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...it Honestly Didn't Matter How We Humans Got To Be The Way We Are, Whether Evolution Or Special Creation Was Responsible. What Mattered And Mattered Desperately Was Our Future Development. Were We Going To Go On Destroying God's Creation, Fighting Each Other, Hurting The Other Creatures Of The His Planet?

-Jane Goodall

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...it Honestly Didn't Matter

Jane Goodall

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...it Honestly Didn't Matter How We Humans Got To Be The Way We Are, Whether Evolution Or Special Creation Was Responsible. What Mattered And Mattered Desperately Was Our Future Development. Were We Going To Go On Destroying God's Creation, Fighting Each Other, Hurting The Other Creatures Of The His Planet?

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The Greatest Danger To Our Future Is Apathy.

Lasting Change Is A Series Of Compromises. And Compromise Is All Right, As Long Your Values Don't Change.

One Cannot Watch Chimpanzee Infants For Long Without Realizing That They Have The Same Emotional Need For Affection And Reassurance As Human Children.

I Don't Even Think Of Chimps As Animals. I Think Of Them As Beings.

If We Kill Off The Wild, Then We Are Killing A Part Of Our Souls.

My Mission Is To Create A World Where We Can Live In Harmony With Nature.

If You Look Through All The Different Cultures. Right From The Earliest, Earliest Days With The Animistic Religions, We Have Sought To Have Some Kind Of Explanation For Our Life, For Our Being, That Is Outside Of Our Humanity.

One Thing I Had Learned From Watching Chimpanzees With Their Infants Is That Having A Child Should Be Fun.

It's Been Proven By Quite A Few Studies That Plants Are Good For Our Psychological Development. If You Green An Area, The Rate Of Crime Goes Down. Torture Victims Begin To Recover When They Spend Time Outside In A Garden With Flowers. So We Need Them, In Some Deep Psychological Sense, Which I Don't Suppose Anybody Really Understands Yet.

Here We Are, Arguably The Most Intelligent Being That's Ever Walked Planet Earth, With This Extraordinary Brain ... And Yet We're Destroying The Only Home We Have.

Whales, Like Elephants, Are So Social And Intelligent. This Hurts Me To Think Of Them Being Transported, Put In Noisy Airplanes, And Brought To A Horrible Concrete Pen When They're Supposed To Be Out In The Sea.

We Can't Leave People In Abject Poverty, So We Need To Raise The Standard Of Living For 80% Of The World's People, While Bringing It Down Considerably For The 20% Who Are Destroying Our Natural Resources.

We Have Language And They Do Not. Chimps Communicate By Embracing, Patting, Looking - All These Things. And They Have Lots Of Sounds. But They Cannot Sit And Discuss. They Cannot Teach About Things That Are Not Present, As Far As We Know.

That's What Keeps Me Going. Everywhere I Go There Are Young People With Shining Eyes Wanting To Tell Me, "dr. Jane, We're Going To Make The World A Better Place."

I've Learned That If You Want People To Join In Any Kind Of Conservation Effort, You Have To Help Them To Care With Their Hearts, Not Just Their Heads.

We Are Beginning To Learn That Each Animal Has A Life And A Place And A Role In This World. If We Place Compassion And Care In The Middle Of All Our Dealings With The Animal World And Honor And Respect Their Lives, Our Attitudes Will Change.

It Was Because The Chimps Are So Eye-catching, So Like Us And Teach Us So Much That My Work Was Recognised Worldwide.

Anyone Who Tries To Improve The Lives Of Animals Invariably Comes In For Criticism From Those Who Believe Such Efforts Are Misplaced In A World Of Suffering Humanity.

Our Brain Is Almost The Same As The Chimps', But We Have Language, We Have Electronic Communications, We've Put People On The Moon - We Are Immensely More Intelligent. And Yet: How Come The Being With The Most Extraordinary Intellect Ever Is Destroying Its Only Planet?

Chimps Are Brutal, And It Is So Deliberate. The Males Go Out And Get Near The Boundary Of Their Territory. And They Walk Very Silently Trying Hard Not To Make Any Noise. They Will Climb Into A Tree And Stare Out Over Hostile Territory For Hours. They Are Waiting For The Right Opportunity. And Then They Attack.

You're Thinking About Putting Scientists Into Small Cages And Doing Research On Them. I Wish It Could Happen Sometimes.

I Like Some Animals More Than Some People, Some People More Than Some Animals.

There Would Be Very Little Point In My Exhausting Myself And Other Conservationists Themselves In Trying To Protect Animals And Habitats If We Weren't At The Same Time Raising Young People To Be Better Stewards.

Your Life Matters. You Can't Live Through A Day Without Making An Impact On The World. And What's Most Important Is To Think About The Impact Of Your Actions On The World Around You.

Other People Have Talked About Chimpanzees Being A Window Into The Past, Which I Suppose Is True, In A Way.

We Have Turned Away From The Natural World. Instead, It's All About Money And Power.

Money And Power

Is It Not Possible That The Chimpanzees Are Responding To Some Feeling Like Awe? A Feeling Generated By The Mystery Of Water; Water That Seems Alive, Always Rushing Past Yet Never Going, Always The Same Yet Ever Different. Was It Perhaps Similar Feelings Of Awe That Gave Rise To The First Animistic Religions, The Worship Of The Elements And The Mysteries Of Nature Over Which There Was No Control? Only When Our Prehistoric Ancestors Developed Language Would It Have Been Possible To Discuss Such Internal Feelings And Create A Shared Religion.

If Plants Could Be Credited With Reasoning Powers, We Would Marvel At The Imaginative Ways They Bribe Or Ensnare Other Creatures To Carry Out Their Wishes.

My Favorite Animals Are Dogs.

What You Do Makes A Difference, And You Have To Decide What Kind Of Difference You Want To Make.

The Refugees Flee To Protect Their Families From Violence; The Europeans, On The Other Hand, Fear For Their Jobs That They Need To Feed Their Families.

Just Remember--if You Are Really And Truly Determined To Work With Animals, Somehow, Either Now Or Later, You Will Find A Way To Do It. But You Have To Want It Desperately, Work Hard, Take Advantage Of An Opportunity--and Never Give Up.

It's Not That Humans And Non-humans Are Identical... But The Lack Of Understanding That Led To The Slave Trade Is The Same Lack Of Understanding Many People Have About Animals Today. When Slaves Were Brought Over From Africa, Many People Believed They Were Not Humans, That They Didn't Have Feelings. Many People Believe That Primates And Other Animals Don't Have Feelings, Too, But They Do.

I Always Loved Animals. And When I Was Ten, I Decided I Had To Go To Africa And Live With Animals And Write Books About Them.

I've Got Different Ideas Of Complete Happiness. But One Is Being By Myself Out In A Forest, Completely Happy. Another Is Walking With A Dog In Some Nice Place. And Three Is Sitting Around Preferably A Fire, But Not Necessarily, And Drinking Red Wine With Friends And Telling Stories.

It Made Me Feel Particularly Sickened To Know That This Kind Of Callous Attitude Toward Animals Is Repeated Again And Again In Laboratories Around This Country.

As A Child, We Couldn't Afford Holidays Overseas, So Instead I Travelled Through Books. I Was Inspired By Dr Dolittle And Tarzan.

If You Look Into Their [chimpanzees] Eyes, You Know You're Looking Into A Thinking Mind. They Teach Us That We Are Not The Only Beings With Personalities, Minds Capable Of Rational Thought, Altruism And A Sense Of Humor. That Leads To New Respect For Other Animals, Respect For The Environment And Respect For All Life.

The Only Possible Way To Get Somebody To Change Is To Reach Into Their Hearts.

I Thought My Life Was Mapped Out. Research, Living In The Forest, Teaching And Writing. But In '86 I Went To A Conference And Realised The Chimpanzees Were Disappearing. I Had Worldwide Recognition And A Gift Of Communication. I Had To Use Them.

But Let Us Not Forget That Human Love And Compassion Are Equally Deeply Rooted In Our Primate Heritage, And In This Sphere Too Our Sensibilities Are Of A Higher Order Of Magnitude Than Those Of Chimpanzees.

I Wanted To Talk To The Animals Like Dr. Dolittle.

Chimps Are Very Quick To Have A Sudden Fight Or Aggressive Episode, But They're Equally As Good At Reconciliation.

We Could Change The World Tomorrow If All The Millions Of People Around The World Acted The Way They Believe.

I'm Highly Political. I Spend An Awful Lot Of Time In The U.s. Trying To Influence Decision-makers. But I Don't Feel In Tune With British Politics.

I Never Wanted To Give Up. I Thought I Might Have To. Especially At The Beginning When Chimpanzees Had Never Seen A White Person Before.they Gave One Look At Me And Ran Away! They Were Scared, But Eventually I Got Their Trust.

I Believe That Accurate Knowledge Is Very, Very Important, But Find That Out In Free Time. Don't Let It Take Over Every Hour Of The Day. Perhaps Most Important, Talk About It.

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? 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.

I Do Not Want To Discuss Evolution In Such Depth, However, Only Touch On It From My Own Perspective: From The Moment When I Stood On The Serengeti Plains Holding The Fossilized Bones Of Ancient Creatures In My Hands To The Moment When, Staring Into The Eyes Of A Chimpanzee, I Saw A Thinking, Reasoning Personality Looking Back. You May Not Believe In Evolution, And That Is All Right. How We Humans Came To Be The Way We Are Is Far Less Important Than How We Should Act Now To Get Out Of The Mess We Have Made For Ourselves.

Realize That Change - Whilst We Want It To Happen Fast - Is Usually The Result Of A Great Deal Of Work, And Often Comes As A Result Of A Series Of Compromises (so Long As We Do Not Compromise Our Values).

I Had Been Told From School Onwards That The Best Definition Of A Human Being Was Man The Tool-maker - Yet I Had Just Watched A Chimp Tool-maker In Action. I Remember That Day As Vividly As If It Was Yesterday.

We, As Humans, Have Actually Developed A Sense Of Social Responsibility. We Have Gone Beyond Our Basic Instincts.

The Least I Can Do Is Speak Out For The Hundreds Of Chimpanzees Who, Right Now, Sit Hunched, Miserable And Without Hope, Staring Out With Dead Eyes From Their Metal Prisons. They Cannot Speak For Themselves.

Primates Are Very Territorial. It Is In Their Nature To Protect Their Food Resources As Well As Their Females And Young.

If Only We Can Overcome Cruelty, To Human And Animal, With Love And Compassion We Shall Stand At The Threshold Of A New Era In Human Moral And Spiritual Evolution - And Realize, At Last, Our Most Unique Quality: Humanity.

I Wasn't Trying To Be A Scientist. I Only Ever Wanted To Be A Naturalist, Like A David Attenborough.

At Some Point, My Body Will Collapse. But I Hope That My Brain Will Still Be Working So That I Can Carry On With Writing.

People Don't Believe That Their Actions Really And Truly Are Going To Make A Difference. But Kids Get It. They Know. And They Get All Excited About The Difference They're Making.

Thousands Of People Who Say They "love" Animals Sit Down Once Or Twice A Day To Enjoy The Flesh Of Creatures Who Have Been Utterly Deprived Of Everything That Could Make Their Lives Worth Living And Who Endured The Awful Suffering And The Terror Of The Abattoirs...

Animals Have Personalities And Minds And Emotions.

It Is These Undeniable Qualities Of Human Love And Compassion And Self-sacrifice That Give Me Hope For The Future. We Are, Indeed, Often Cruel And Evil. Nobody Can Deny This. We Gang Up On Each One Another, We Torture Each Other, With Words As Well As Deeds, We Fight, We Kill. But We Are Also Capable Of The Most Noble, Generous, And Heroic Behavior.

It's Not Africa That Is Destroying The African Rainforest, It's Selling Concessions To Timber Companies That Are Not African, They Are From The Developed World - Japan, America, Germany, Britain.

Researchers Find It Very Necessary To Keep Blinkers On. They Don't Want To Admit That The Animals They Are Working With Have Feelings. They Don't Want To Admit That They Might Have Minds And Personalities Because That Would Make It Quite Difficult For Them To Do What They Do; So We Find That Within The Lab Communities There Is A Very Strong Resistance Among The Researchers To Admitting That Animals Have Minds, Personalities And Feelings.

We Have A Responsibility Toward The Other Life-forms Of Our Planet Whose Continued Existence Is Threatened By The Thoughtless Behavior Of Our Own Human Species. . . . Environmental Responsibility – For If There Is No God, Then, Obviously, It Is Up To Us To Put Things Right.

The Most Important Thing Is To Actually Think About What You Do. To Become Aware And Actually Think About The Effect Of What You Do On The Environment And On Society. That's Key, And That Underlies Everything Else.

It Would Be Absolutely Useless For Any Of Us To Work To Save Wildlife Without Working To Educate The Next Generation Of Conservationists.

I Think The Most Important Thing To Do Is To Be Willing To Listen, Willing To Care, And Willing To Admit Mistakes And Change Your Ways For The Better!

We Have To Create More And More Vegetarians, And Help People To Understand That It Is Not Only The Suffering Of The Animals (which Is What Made Me Vegetarian) But Also The Incredible Harm To The Environment, The Tremendous Amount Of Greenhouse Gas Created By The Whole Vast Machinery Of Intensive Animal Farming.

My Hope For The Future Is That We Learn Wisdom Again.

Hope For The Future

The Problem Of The Chimps Is That They Can Only Sit And Look. They Can't Discuss What They Feel. All That Feeling Is Trapped Within Each One.

It May Sound Trite, But Young People Really Are The Future.

Change Happens By Listening And Then Starting A Dialogue With The People Who Are Doing Something You Don't Believe Is Right.

As Thy Days, So Shall Thy Strength Be.

I Believe That We Have More Capability Than Any Other Creature To Control Our Biological Inheritance - And We Do So Most Of The Time.

If We Start With Chimpanzees, They Differ From Us With The Composition Of The Dna By Only Just Over One Percent. So, As Far As Genetics Go, We're Almost Identical. The Composition Of The Blood, The Immune System, The Structure Of The Brain - Almost Identical.

Being Evil Is Something That Only Humans Are Capable Of.

My Mother Always Taught Us That If People Don't Agree With You, The Important Thing Is To Listen To Them. But If You've Listened To Them Carefully And You Still Think That You're Right, Then You Must Have The Courage Of Your Convictions.

Animals Are As Deserving Of A Place On This Planet As We Are, And The Difference Between Us Is That Humans Have A Voice They Can Use To Help The Animal Cause, And It Is Up To All Of Us To Use It To Make A Positive Difference!

We Now Know That The Structure Of The Dna In Humans And Chimpanzees Differs By Only Just Over One Percent. You Could Even Have A Blood Transfusion From A Chimp, Provided You Have The Same Blood Group.

Chimpanzees Have Given Me So Much. The Long Hours Spent With Them In The Forest Have Enriched My Life Beyond Measure. What I Have Learned From Them Has Shaped My Understanding Of Human Behavior, Of Our Place In Nature.

We Are Unique. Chimpanzees Are Unique. Dogs Are Unique. But We Humans Are Just Not As Different As We Used To Think.

Young People, When Informed And Empowered, When They Realize That What They Do Truly Makes A Difference, Can Indeed Change The World.

Making A Difference

If You Really Want Something, And Really Work Hard, And Take Advantage Of Opportunities, And Never Give Up, You Will Find A Way.. Follow Your Dreams.

I Have Found That To Love And Be Loved Is The Most Empowering And Exhilarating Of All Human Emotions.

I Sometimes Wonder How Some People Can Live With Themselves In Some Of The Big Companies Today. So Many Far-reaching Decisions Are Based On How They Will Affect The Next Shareholders' Meeting.

Science Demands Objective Factual Evidence - Proof; Spiritual Experience Is Subjective And Leads To Faith.

Just Think Of The Trust That Often Exists In Soldiers. Within Their Own Unit, You Could Say They Have To Trust Each Other. A Spirit Of Camaraderie Builds Up And, In The End, They Will Risk Their Lives For Each Other. They May Even Go So Far As To Dehumanise The Other, Enemy Group - A Mechanism You Can Also Observe In Chimps.

We, As Humans, Have Actually Developed A Sense Of Social Responsibility. We Have Gone Beyond Our Basic Instincts. We Can And We Do. This Is What Sets Us Apart From The Chimps. They Are Extremely Brutal And Hostile. Your Next Door Neighbor Is To Be Killed Unless She Is A Juicy Young Female, Who Hasn't Yet Had Her First Baby, In Which Case You Want Her.

The Soul Of Money Is An Inspired And Utterly Fascinating Book. It Will Change The Way You Think About Money. ... It Is A Book For Everyone Who Would Like To Make The World A Better Place.

If You Do Microcredit With Men, They Tend To Quickly Drink It. They Don't Pay You Back.

Without The Heart To Ground It And Open It To Who We Really Can Be As Human Beings, The Brain Is A Very Dangerous Machine. A Machine That Is Saying: We've Got To Have Economic Growth; We've Got To Have Unending Economic Growth, Otherwise Societies Will Collapse. And Yet There Should Be Something Saying: Wait A Minute, This Isn't Going To Work.

The More We Learn Of The True Nature Of Non-human Animals, Especially Those With Complex Brains And Corresponding Complex Social Behavior, The More Ethical Concerns Are Raised Regarding Their Use In The Service Of Man - Whether This Be In Entertainment, As "pets," For Food, In Research Laboratories, Or Any Of The Other Uses To Which We Subject Them.

I Had This Wonderful, Supportive Mother Who Didn't Get Mad Because Of All The Earth Mucking Up My Bed. She Just Said They'd Die - They Needed The Earth.

There Is A Lot Of Corruption All Over The World And Not Only When It Comes To Illegal Wildlife Trade! There Are A Few Ways To Ensure This Stops: If There Are No Customers, There Will Be No Trade.

In What Terms Should We Think Of These Beings, Nonhuman Yet Possessing So Very Many Human-like Characteristics? How Should We Treat Them? Surely We Should Treat Them With The Same Consideration And Kindness As We Show To Other Humans; And As We Recognize Human Rights, So Too Should We Recognize The Rights Of The Great Apes? Yes.

But Does That Mean That War And Violence Are Inevitable? I Would Argue Not Because We Have Also Evolved This Amazingly Sophisticated Intellect, And We Are Capable Of Controlling Our Innate Behavior A Lot Of The Time.

You Cannot Share Your Life With A Dog, As I Had Done In Bournemouth, Or A Cat, And Not Know Perfectly Well That Animals Have Personalities And Minds And Feelings.

You Better Not Mess With Chimps. They Are Much Stronger Than Humans.

I Didn't Want To Become A Professor Or Get Tenure Or Teach Or Anything. All I Wanted To Do Was Get A Degree Because Louis Leakey Said I Needed One, Which Was Right, And Once I Succeeded I Could Get Back To The Field.

We Seem To Have Lost The Wisdom Of The Indigenous People, Which Dictated That In Any Major Decision, The First Consideration Was 'how Will This Decision We're Making Today Affect Our People In The Future? These Days, Decisions Are Made Based On The Bottom Line.

We Are Always Talking About How We Can Get More Environmental And Humanitarian Education. It Is About Listening To The Voice Of Young People - How They Feel, And What Would Be Most Meaningful For Them.

I Don't Spend That Much Time Being Introspective, Believe It Or Not. All I Know Is That I Grew Up Not Questioning God Because That's How You Are. God Was There Like The Birds And The Wind.

In Tanzania, The Chimps Are Isolated In A Very Tiny Patch Of Forest. I Flew Over It 13 Years Ago And Realized That, Basically, All The Trees Had Gone, That People All Around The Park Are Struggling To Survive. It Became Very Clear That There Was No Way To Protect The Chimps While The People Were In This Dire Circumstance.

I Feel A Desperation To Make People See What We Are Doing To The Environment, What A Mess We Are Making Of Our World. At This Point, The More People I Reach, The More I Accomplish. ... I Miss Gombe And My Wonderful Years In The Forest But If I Were To Go Back To That, I Wouldn't Feel I Was Doing What I Should Be Doing.

Words Can Be Said In Bitterness And Anger, And Often There Seems To Be An Element Of Truth In The Nastiness. And Words Don't Go Away, They Just Echo Around.

I Started As - Well, I Wanted To Be Poet Laureate. And I Wanted To Be A Naturalist. That's How I Began. I Didn't Have Any Desire To Go And Be A Scientist. Louis Leakey Channeled Me There. I'm Delighted He Did. I Love Science. I Love Analyzing And Making Sense Of All These Observations. So, It Was The Perfect Rounding Off Of Who I Was Into Who I Am.

When I Was A Child, The African Forest Sounded Like A Dream To Me, Because It Was Full Of Animals And It Was Wild.

You May Not Believe In Evolution, And That Is All Right. How We Humans Came To Be The Way We Are Is Far Less Important Than How We Should Act Now To Get Out Of The Mess We Have Made For Ourselves.

Some Humans Are Mathematicians-others Aren't.

To Me, Trees Are Living Beings And They Have Their Own Sort Of Personalities.

Above All We Must Realize That Each Of Us Makes A Difference With Our Life. Each Of Us Impacts The World Around Us Every Single Day. We Have A Choice To Use The Gift Of Our Life To Make The World A Better Place - Or Not To Bother

I See That Within Each Human Being There Are Two Extremes: There's The Loving, The Passionate, Altruistic Side That Has Evolved With Us, And Then There's The Violent, Brutal Side That Has Evolved With Us. The Question For Each Individual Is: Which Side Is Going To Come Out On Top?

I Want To Change Awareness.

We Have The Choice To Use The Gift Of Our Life To Make The World A Better Place--or Not To Bother

Of Course Animals Have A Personality And Emotions.

Some People Actually Do Not Like Animals - Hard For Me To Understand, But True.

I Just Have This Absolute Belief That Humans Are Moving Away From Cruelty And Destruction Towards A Time When We Can Truly Live In Harmony With Nature. When We Understand That There Is A Spiritual Power Around Us From Which We Can Draw Strength. That Is Where I Believe Human Destiny Ultimately Is Taking Us. I Just Hope We Have Time.

To Me, Cruelty Is The Worst Of Human Sins. Once We Accept That A Living Creature Has Feelings And Suffers Pain, Then By Knowingly And Deliberately Inflicting Suffering On That Creature, We Are Guilty, Whether It Be Human Or Animal.

Every Stage Of My Life Set The Scene For The Next, And At Each Point All I Had To Do Was Say "yes" And Not Think Too Much About The Consequences.

Most Africans Don't Get To See These Wild Animals At All. Once They See And Learn About Them, They Are Much More Likely To Become Involved In Protecting The Environment.

Every Single Day, We Could Be In A Motorcar Accident, So, We Have To Carry On With Our Lives, And Not Imagine Terror Around Every Corner.

Successful Actors And Actresses Have To Get Themselves Into Their Roles Before Acting. Therefore, You Need To Really Care About What You Are Saying.

The Tree I Had In The Garden As A Child, My Beech Tree, I Used To Climb Up There And Spend Hours. I Took My Homework Up There, My Books, I Went Up There If I Was Sad, And It Just Felt Very Good To Be Up There Among The Green Leaves And The Birds And The Sky.

We're The Ones Who Can Make A Difference. If We Lead Lives Where We Consciously Leave The Lightest Possible Ecological Footprints, If We Buy The Things That Are Ethical For Us To Buy And Don't Buy The Things That Are Not, We Can Change The World Overnight.

Making A Difference

I Believe That The Tragedy [like Terror Attack] That's Caused So Much Grief And Suffering To So Many Thousands And Thousands Of People Has Also Served As A Call To Action, Because Many People Now Are Re-examining Their Own Value Systems, And The Churches, Temples, Mosques And Cathedrals Are Packed To Overflowing For The First Time In Years.

There Isn't A Sharp Line Dividing Humans From The Rest Of The Animal Kingdom. All The Time, We Find Animals Doing Things That, In Our Arrogance, We Thought Were Just Human.

I Believe The Only Hope For Mankind Lies In The Hands Of Our Young People.

Cultural Speciation Had Been Crippling To Human Moral And Spiritual Growth. It Had Hindered Freedom Of Thought, Limited Our Thinking, Imprisoned Us In The Cultures Into Which We Had Been Born. . . . These Cultural Mind Prisons. . . . Cultural Speciation Was Clearly A Barrier To World Peace. So Long As We Continued To Attach More Importance To Our Own Narrow Group Membership Than To The ‘global Village’ We Would Propagate Prejudice And Ignorance.

Become As Knowledgeable As Possible.

Researchers Find It Very Necessary To Keep Blinkers On. They Don't Want To Admit That The Animals They Are Working With Have Feelings.

From My Perspective, I Absolutely Believe In A Greater Spiritual Power, Far Greater Than I Am, From Which I Have Derived Strength In Moments Of Sadness Or Fear. That's What I Believe, And It Was Very, Very Strong In The Forest.

Maternal Behavior Helps When You Have To Be Patient With Nonverbal Creatures.

You Can't Do Everything. You Can't Do Health And Forestry And Agriculture. You've Got To Focus And Do One Or The Other.

Farm Animals Feel Pleasure And Sadness, Excitement And Resentment, Depression, Fear, And Pain. They Are Far More Aware And Intelligent Than We Ever Imagined...they Are Individuals In Their Own Right.

I Shouldn't Have Named The Chimps. It Wasn't Scientific. I Didn't Know. I Knew Nothing. And Worse Sin Of All Was That I Was Ascribing To Them Emotions Like Happiness, Sadness And So Forth.

People Say, "oh, We Ought To Fight For Animal Rights." We Fought For Human Rights, But Even If Humans Have Rights, They Can Still Be Horribly Abused And Are Every Day. You Don't Have To Go To Some Far Off Land, Far Away Place; We Have A Lot Of Child Abuse In Our Own Society.

Every Individual Matters. Every Individual Has A Role To Play. Every Individual Makes A Difference.

Even Chimps Understand The Concept - If A Troop Of Chimps Enters A Fruit Tree, They Will Only Pick The Fruits That Are Ripe And Leave The Others Growing. That Is Sustainability.

Every Individual Matters And Has A Role To Play In This Life On Earth.

They Used To Ask: "how Will This Decision That We Make Today Affect Our People In The Future?" Now We Make Decisions Based On: "how Does It Affect Me, Now? How Does It Affect The Next Shareholders Meeting, Three Months Ahead? How Does It Affect My Next Political Campaign?"

I Had A Wonderful Teacher About Animal Behavior.

The Voice Of The Natural World Would Be, "could You Please Give Us Space And Leave Us Alone To Get Along With Our Own Lives And Our Own Ways, Because We Actually Know Much Better How To Do It Then When You Start Interfering."

I Would Never Say I Was An Icon, But So Many People Have Said I Am, So I Suppose I Am. I Mean, I Can't Not Be What Everyone Says I Am. But I Don't Feel Like An Icon.

We Learn The Social Norms Of Our Society And Modify Our Behaviour Accordingly.

I'm Always Pushing For Human Responsibility. Given That Chimpanzees And Many Other Animals Are Sentient And Sapient, Then We Should Treat Them With Respect.

I Wouldn't Even Like To Begin To Define God - I Have Absolutely No Idea. But What I Feel, And What Touches Me, Is A Great Spiritual Power, Which I Don't Even Want To Name. If I Had To, I Would Say God, Because I Don't Know Any Other.

Never Be Arrogant Or Abrasive. Treat Your Opponent Respectfully If They Really And Truly Believe They Are Right.

I Am Obstinate And I Will Not Give In.

When I Began In 1960, Individuality Wasn't An Accepted Thing To Look For; It Was About Species-specific Behaviour. But Animal Behaviour Is Not Hard Science. There's Room For Intuition.

I Have Never Had An Animal That Didn't Have A Personality, One Differing From Another.

Without The Support Of Local People, You Might As Well Give Up Because You Can Make All The Noise You Like, You Can Demarcate A National Park, But If The People Outside Want To Go Creeping Into A Forest You Really Can't Stop Them. They've Got To Get A Benefit.

You Have To Realise That Touching Is A Real Violation Of Personal Space.

I Think The Most Important Thing Is To Keep Active, And To Hope That Your Mind Stays Active.

A Book Came Out Recently Written By Scientists And Environmentalists That Made Me So Angry. It Said The Only Thing We Have To Worry About Is Big Industry. Each Individual Who Tries To Make His Or Her Own Environment Better Is Useless. I Find This Criminal, Because Then You Have A Billion People All Saying, It Doesn't Matter What I Do Because I'm Just One Person. But If You Turn That Around And A Billion People Say, What I Do Does Make A Difference, Then It Will Make A Difference.

Chimpanzees Can Be Quite Political.

One Individual Cannot Possible Make A Difference, Alone. It Is Individual Efforts, Collectively, That Makes A Noticeable Difference - All The Difference In The World!

Individual Effort

Making A Difference

Today It Is Generally Accepted That Although The Earliest Humans Probably Ate Some Meat, It Was Unlikely To Have Played A Major Role In Their Diet. Plants Would Have Been A Much More Important Source Of Food.

...it Honestly Didn't Matter How We Humans Got To Be The Way We Are, Whether Evolution Or Special Creation Was Responsible. What Mattered And Mattered Desperately Was Our Future Development. Were We Going To Go On Destroying God's Creation, Fighting Each Other, Hurting The Other Creatures Of The His Planet?

I Had Never Been Able To Believe That God Would Give Us Poor Frail Humans Only One Chance At Making It -- That We Would Be Assigned To Some Kind Of Hell Because We Failed During One Experience Of Mortal Life. ... So The Concepts Of Karma And Reincarnation Made Logical Sense To Me.

I Learnt From Flo How To Be Mother. Flo Was Patient, Tolerant. She Was Supportive. She Was Always There. She Was Playful. She Enjoyed Having Her Babies, As Good Mothers Do.

People Say To Me So Often, 'jane How Can You Be So Peaceful When Everywhere Around You People Want Books Signed, People Are Asking These Questions And Yet You Seem Peaceful,' And I Always Answer That It Is The Peace Of The Forest That I Carry Inside.

I Don't Care Two Hoots About Civilization. I Want To Wander In The Wild.

To Reconnect With Nature Is Key If We Want To Save The Planet.

It's Not A Pretty Picture, But There Are Reasons For Hope.

There Are An Awful Lot Of Scientists Today Who Believe That Before Very Long We Shall Have Unraveled All The Secrets Of The Universe. There Will Be No Puzzles Anymore. To Me, It'd Be Really, Really Tragic Because I Think One Of The Most Exciting Things Is This Feeling Of Mystery, Feeling Of Awe, The Feeling Of Looking At A Little Live Thing And Being Amazed By It And How It Has Emerged Through These Hundreds Of Years Of Evolution And There It Is And It Is Perfect And Why.

You Aren't Going To Save The World On Your Own. But You Might Inspire A Generation Of Kids To Save It For All Of Us. You Would Be Amazed At What Inspired Children Can Do.

Even In Chimps There Is True Altruistic Behaviour; Behaviour That Doesn't Fit Into The Sociobiological Model That Says You Either Help A Close Relative And Thereby Your Own Genes, Or You Help Somebody Else Now In Return For Their Help In The Future. When A Very High-ranking Male Chimpanzee Rescues A Little Orphan, Saving His Life, That Kind Of Explanation Doesn't Work.

It's The Bond Between Mother And Child, Which Is Really For Us And For Chimps And Other Primates, The Root Of All The Expressions Of Social Behavior.

So Long As We Continued To Attach More Importance To Our Own Narrow Group Membership Than To The 'global Village' We Would Propagate Prejudice And Ignorance. There Was Absolutely No Harm In Being Part Of A Small Group - Indeed, With Our Hunter-gatherer Band Mentality It Gave Comfort, Provided Us With An Inner Circle Of Friends Who Could Be Utterly Trusted, Who Were Absolutely Reliable. It Helped Give Us Peace Of Mind. The Danger Came Only From Drawing That Sharp Line, Digging That Ditch, Laying That Minefield, Between Our Own Group And Any Other Group That Thought Differently.

Certainly The First True Humans Were Unique By Virtue Of Their Large Brains. It Was Because The Human Brain Is So Large When Compared With That Of A Chimpanzee That Paleontologists For Years Hunted For A Half-ape, Half-human Skeleton That Would Provide A Fossil Link Between The Human And The Ape.

Chimps Are Unbelievably Like Us - In Biological, Non-verbal Ways. They Can Be Loving And Compassionate And Yet They Have A Dark Side... 98 Per Cent Of Our Dna Is The Same. The Difference Is That We Have Developed Language - We Can Teach About Things That Aren't There, Plan For The Future, Discuss, Share Ideas

Each One Of Us Matters, Has A Role To Play, And Makes A Difference. Each One Of Us Must Take Responsibility For Our Own Lives, And Above All, Show Respect And Love For Living Things Around Us, Especially Each Other.

I Think The Best Evenings Are When We Have Messages, Things That Make Us Think, But We Can Also Laugh And Enjoy Each Other's Company.

I Believe Sharing Stories And Experiences Is The Best Way To Teach People To Empathize!

There Have Been Too Many Events In My Life, And In The Lives Of My Friends, Which Have Defied Any Kind Of Scientific Explanation. Science Does Not Have Appropriate Tools For The Dissection Of The Spirit.

If We Do Not Do Something To Help These Creatures, We Make A Mockery Of The Whole Concept Of Justice.

I Am Living In The Africa I Have Always Longed For, Always Felt Stirring In My Blood.

As Human Beings, We Can Encompass A Vague Feeling Of What The Universe Is, And All In This Funny Little Brain Here - So There Has To Be Something More Than Just Brain, It Has To Be Something To Do With Spirit As Well.

Someday We Shall Look Back On This Dark Era Of Agriculture And Shake Our Heads. How Could We Have Ever Believed That It Was A Good Idea To Grow Our Food With Poisons?

There Are Many Animal-welfare Groups That Sometimes Seem To Forget That Human Beings Are Animals Too, That We Need To Include Them In Our Sphere Of Compassion.

I Think I'd Like To Be Remembered As Someone Who Really Helped People To Have A Little Humility And Realize That We Are Part Of The Animal Kingdom Not Separated From It.

I Think We Must Cling To The Hope That We Can See In The Great Heroism, The Bravery Of The Firemen And Policemen, And The Outpouring Of Caring And Concern That Has Come Pouring In From Around The World.

What Makes Us Human, I Think, Is An Ability To Ask Questions, A Consequence Of Our Sophisticated Spoken Language.

I Don't Have Any Idea Of Who Or What God Is. But I Do Believe In Some Great Spiritual Power. 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.

Women Tend To Be More Intuitive, Or To Admit To Being Intuitive, And Maybe The Hard Science Approach Isn't So Attractive. The Way That Science Is Taught Is Very Cold. I Would Never Have Become A Scientist If I Had Been Taught Like That.

Chimpanzees, Gorillas, Orangutan Shave Been Living For Hundreds Of Thousands Of Years In Their Forest,living Fantastic Lives, Never Overpopulating, Never Destroying The Forest. I Would Say That They Have Been In A Way More Successful Than Us As Far As Being In Harmony With The Environment.

A Sense Of Calm Came Over Me. More And More Often I Found Myself Thinking, "this Is Where I Belong. This Is What I Came Into This World To Do.

I Urge You To Read Eternal Treblinka And Think Deeply About Its Important Message.

When I Go Back To Gombe It's To Be In That Timeless World Where It's Soft And Where Life Is Entwined And You Actually See The Pattern Of Nature. I Always Feel This Great Spiritual Power Which I Believe Is Around.

I Get Upset When So Many People Say There Are All Sorts Of Problems In Africa And India Where They Have These Big Families. They Don't Realize That 10 Children In Rural Tanzania Will Use Less Natural Resources In A Year Than One Middle Class American Child. People Don't Think Like That.

I Don't Think That Faith, Whatever You're Being Faithful About, Really Can Be Scientifically Explained. And I Don't Want To Explain This Whole Life Business Through Truth, Science. There's So Much Mystery. There's So Much Awe.

Of Course We're All Programmed Genetically To Some Extent. But The "selfish Gene" Thesis Doesn't Explain Everything.

I Had A Wonderful Teacher About Animal Behavior - My Dog Rusty. He Taught Me That Animals Have Personalities, Minds, And Feelings.

Louis [leakey] Was Anxious To Initiate A Scientific Study Of These Chimpanzees. It Would Be Difficult, He Emphasized, For Nothing Was Known; There Were No Guidelines For Such A Field Study; And The Habitat Was Remote And Rugged. Dangerous Wild Animals Would Be Living There, And Chimpanzees Themselves Were Considered At Least Four Times Stronger Than Humans. I Remember Wondering What Kind Of Scientist He Would Find For Such A Herculean Task.

Well, In Some Ways We're Not Successful At All. We're Destroying Our Home. That's Not A Bit Successful.

Having Respect For Animals Makes Us Better Humans.

I Cannot Remember A Time When I Did Not Want To Go To Africa To Study Animals.

I Was Even Accused Of Teaching The Chimps How To Fish For Termites Which I Mean That Would Have Been Such A Brilliant Coup.

Words Can Enhance Experience, But They Can Also Take So Much Away. We See An Insect And At Once We Abstract Certain Characteristics And Classify It - A Fly. And In That Very Cognitive Exercise, Part Of The Wonder Is Gone. Once We Have Labeled The Things Around Us We Do Not Bother To Look At Them So Carefully. Words Are Part Of Our Rational Selves, And To Abandon Them For A While Is To Give Freer Reign To Our Intuitive Selves.

And I Thought How Sad It Was That, For All Our Sophisticated Intellect, For All Our Noble Aspirations, Our Aggressive Behavior Was Not Just Similar In Many Ways To That Of The Chimpanzees - It Was Even Worse. Worse Because Human Beings Have The Potential To Rise Above Their Baser Instincts, Whereas Chimpanzees Probably Do Not.

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