's parliament and the director of that country's national parks); he died of cancer in October 1980.^[10] With his position in the Tanzanian government as head of the country's national park system, Bryceson was able to protect Goodall's research project and implement an embargo on tourism at Gombe while he was alive.^[10]

When asked if she believed in God, Goodall said in September 2010: "I don’t have any idea of who or what God is. But I do believe in some great spiritual power. I don’t know what to call it. I feel it particularly when I’m out in nature. It’s just something that’s bigger and stronger than what I am or what anybody is. I feel it. And it’s enough for me."^[11]

Work[link]

Research at Gombe Stream National Park[link]

Goodall at the University of Hong Kong in 2006

Goodall is best known for her study of chimpanzee social and family life. She began studying the Kasakela chimpanzee community in Gombe Stream National Park, Tanzania in 1960.^[12] Without collegiate training directing her research, Goodall observed things that strict scientific doctrines may have overlooked.^[13] Instead of numbering the chimpanzees she observed, she gave them names such as Fifi and David Greybeard, and observed them to have unique and individual personalities, an unconventional idea at the time.^[13] She found that, “it isn’t only human beings who have personality, who are capable of rational thought [and] emotions like joy and sorrow.”^[13] She also observed behaviors such as hugs, kisses, pats on the back, and even tickling, what we consider "human" actions.^[13] Goodall insists that these gestures are evidence of "the close, supportive, affectionate bonds that develop between family members and other individuals within a community, which can persist throughout a life span of more than 50 years."^[13] These findings suggest similarities between humans and chimpanzees exist in more than genes alone, but can be seen in emotion, intelligence, and family and social relationships.

Goodall’s research at Gombe Stream is best known to the scientific community for challenging two long-standing beliefs of the day: that only humans could construct and use tools, and that chimpanzees were vegetarians.^[13] While observing one chimpanzee feeding at a termite mound, she watched him repeatedly place stalks of grass into termite holes, then remove them from the hole covered with clinging termites, effectively “fishing” for termites.^[14] The chimps would also take twigs from trees and strip off the leaves to make the twig more effective, a form of object modification which is the rudimentary beginnings of toolmaking.^[14] Humans had long distinguished ourselves from the rest of the animal kingdom as "Man the Toolmaker". In response to Goodall's revolutionary findings, Louis Leakey wrote, "We must now redefine man, redefine tool, or accept chimpanzees as human!".^[14][15][16]

In contrast to the peaceful and affectionate behaviors she observed, Goodall also found an aggressive side of chimp nature at Gombe Stream. She discovered that chimps will systematically hunt and eat smaller primates such as colobus monkeys.^[13] Goodall watched a hunting group isolate a colobus monkey high in a tree, block all possible exits, then one chimpanzee climbed up and captured and killed the colobus.^[16] The others then each took parts of the carcass, sharing with other members of the troop in response to begging behaviours.^[16] The chimps at Gombe kill and eat as much as one-third of the colobus population in the park each year.^[13] This alone was a major scientific find which challenged previous conceptions of chimp diet and behavior.

But perhaps more startling, and disturbing, was the tendency for aggression and violence within chimpanzee troops. Goodall observed dominant females deliberately killing the young of other females in the troop in order to maintain their dominance,^[13] sometimes going as far as cannibalism.^[14] She says of this revelation, "During the first ten years of the study I had believed […] that the Gombe chimpanzees were, for the most part, rather nicer than human beings. […] Then suddenly we found that chimpanzees could be brutal—that they, like us, had a darker side to their nature."^[14] These findings revolutionized contemporary knowledge of chimpanzee behaviour, and were further evidence of the social similarities between humans and chimpanzees, albeit in a much darker manner.

Goodall also set herself apart from the traditional conventions of the time by naming the animals in her studies of primates, instead of assigning each a number. Numbering was a nearly universal practice at the time, and thought to be important in the removal of one's self from the potential for emotional attachment to the subject being studied. Setting herself apart from other researchers also led her to develop a close bond with the chimpanzees and to become, to this day, the only human ever accepted into chimpanzee society. She was the lowest ranking member of a troop for a period of 22 months. Among those that Goodall named during her years in Gombe were:^[17]

• David Greybeard, a grey-chinned male who first warmed up to Goodall.^[18]
• Goliath, a friend of David Greybeard, originally the alpha male named for his bold nature.
• Mike, who through his cunning and improvisation displaced Goliath as the alpha male.
• Humphrey, a big, strong, bullysome male.
• Gigi, a large, sterile female who delighted in being the "aunt" of any young chimps or humans.
• Mr. McGregor, a belligerent older male.
• Flo, a motherly, high-ranking female with a bulbous nose and ragged ears, and her children, Figan, Faben, Freud, Fifi, and Flint.^[19][20]
• Frodo, Fifi's second oldest child, an aggressive male who would frequently attack Jane, and ultimately forced her to leave the troop when he became alpha male.^[21]

Jane Goodall incorporation[link]

Jane Goodall in 2009 with Hungarian Roots & Shoots group members.

In 1977, Goodall established the Jane Goodall Institute (JGI), which supports the Gombe research, and she is a global leader in the effort to protect chimpanzees and their habitats. With nineteen offices around the world, the JGI is widely recognized for innovative, community-centred conservation and development programs in Africa. Its global youth program, Roots & Shoots began in 1991 when a group of 16 local teenagers met with Goodall on her back porch in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. They were eager to discuss a range of problems they knew about from first-hand experience that caused them deep concern. The organisation now has over 10,000 groups in over 100 countries.^[22]

Goodall in 2009 with Lou Perrotti, who contributed to her book, Hope for Animals and Their World.

Due to an overflow of handwritten notes, photographs, and data piling up at Jane's home in Dar es Salaam in the mid-1990s, the Jane Goodall Institute’s Center for Primate Studies was created at the University of Minnesota to house and organize this data. Currently all of the original Jane Goodall archives reside there and have been digitized and analyzed and placed in an online database.^[23] On March 17, 2011, Duke University spokesman Karl Bates announced that the archives will move to Duke, with Anne E. Pusey, Duke's chairman of evolutionary anthropology, overseeing the collection. Pusey, who managed the archives in Minnesota and worked with Goodall in Tanzania, had worked at Duke for a year.^[24]

Today, Goodall devotes virtually all of her time to advocacy on behalf of chimpanzees and the environment, travelling nearly 300 days a year.^[25] Goodall is also a board member for the world's largest chimpanzee sanctuary outside of Africa, Save the Chimps in Fort Pierce, Florida.

Activism[link]

Goodall with Allyson Reed of Skulls Unlimited International, at the Association of Zoos and Aquariums annual conference, 9, 2009.

Goodall is the former president of Advocates for Animals, an organization based in Edinburgh, Scotland, that campaigns against the use of animals in medical research, zoos, farming and sport.

Goodall is a devoted vegetarian and advocates the diet for ethical, environmental, and health reasons. In The Inner World of Farm Animals, Goodall writes that farm animals are "far more aware and intelligent than we ever imagined and, despite having been bred as domestic slaves, they are individual beings in their own right. As such, they deserve our respect. And our help. Who will plead for them if we are silent?”^[26] Goodall has also said, “Thousands of people who say they 'love' animals sit down once or twice a day to enjoy the flesh of creatures who have been treated so with little respect and kindness just to make more meat."

In May 2008, Goodall controversially described Edinburgh Zoo's new primate enclosure as a "wonderful facility" where monkeys "are probably better off [than those] living in the wild in an area like Budongo, where one in six gets caught in a wire snare, and countries like Congo, where chimpanzees, monkeys and gorillas are shot for food commercially."^[27] This was in conflict with Advocates for Animals' position on captive animals.^[28] In June 2008 Goodall confirmed that she had resigned the presidency of the organisation which she had held since 1998, citing her busy schedule and explaining, "I just don't have time for them."^[29]

Criticism[link]

Goodall at TEDGlobal 2007

Some primatologists have suggested flaws in Goodall's methodology which may call into question the validity of her observations. Goodall used unconventional practices in her study, for example, naming individuals instead of numbering them. At the time numbering was used to prevent emotional attachment and loss of objectivity. Claiming to see individuality and emotion in chimpanzees, she was accused of "that worst of ethological sins",^[30] anthropomorphism.

Many standard methods are aimed at helping observers to avoid interference and the use of feeding stations to attract Gombe chimpanzees is, in particular, thought by some to have altered normal foraging and feeding patterns as well as social relationships; this argument is the focus of a book published by Margaret Power in 1991.^[31] It has been suggested that higher levels of aggression and conflict with other chimpanzee groups in the area were consequences of the feeding, which could have created the "wars" between chimpanzee social groups described by Goodall, aspects of which she did not witness in the years before artificial feeding began at Gombe. Thus, some regard Goodall's observations as distortions of normal chimpanzee behavior.^[32] Goodall herself acknowledged that feeding contributed to aggression within and between groups but maintained that the effect was limited to alteration of the intensity and not the nature of chimpanzee conflict, and further that feeding was necessary for the study to be effective at all. Craig Stanford of the Jane Goodall Research Institute at the University of Southern California asserts that researchers undergoing studies with no artificial provisioning have a difficult time viewing any social behaviors of chimpanzees at all, especially any related to intergroup conflict.^[33]

Some recent studies such as those by Crickette Sanz in the Goualougo Triangle (Congo) and Christophe Boesch in the Taï National Park (Ivory Coast) have not shown the aggression observed in the Gombe studies.^[34] However, not all primatologists agree that the studies are flawed; for example, Jim Moore provides a critique of Margaret Powers' assertions^[35] and some studies of other chimpanzee groups have shown similar aggression to Gombe even in the absence of feeding.^[36]

In popular culture[link]

David Greybeard Sculpture at Animal Kingdom

• In The Simpsons episode "Simpson Safari", Dr. Joan Bushwell, a character loosely based on Goodall,^[37] is a research scientist in charge of a chimpanzee refuge who is secretly forcing her chimps to mine diamonds for her benefit.
• On her album Street Angel, Stevie Nicks pays tribute to Goodall with the track "Jane".
• A parody of Goodall appears in the webcomic, Irregular Webcomic!^[38] as a foil to Steve, himself a parody of Steve Irwin. She would later appear as herself interacting with the comic's writer, David Morgan-Mar.^[39]
• A parody of Goodall appears once on The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack, living on an island inhabited by chimpanzees.
• She is included in the Symphony of Science video The Unbroken Thread.^[40]
• Benjamin Hale's 2011 novel The Evolution of Bruno Littlemore contains epitaphs by Jane Goodall.
• On September 24, 2011, Dr. Goodall appeared on Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! in the Not My Job segment.
• She was featured in Apple's "Think Different" campaign.

Gary Larson cartoon incident[link]

One of cartoonist Gary Larson's more famous cartoons shows two chimpanzees grooming. One finds a blonde human hair on the other and inquires, "Conducting a little more 'research' with that Jane Goodall tramp?" Goodall herself was in Africa at the time, and the Jane Goodall Institute thought this was in bad taste, and had their lawyers draft a letter to Larson and his distribution syndicate, in which they described the cartoon as an "atrocity". They were stymied by Goodall herself when she returned and saw the cartoon, as she stated that she found the cartoon amusing.^[41] Since then, all profits from sales of a shirt featuring this cartoon go to the Jane Goodall Institute. Goodall wrote a preface to The Far Side Gallery 5, detailing her version of the controversy, and the Institute's letter was included next to the cartoon in the complete Far Side collection.^[42] She praised Larson's creative ideas, which often compare and contrast the behavior of humans and animals. In 1988, Larson visited Gombe.^[41]

Awards and recognition[link]

Honours[link]

Goodall teaching about wetlands in Martha's Vineyard, 2006

Goodall has received many honours for her environmental and humanitarian work, as well as others. She was named a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire in a ceremony held in Buckingham Palace in 2004.^[43] In April 2002, Secretary-General Kofi Annan named Goodall a United Nations Messenger of Peace. Her other honors include the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, the French Legion of Honor, Medal of Tanzania, Japan's prestigious Kyoto Prize, the Benjamin Franklin Medal in Life Science, the Gandhi-King Award for Nonviolence and the Spanish Prince of Asturias Awards. She is also a member of the advisory board of BBC Wildlife magazine and a patron of Population Matters (formerly the Optimum Population Trust). She has received many tributes, honors, and awards from local governments, schools, institutions, and charities around the world. Goodall is honored by The Walt Disney Company with a plaque on the Tree of Life at Walt Disney World's Animal Kingdom theme park, alongside a carving of her beloved David Greybeard, the original chimp who approached Goodall during her first year at Gombe.^[44] In 2010 Dave Matthews and Tim Reynolds held a benefit concert at DAR Constitution Hall in Washington DC to commemorate Gombe 50: a global celebration of Jane Goodall’s pioneering chimpanzee research and inspiring vision for our future.^[45]

Awards[link]

• 1980: Order of the Golden Ark, World Wildlife Award for Conservation
• 1984: J. Paul Getty Wildlife Conservation Prize
• 1985: Living Legacy Award from the International Women's League
• 1985:Society of the United States; Award for Humane Excellence, American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
• 1987: Ian Biggs' Prize
• 1989: Encyclopædia Britannica Award for Excellence on the Dissemination of Learning for the Benefit of Mankind; Anthropologist of the Year Award
• 1990: The AMES Award, American Anthropologist Association; Whooping Crane Conservation Award, Conoco, Inc.; Gold Medal of the Society of Women Geographers; Inamori Foundation Award; Washoe Award; The Kyoto Prize in Basic Science
• 1991: The Edinburgh Medal
• 1993: Rainforest Alliance Champion Award
• 1994: Chester Zoo Diamond Jubilee Medal
• 1995: Commander of the Order of the British Empire, presented by Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II; The National Geographic Society Hubbard Medal for Distinction in Exploration, Discovery, and Research; Lifetime Achievement Award, In Defense of Animals; The Moody Gardens Environmental Award; Honorary Wardenship of Uganda National Parks
• 1996: The Zoological Society of London Silver Medal; The Tanzanian Kilimanjaro Medal; The Primate Society of Great Britain Conservation Award; The Caring Institute Award; The Polar Bear Award; William Procter Prize for Scientific Achievement
• 1997: John & Alice Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement; David S. Ingells, Jr. Award for Excellence; Common Wealth Award for Public Service; The Field Museum's Award of Merit; Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement; Royal Geographical Society / Discovery Channel Europe Award for A Lifetime of Discovery
• 1998: Disney's Animal Kingdom Eco Hero Award; National Science Board Public Service Award; The Orion Society's John Hay Award
• 1999: International Peace Award; Botanical Research Institute of Texas International Award of Excellence in Conservation, Community of Christ International Peace Award

Tournament of Roses Parade Grand Marshal Dr. Jane Goodall, 11th female Grand Marshal, at Tournament House, 2012

• 2001: Graham J. Norton Award for Achievement in Increasing Community Livability; Rungius Award of the National Museum of Wildlife Art, USA; Roger Tory Peterson Memorial Medal, Harvard Museum of Natural History; Master Peace Award; Gandhi/King Award for Non-Violence
• 2002: The Huxley Memorial Medal, Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland; United Nations "Messenger of Peace" Appointment
• 2003: Benjamin Franklin Medal in Life Science; Harvard Medical School's Center for Health and the Global Environment Award; Prince of Asturias Award for Technical and Scientific Achievement; Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire, presented by His Royal Highness Prince Charles; Chicago Academy of Sciences' Honorary Environmental Leader Award
• 2004: Nierenberg Prize for Science in the Public Interest; Will Rogers Spirit Award, the Rotary Club of Will Rogers and Will Rogers Memorial Museums; Life Time Achievement Award, the International Fund for Animal Welfare; Honorary Degree from Haverford College
• 2005: Honorary doctorate degree in science from Syracuse University
• 2005:Honorary doctorate degree in science from Rutgers University
• 2005: Presented with Discovery and Imagination Award
• 2006: Received the 60th Anniversary Medal of the UNESCO and the French Légion d'honneur.
• 2007: Honorary doctorate degree in commemoration of Carl Linnaeus from Uppsala University
• 2007: Honorary doctorate degree from University of Liverpool
• 2008: Honorary doctorate degree from University of Toronto
• 2011: Honorary doctorate degree from American University of Paris
• 2011: Order of Merit of the Italian Republic
• 2012: Named Grand Marshal of the 2013 Tournament of Roses Parade^[46]

Media[link]

Books[link]

• 1969 My Friends the Wild Chimpanzees Washington, DC: National Geographic Society
• 1971 Innocent Killers (with H. van Lawick). Boston: Houghton Mifflin; London: Collins.
• 1971 In the Shadow of Man Boston: Houghton Mifflin; London: Collins. Published in 48 languages.
• 1986 The Chimpanzees of Gombe: Patterns of Behavior Boston: Bellknap Press of the Harvard University Press. Published also in Japanese and Russian. R.R. Hawkins Award for the Outstanding Technical, Scientific or Medical book of 1986, to Bellknap Press of Harvard University Press, Boston. The Wildlife Society (USA) Award for "Outstanding Publication in Wildlife Ecology and Management".
• 1990 Through a Window: 30 years observing the Gombe chimpanzees London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson; Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Translated into more than 15 languages. 1991 Penguin edition, UK. American Library Association "Best" list among Nine Notable Books (Nonfiction) for 1991.
• 1991 Visions of Caliban (co-authored with Dale Peterson, Ph.D.). Boston: Houghton Mifflin. New York Times "Notable Book" for 1993. Library Journal "Best Sci-Tech Book" for 1993.
• 1999 Brutal Kinship (with Michael Nichols). New York: Aperture Foundation.
• 1999 Reason For Hope; A Spiritual Journey (with Phillip Berman). New York: Warner Books, Inc. Translated into Japanese and Portuguese.
• 2000 40 Years At Gombe New York: Stewart, Tabori, and Chang.
• 2000 Africa In My Blood (edited by Dale Peterson). New York: Houghton Mifflin Company.
• 2001 Beyond Innocence: An Autobiography in Letters, the later years (edited by Dale Peterson). New York: Houghton Mifflin Company. ISBN 0-618-12520-5 Online version
• 2002 The Ten Trusts: What We Must Do To Care for the Animals We Love (with Marc Bekoff). San Francisco: Harper San Francisco
• 2005 Harvest for Hope: A Guide to Mindful Eating New York: Warner Books, Inc. ISBN 0-446-53362-9
• 2009 Hope for Animals and Their World: How Endangered Species Are Being Rescued from the Brink Grand Central Publishing ISBN 0-446-58177-1

Children's books[link]

• 1972 Grub: The Bush Baby (with H. van Lawick). Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
• 1988 My Life with the Chimpanzees New York: Byron Preiss Visual Publications, Inc. Translated into French, Japanese and Chinese. Parenting's Reading-Magic Award for "Outstanding Book for Children," 1989.
• 1989 The Chimpanzee Family Book Saxonville, MA: Picture Book Studio; Munich: Neugebauer Press; London: Picture Book Studio. Translated into more than 15 languages, including Japanese and Swahili. The UNICEF Award for the best children's book of 1989. Austrian state prize for best children's book of 1990.
• 1989 Jane Goodall's Animal World: Chimps New York: Macmillan.
• 1989 Animal Family Series: Chimpanzee Family; Lion Family; Elephant Family; Zebra Family; Giraffe Family; Baboon Family; Hyena Family; Wildebeest Family Toronto: Madison Marketing Ltd.
• 1994 With Love New York / London: North-South Books. Translated into German, French, Italian, and Japanese.
• 1999 Dr. White (illustrated by Julie Litty). New York: North-South Books.
• 2000 The Eagle & the Wren (illustrated by Alexander Reichstein). New York: North-South Books.
• 2001 Chimpanzees I Love: Saving Their World and Ours New York: Scholastic Press
• 2004 Rickie and Henri: A True Story (with Alan Marks) Penguin Young Readers Group

Films[link]

• 1963 Miss Goodall and the Wild Chimpanzees National Geographic Society
• 1975 Miss Goodall: The Hyena Story The World of Animal Behavior Series 16mm 1979 version for DiscoVision, not released for LaserDisc
• 1984 Among the Wild Chimpanzees National Geographic Special
• 1988 People of the Forest with Hugo van Lawick
• 1990 Chimpanzee Alert in the Nature Watch Series, Central Television
• 1990 The Life and Legend of Jane Goodall National Geographic Society.
• 1990 The Gombe Chimpanzees Bavarian Television
• 1995 Fifi's Boys for the Natural World series for the
• 1996 Chimpanzee Diary for BBC2 Animal Zone
• 1997 Animal Minds for BBC
• Goodall voiced herself in the animated TV series The Wild Thornberrys.
• 2000 Jane Goodall: Reason For Hope PBS special produced by KTCA
• 2001 Chimps R Us PBS special Scientific Frontiers.
• 2002 Jane Goodall's Wild Chimpanzees (IMAX format), in collaboration with Science North
• 2005 Jane Goodall's Return to Gombe for Animal Planet
• 2006 Chimps, So Like Us HBO film nominated for 1990 Academy Award
• 2007 When Animals Talk We Should Listen theatrical documentary feature co-produced by Animal Planet
• 2010 Jane's Journey theatrical documentary feature co-produced by Animal Planet
• 2012 Chimpanzee theatrical nature documentary feature co-produced by Disneynature

See also[link]

• Roots & Shoots
• USC Jane Goodall Research Center

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Jane Goodall

• The Jane Goodall Institute
• Jane Goodall at TED Conferences
• Appearances on C-SPAN
• Jane Goodall on Charlie Rose
• Works by or about Jane Goodall in libraries (WorldCat catalog)
• Jane Goodall collected news and commentary at The Guardian
• Jane Goodall collected news and commentary at The New York Times
• Lecture of Goodall at Harvard University in 2007
• Jane Goodall Interview on The Hour with George Stroumboulopoulos
• Jane Goodall interviewed by Alyssa McDonald July 2010 on New Statesman.

v t e Ape-related articles Ape species Human Bonobo Common chimpanzee Gorilla Orangutan Gibbon Ape study Ape language Great Ape Trust Dian Fossey Birutė Galdikas Jane Goodall Chimpanzee genome project Human genome project Neanderthal genome project Willie Smits Lone Drøscher Nielsen Borneo Orangutan Survival Legal and social status Personhood Research ban Kinshasa Declaration Great Ape Project Survival Project See also List of apes (non-human) Bushmeat Ape extinction List of fictional primates Human evolution Mythic humanoids Hominid

Terence Kemp McKenna

Born	(1946-11-16)November 16, 1946 Paonia, Colorado, United States
Died	April 3, 2000(2000-04-03) (aged 53) San Rafael, California, United States
Era	20th century philosophy
Region	Western Philosophy
School	Metaphysics, phenomenology
Main interests	shamanism, ethnobotany, metaphysics, psychedelic drugs, futurism, primitivism, environmentalism, consciousness, phenomenology, historical revisionism, evolution, ontology, Mind at Large, virtual reality, dominator culture, criticizing science, the Logos
Notable ideas	Novelty Theory, The "Stoned Ape" Theory of Human Evolution, Machine elves
Influenced by psychedelic drugs, Marshall McLuhan, Alfred North Whitehead, Teilhard de Chardin, Aldous Huxley, I Ching, William Blake, Riane Eisler, James Joyce, Vladimir Nabokov, Heraclitus
Influenced Rupert Sheldrake, Robert Anton Wilson, Ralph Abraham, RU Sirius, Cliff Pickover, Timothy Leary

Terence Kemp McKenna (November 16, 1946 – April 3, 2000) was an American philosopher, psychonaut, researcher, teacher, lecturer and writer on many subjects, such as human consciousness, language, psychedelic drugs, the evolution of civilizations, the origin and end of the universe, alchemy, and extraterrestrial beings.

Biography[link]

Early life[link]

Terence McKenna grew up in Paonia, Colorado.^[1] He was introduced to geology through his uncle and developed a hobby of solitary fossil hunting in the arroyos near his home.^[2] From this he developed a deep artistic and scientific appreciation of nature.

At age 16, McKenna moved to Los Altos, California to live with family friends for a year. He finished high school in Lancaster, CA.^[1] In 1963, McKenna was introduced to the literary world of psychedelics through The Doors of Perception and Heaven and Hell by Aldous Huxley and certain issues of The Village Voice that talked about psychedelics.^[1][3]

McKenna claimed that one of his early psychedelic experiences with morning glory seeds showed him "that there was something there worth pursuing."^[1] In an audio interview Terence Mckenna claims to have started smoking cannabis regularly during the summer following his 17th birthday.

Studying and traveling[link]

In 1965, McKenna enrolled in the University of California, Berkeley^[4] to study art history.^[1] In 1967, while in college, he discovered and begun studying shamanism through the study of Tibetan folk religion.^[5] That year, which he called his "opium and kabbala phase"^[6] he also traveled to Jerusalem, where he met Kathleen Harrison, who would later become his wife.^[6]

In 1969, McKenna traveled to Nepal led by his "interest in Tibetan painting and hallucinogenic shamanism."^[6] During his time there, he studied the Tibetan language and worked as a hashish smuggler, until "one of his Bombay-to-Aspen shipments fell into the hands of U. S. Customs." He was forced to move to avoid capture by Interpol.^[6] He wandered through Southeast Asia viewing ruins, collected butterflies in Indonesia, and worked as an English teacher in Tokyo. He then went back to Berkeley to continue studying biology, which he called "his first love".^[6]

After the partial completion of his studies, and his mother's death from cancer in 1971,^[7] McKenna, his brother Dennis, and three friends traveled to the Colombian Amazon in search of oo-koo-hé, a plant preparation containing dimethyltryptamine (DMT). Instead of oo-koo-hé they found various forms of ayahuasca, or yagé, and gigantic Psilocybe cubensis which became the new focus of the expedition.^[6] In La Chorrera, at the urging of his brother, he was the subject of a psychedelic experiment which he claimed put him in contact with "Logos": an informative, divine voice he believed was universal to visionary religious experience.^[6] The voice's reputed revelations and his brother's simultaneous peculiar experience prompted him to explore the structure of an early form of the I Ching, which led to his "Novelty Theory".^[6] During their stay in the Amazon, McKenna also became romantically involved with his translator, Ev.^[6]

In 1972, McKenna returned to Berkeley to finish his studies.^[4] There he decided to switch majors to a Bachelor of Science in ecology and conservation, in a then new experimental section of the same university called the Tussman Experimental College.^[1] During his studies, he would also develop techniques for cultivating psilocybin mushrooms with Dennis.^[6]

In 1975, he parted with his girlfriend, Ev, when she left him for one of his friends from Berkeley. Their parting left him "tormented with migraines and living alone".^[6] He graduated in 1975.^[8] That same year, he began a relationship with Kathleen Harrison, whom he had met in Jerusalem.

Soon after graduating, McKenna and Dennis published a book inspired by their Amazon experiences, The Invisible Landscape: Mind, Hallucinogens and the I Ching. He also began lecturing.^[4] The brothers' experiences in the Amazon would later play a major role in McKenna's book True Hallucinations, published in 1993.^[6] In 1976, the brothers published what they had learned about the cultivation of mushrooms in a book entitled Psilocybin - Magic Mushroom Grower's Guide under the pseudonyms "OT Oss" and "ON Oeric".^[9]

Later life[link]

In the early 1980s, McKenna began to speak publicly on the topic of psychedelic drugs, lecturing extensively and conducting weekend workshops. Though associated with the New Age and human potential movements, McKenna himself had little patience for New Age sensibilities. He repeatedly stressed the importance and primacy of felt experience, as opposed to dogma.^[10] Timothy Leary once introduced him as "one of the five or six most important people on the planet."^[11]

He soon became a fixture of popular counterculture. His growing popularity culminated in the early-to-mid-1990s with the publication of several books: True Hallucinations, relating the tale of his 1971 La Chorrera experience; Food of the Gods; and The Archaic Revival. He became a popular personality in the psychedelic rave/dance scene of the early 1990s, with frequent spoken word performances at raves and contributions to psychedelic and goa trance albums by The Shamen, Spacetime Continuum, Alien Project, Capsula, Entheogenic, Zuvuya, Shpongle, and Shakti Twins. His speeches were, and are, sampled by many. In 1994 he appeared as a speaker at the Starwood Festival, documented in the book Tripping by Charles Hayes. His lectures were produced on both cassette tape and CD.^[13]

McKenna was a colleague of chaos mathematician Ralph Abraham, and biologist Rupert Sheldrake, creator of the theory of "morphogenetic fields", not to be confused with the mainstream usage of the same term. He conducted several public debates known as trialogues with them from the late 1980s until his death. Books containing transcriptions of some of these events were published. He was also a friend and associate of Ralph Metzner, Nicole Maxwell, and Riane Eisler, participating in joint workshops and symposia with them. He was a personal friend of Tom Robbins, and influenced the thought of many scientists, writers, artists, and entertainers. His influences include comedian Bill Hicks, whose routines about psychedelic drugs drew heavily from McKenna's works. He is also the inspiration for the Twin Peaks character Dr. Jacoby.^[14]

In addition to psychedelic drugs, McKenna spoke on the subjects of virtual reality, which he saw as a way to artistically communicate the experience of psychedelics; techno-paganism; artificial intelligence; evolution; extraterrestrials; and aesthetic theory, specifically about art/visual experience as information representing the significance of hallucinatory visions experienced under the influence of psychedelics.

In 1985,^[8] McKenna co-founded Botanical Dimensions with his then-wife Kathleen, a nonprofit ethnobotanical preserve in Hawaii, where he lived for many years before he died. In 1997 he and Kathleen divorced.^[15] Before moving to Hawaii permanently, McKenna split his time between Hawaii and Occidental, located in the redwood-studded hills of Sonoma County, California.

Death[link]

A longtime sufferer of migraines, in mid-1999 McKenna returned to his home on the big island of Hawaii after a long lecturing tour. He began to suffer from increasingly painful headaches. This culminated in three brain seizures in one night, which he claimed were the most powerful psychedelic experiences he had ever known. Upon his emergency trip to the hospital on Oahu, Terence was diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme, a highly aggressive form of brain cancer. For the next several months he underwent various treatments, including experimental gamma knife radiation treatment. According to Wired magazine, McKenna was worried that his tumour was caused by his 35-years of smoking cannabis; though his doctors assured him there was no causal relation.^[15]

In late 1999, Erik Davis conducted what would be the last interview of McKenna.^[16] During the interview McKenna also talked about the announcement of his death:

McKenna died on April 3, 2000, at the age of 53, with his loved ones at his bedside. He is survived by his brother Dennis, his son Finn, and his daughter Klea.

Library fire[link]

On February 7, 2007, McKenna's library of rare books and personal notes was destroyed in a fire which burned offices belonging to Big Sur's Esalen Institute which was storing the collection. An index maintained by his brother Dennis survives, though little else.^[18]

Ideas[link]

Terence McKenna advocated the exploration of altered states of mind via the ingestion of naturally occurring psychedelic substances. For example, and in particular, as facilitated by the ingestion of high doses of psychedelic mushrooms, and DMT, which he believed was the apotheosis of the psychedelic experience. He spoke of the "jeweled, self-dribbling basketballs" or "self-transforming machine elves" that one encounters in that state.

Although he avoided giving his allegiance to any one interpretation (part of his rejection of monotheism), he was open to the idea of psychedelics as being "trans-dimensional travel"; literally, enabling an individual to encounter what could be ancestors, or spirits of earth.^[10] He remained opposed to most forms of organized religion or guru-based forms of spiritual awakening.

Either philosophically or religiously, he expressed admiration for Marshall McLuhan, Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, Gnostic Christianity, Alfred North Whitehead and Alchemy. McKenna always regarded the Greek philosopher Heraclitus as his favorite philosopher.^[11]

He also expressed admiration for the works of James Joyce (calling Finnegans Wake "the quintessential work of art, or at least work of literature of the 20th century")^[20] and Vladimir Nabokov: McKenna once said that he would have become a Nabokov lecturer if he had never encountered psychedelics.

"Stoned Ape" theory of human evolution[link]

In his book Food of the Gods,^[21] McKenna proposed that the transformation from humans' early ancestors Homo erectus to the species Homo sapiens mainly had to do with the addition of the mushroom Psilocybe cubensis in its diet - an event which according to his theory took place in about 100,000 BC (this is when he believed that the species diverged from the Homo genus). He based his theory on the main effects, or alleged effects, produced by the mushroom. One of the effects that comes about from the ingestion of low doses, which agrees with one of scientist Roland Fischer's findings from the late 1960s-early 1970s,^[22] is it significantly improves the visual acuity of humans - so theoretically, of other human-like mammals too. According to McKenna, this effect would have definitely proven to be of evolutionary advantage to humans' omnivorous hunter-gatherer ancestors that would have stumbled upon it "accidentally"; as it would make it easier for them to hunt.

In higher doses, McKenna claims, the mushroom acts as a sexual stimulator, which would make it even more beneficial evolutionarily, as it would result in more offspring. At even higher doses, the mushroom would have acted to "dissolve boundaries", which would have promoted community-bonding and group sexual activities-that would result in a mixing of genes and therefore greater genetic diversity. Generally McKenna believed that the periodic ingestion of the mushroom would have acted to dissolve the ego in humans before it ever got the chance to grow in destructive proportions. In this context, he likened the ego to a cancerous tumor that can grow uncontrollable and become destructive to its host. In his own words:

Wherever and whenever the ego function began to form, it was akin to a cancerous tumor or a blockage in the energy of the psyche. The use of psychedelic plants in a context of shamanic initiation dissolved-as it dissolves today-the knotted structure of the ego into undifferentiated feeling, what Eastern philosophy calls the Tao.

—Terence McKenna, Food of the Gods

The mushroom, according to McKenna, had also given humans their first truly religious experiences (which, as he believed, were the basis for the foundation of all subsequent religions to date). Another factor that McKenna talked about was the mushroom's potency to promote linguistic thinking. This would have promoted vocalisation, which in turn would have acted in cleansing the brain (based on a scientific theory that vibrations from speaking cause the precipitation of impurities from the brain to the cerebrospinal fluid), which would further mutate the brain. All these factors according to McKenna were the most important factors that promoted evolution towards the Homo sapiens species. After this transformation took place, the species would have begun moving out of Africa to populate the rest of the planet ^[21] Later on, this theory by McKenna was given the name "The 'Stoned Ape' Theory of Human Evolution".^[23]

Novelty theory[link]

McKenna's Timewave zero is a numerological formula that purports to calculate the ebb and flow of "novelty", defined as increase over time in the universe's interconnectedness, or organized complexity. ^[24] According to McKenna, the universe has a teleological attractor at the end of time that increases interconnectedness, eventually reaching a singularity of infinite complexity in 2012, at which point anything and everything imaginable will occur simultaneously. He conceived this idea over several years in the early to mid-1970s while using psilocybin and DMT.^[24]

McKenna expressed "novelty" in a computer program which purportedly produces a waveform known as "timewave zero" or the "timewave". Based on McKenna's interpretation of the King Wen sequence of the I Ching, ^[15] the graph appears to show great periods of novelty corresponding with major shifts in humanity'sbiological and sociocultural evolution. He believed that the events of any given time are recursively related to the events of other times, and chose the atomic bombing of Hiroshima as the basis for calculating his end date of November 2012. When he later discovered this date's proximity to the end of the 13th b'ak'tun of the Maya calendar, he revised his hypothesis so that the two dates matched. ^[25]

The 1975 first edition of The Invisible Landscape refers to 2012 (but no specific day during the year) only twice. In the 1993 second edition, McKenna employed Sharer's date^{[Note d]} of 21 December 2012 throughout. ^[26]

Bibliography[link]

• 1975 - The Invisible Landscape: Mind, Hallucinogens, and the I Ching (with Dennis McKenna) (Seabury; 1st Ed) ISBN 0-8164-9249-2.
• 1976 - The Invisible Landscape (with Dennis McKenna, and Quinn Taylor) (Scribner) ISBN 0-8264-0122-8
• 1976 - Psilocybin - Magic Mushroom Grower's Guide (with Dennis McKenna: credited under the pseudonyms OT Oss and ON Oeric) (2nd edition 1986) (And/Or Press) ISBN 0-915904-13-6
• 1992 - Psilocybin - Magic Mushroom Grower's Guide (with Dennis McKenna: (credited under the pseudonyms OT Oss and ON Oeric) (Quick American Publishing Company; Revised edition) ISBN 0-932551-06-8
• 1992 - The Archaic Revival (HarperSanFrancisco; 1st edition) ISBN 0-06-250613-7
• 1992 - Food of the Gods: The Search for the Original Tree of Knowledge - A Radical History of Plants, Drugs, and Human Evolution (Bantam) ISBN 0-553-37130-4
• 1992 - Synesthesia (with Timothy C. Ely) (Granary Books 1st Ed) ISBN 1-887123-04-0
• 1992 - Trialogues at the Edge of the West: Chaos, Creativity, and the Resacralization of the World (with Ralph H. Abraham, Rupert Sheldrake and Jean Houston) (Bear & Company Publishing 1st Ed) ISBN 0-939680-97-1
• 1993 - True Hallucinations: Being an Account of the Author’s Extraordinary Adventures in the Devil’s Paradise (HarperSanFrancisco 1st Ed) ISBN 0-06-250545-9
• 1994 - The Invisible Landscape (HarperSanFrancisco; Reprint edition) ISBN 0-06-250635-8
• 1998 - True Hallucinations & the Archaic Revival: Tales and Speculations About the Mysteries of the Psychedelic Experience (Fine Communications/MJF Books) (Hardbound) ISBN 1-56731-289-6
• 1998 - The Evolutionary Mind : Trialogues at the Edge of the Unthinkable (with Rupert Sheldrake and Ralph H. Abraham) (Trialogue Press; 1st Ed) ISBN 0-942344-13-8
• 1999 - Food of the Gods: A Radical History of Plants, Drugs, and Human Evolution (Rider & Co; New edition) ISBN 0-7126-7038-6
• 1999 - Robert Venosa: Illuminatus (with Robert Venosa, Ernst Fuchs, H. R. Giger, and Mati Klarwein) (Craftsman House) ISBN 90-5703-272-4
• 2001 - Chaos, Creativity, and Cosmic Consciousness (with Rupert Sheldrake and Ralph H. Abraham) (Park Street Press; revised ed) ISBN 0-89281-977-4 (Revised edition of Trialogues at the Edge of the West)
• 2005 - The Evolutionary Mind: Trialogues on Science, Spirit & Psychedelics (Monkfish Book Publishing; Revised Ed) ISBN 0-9749359-7-2

Spoken word[link]

• History Ends In Green: Gaia, Psychedelics and the Archaic Revival, 6 audiocassette set, Mystic Fire audio, 1993, ISBN 1-56176-907-X (recorded at the Esalen Institute, 1989)
• TechnoPagans at the End of History (transcription of rap with Mark Pesce from 1998)
• Psychedelics in the Age of Intelligent Machines (1999) 90 minutes video
• Alien Dreamtime with Spacetime Continuum & Stephen Kent (Magic Carpet Media) (CD) video
• Conversations on the Edge of Magic (1994) (CD & Cassette) ACE
• Rap-Dancing Into the Third Millennium (1994) (Cassette) (Re-issued on CD as The Quintessential Hallucinogen) ACE
• Packing For the Long Strange Trip (1994) (Cassette) ACE
• Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell, broadcast on May 22, 1997, Five hour interview covering various topics
• Global Perspectives and Psychedelic Poetics (1994) (Cassette) Sound Horizons Audio-Video, Inc.
• The Search for the Original Tree of Knowledge (1992) (Cassette) Sounds True

Discography[link]

• Re : Evolution with The Shamen (1992)
• Terence McKenna & Zuvuya - Dream Matrix Telemetry (1993)
• Alien Dreamtime with Spacetime Continuum & Stephen Kent (Magic Carpet Media) (DVD)
• 2009 - Cognition Factor (2009)

Notes[link]

• ^d Coe's initial date was "24 December 2011." He revised it to "11 January AD 2013" in the 1980 2nd edition of his book, ^[27] not settling on 23 December 2012 until the 1984 3rd edition.^[28] The correlation of b'ak'tun 13 as 21 December 2012 first appeared in Table B.2 of Robert J. Sharer's 1983 revision of the 4th edition of Sylvanus Morley's book The Ancient Maya.^[29]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to: Terence McKenna

• Terence McKenna Land at Deoxy.org
• Terence McKenna at Levity.com
• Erowid's Terence McKenna Vault
• Botanical Dimensions
• Rotten.com bio
• FloatingWorldWeb's McKenna Pages
• Terence McKenna's Last Trip 2000 Wired Magazine article by Erik Davis
• "Mind contagions" (2001) at disinfo.com
• Psychedelics, Evolution & Fun 2008 essay by Patrick Lundborg
• Machine Elves 101, or Why Terence McKenna Matters - Reallity Sandwish by Daniel Moler
• Transcription from 1991 interview regarding cannabis

Audio and video resources[link]

• Terence McKenna's interview Conducted by John Hazard in October 1998
• Audio and video archive at Deoxy.org
• Terence McKenna media archive at EROCx1.com
• FutureHi.net MP3 Downloads - Terence McKenna, Albert Hoffman, Robert Anton Wilson, and more
• McKenna at the 1999 Entheobotany Seminar - Audio Podcast
• Psychedelics in the Age of Intelligent Machines - Video samples from the 1999 DVD
• McKenna Video on FloatingWorldWeb - McKenna Video Portal
• Over 100 podcasts of Terence McKenna talks - Audio Podcast

Transcripts[link]

• MindofMcKenna - McKenna audio excerpts, transcriptions and quotes