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Re: ANTHRO-L Digest - 25 Oct 1995 to 26 Oct 1995
Ruby Rohrlich (rohrlich@GWIS2.CIRC.GWU.EDU)
Fri, 27 Oct 1995 22:14:20 -0400
I have always used "beast" as a synonym for"animal," although it is true
that when one human uses the wordto describ e another human, it
usually has a derogatory connotation, but that's true for the word
"animal" also, even though humans may acknowledge that we're animals but
they don't acknowledge that we're beasts, unless under specific negative
conditions. Ruby Rohrlich
On Fri, 27 Oct 1995, Marie E. Seitz wrote:
> In a message dated 95-10-27 00:12:50 EDT, Matthew Hill wrote:
>
> >The poor beast seems to have had a most unfortunate upbringing in the
> >home of a psychotherapist, Maurice Temerlin, who has written a book,
> >Lucy: Growing Up Human, about the experience. She was not returned
> >to Africa, since she was born in captivity...Peterson was extremely
> interested in Lucy >and writes, second hand, a bit about her experience. It
> does not include the anecdote >mentioned but does document Lucy's discontent
> with life in the bush and the heroic
> >efforts of Janis Carter to get her to adapt (Carter has an article in
> Smithsonian for June >88).
>
> Please, don't use the term "beast" to refer to chimps. They have much more in
> common with humans than most of us think. It is unfortunate that Temerlin did
> not think far enough in advance about what would become of Lucy after his
> research was finished (the same thing happened with Washoe, who was lucky
> enough to end up with Roger Fauts, also a psychologist). Returning her to the
> wild was a bad idea, as she believes herself to be a human, not a chimp. It
> is a problem when we are able to glean a little about how animals think and
> yet are not concerned with what is learned.
>
> Marie Papachatzis
> Dept. of Anthropology
> SUNY at Buffalo
>
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