Why do the lower primates nurture their young?  My mother didn't?
349546
My son says because all mothers are evil.
95133
A learned behavior from their mothers.
53112
Back to the old debate... nature or nurture?\nI think both, and the issue is a very complex one.
836762
Technically, we don't differ from primates since Homo sapiens are primates.  Monkeys, lemurs, apes and hominids all belong to the order Primates.   \n\nI'm assuming your question is "How do we differ from other primates?"  So, I'll answer that instead.  \n\nWe are unlike the other primates physically in that we do not have opposable thumbs on our feet.  Our hipbones are structured differently to facilitate vertical walking.  Due to this, unlike other primates, humans are the only obligatory bipedal primates.  One misconception is that humans are hairless relatives of apes.  In fact, we have just the number of hair follicles per square centimeter of skin that one would expect on an animal of our size.  It's just thought our hair is unpigmented and finer and shorter than most other animals so it's not as visible at a glance.    \n\nApart from physical characteristics, our advanced brain size and capacity exceeds that of lesser primates.  This allows us to have abstract thought and use logic and other ideas that lesser primates are capable of.  Our use of tools and external objects to compensate our physical shortcomings is unrivaled not only among other primates, but among all other organisms.  \n\nWe do have some common characteristics with primates.  After all, we are supposed to have descended from a common ancestor.  Like other primates, we have opposable thumbs on our hands.  Also, all primates have five fingers (not counting my old shop teacher, Mr. Windslow).  All primates have fingernails instead of claws, or other keratinous apendages.  In general, primates are social creatures.  All primates also have forward facing eyes, useful for depth perception.  Humans are similar to most primates in that we are both omnivorous, meaning that we have the physiology to eat and digest both plant matter and meat.
439368
So primates like yourself can make insignificant observations and feel proud of it.\n\nLook who's talking.
584222
A) the number of offspring-\nEven if you didnt know this, you could figure it out by the process of elimination, going from monkeys to apes (even including humans)- Primates have gotten bigger (apes are bigger in general than monkeys) apes (and humans) live longer than monkeys, apes (and humans) take many more years to raise children than monkeys, and apes (and humans) dont sexually mature for a very long time compared to monkeys- That only leaves (A).  If you think about it, apes and humans generally only have a single offspring at a time, at most one a year-thats about as decreased as you can get.  Of course, Elephants may only have one offspring ever, but they arent primates.
765726
The members of the ape families does this also, along with picking other orifices as well. Oh wait, I forgot, some consider us to have evolved from the ape.
541082
Ancient Behaviors Hard-Wired in Human Brain\n\nBy Robert Roy Britt\nLiveScience Senior Writer\n6 March 2005\n\nDon't blame your lame smile or lack of an intimidating frown on your upbringing, a new study suggests. Such behaviors may be hard-wired in your brain.\n\nScientists know many behaviors of lower organisms are innate. Ants instinctively follow other ants to a picnic basket. Birds operate largely on autopilot, dogs less so.\n\nIn people and monkeys, however, behavior is largely something learned, so researchers have assumed our hard-wiring is limited. If that's true, however, why do many reactions, such as aggression, play out the same among diverse populations around the world?\n\nScientists announced Tuesday they can elicit complex behaviors by stimulating specific areas in the brain of a small primate called the bush baby. Similar studies have been done on other primates.\n\n"We have now seen this feature in the brain of an Old World monkey and New World prosimian," said study leader Jon Kaas of Vanderbilt University. "The fact that it appears in the brains of two such divergent primates suggests that this form of organization evolved very early in the development of primates. That, in turn, suggests that it is characteristic of all primate brains, including the human brain."\n\nThe triggered behaviors include aggressive facial gestures, defensive arm movements, putting hand to mouth and other reaching and grasping movements -- all survival skills.\n\n"These results explain why certain behaviors – such as defensive and aggressive movements, smiling and grasping food – are so similar around the world," Kaas said. "It is because the instructions for these movements are built-in and not learned."\n\nThe results are detailed in the online edition of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
785777
Certain women are menstrual pacesetters.  Their sweat contains pheromones (which are scents that we humans can not consciously detect, but which send us signals nonetheless) that tell other women's bodies to cycle in synchronization with them.\n\nThey found this out, btw, by keeping absorbent pads under the arms of such women for a day, and then rubbing the pads on the upper lips of other women.  Yummy.  But it worked... about 80% of the women synchronized their cycles with their pacesetters.\n\nAs to why it works?  Harder to say.  It could be something like in rats, where if you have a bunch of female rats they all reproduce at the same time, so that the babies are all the same age and don't compete with one another.  Thus if one human mom loses her milk, or dies or something, the other moms with babies of the same age are able to pick up the slack.  Or it could be something totally other.  I don't mess with evolutionary psychology.
594431
1. There is no such thing as a "lower primate". Only creationists who are ignorant of evolutionary science would ever  use such a term. All organisms have been evolving for EXACTLY the same amount of time. There are no "lower" organisms.\n\n2. We are not simply the descendants of apes, we ARE apes. Humans are one of the 5 currently living great ape species. \n\n3. The most compelling evidence is in the degre of genetic homogeneity, with over 95% of genetic material shared between humans and the chimp species.
980943
The few monkeys I have known (ex-husbands not included) would chase anything, including themselves. I'm thinking it would, but wouldn't go around the bush...it'd go through!
634658
Ahhh...nature versus nurture!  Even the experts cannot say with certainty whether nature and your genetic makeup or your nurturing is what makes up the person. There have been studies done with twins who were raised apart, and found that the twins had MANY things that they did just alike, from little things such as which hand they used to open a letter to bigger things such as they body-type and coloring of the people they fell in love with!  There have also been many studies done as to how poverty, violence, drug/alcohol abuse, sexual/physical abuse and parental abandonment affects children, especially in the birth to age 4 range, and how this shows up in their later life as violence in men and self-abuse in women. So having said all this, I personally feel that it is a combination of both, and sometimes it is neither. There are always the stories of the family who did everything right and still wound up with a drug addicted child or a murderer or rapist on their hands. But if you take a 'normal' family and have them raise a child (by normal I mean average, honest, working, functioning people)you will by and large see differences in that child as compared to a child raised by a disfunctional, abusive, out of control, self-serving family.   Did this answer your question at all?
428481
Growing up with my mother and four sisters, we never once discussed our cycles, or where babies came from, or menapause.\n\nWe do now. In fact, its ALL we talk about. lol.
460939
I am the youngest of four, although 2 have since passed away. I was in a unique position because my parents were away from each other for many years. My oldest sister was 16 when I was born, my brother nearly 10, and my other sister almost 6. As a result, I didn't get to play with them as such, but they did become surrogate parents especially as my parents got older and less energetic. I was pretty well raised by them. My parents provided financial and physical support, but my siblings were the ones I went to with my problems. I don't think I grew up spoiled, I had to compete with nieces and nephews from an early age. As the youngest, the tables are turned now and my elderly parents need me. I still have the stamina I might not have had if I were older.
947194
Thanks to Eve, humanity got the opportunity to leave its childhood home, to explore and discover and learn and invent, to do the things that no other species can do.  Like any good mother, Eve made sure that we grew up.  \n\nOf course she's just a myth; but if she were real, we would all be forever in her debt.
943602
I caught the tail end of that show.  I did not know you could adopt one.  I thought the point of people not being able to keep them...was a good point also.  I did not know they lived so long.  Also the poor chimp that they took one of his vertebra's out.
261980
Hmm...monkeys are a tad not as smart as humans, they cannot speak, hairy, and extremely on the ugly side...humans are a bit more advanced, and i'll say that's your answer..:)