海角大神

Ecologist Carl Safina鈥檚 latest book focuses on the scarlet macaw, the sperm whale, and the chimpanzee, but his concerns range far more widely than a trio of animals. In 鈥淏ecoming Wild: How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty, and Achieve Peace,鈥� he writes about culture, the structures of societies, and what makes us who and what we are.聽

Safina鈥檚 three animals are cannily chosen for their variety: an enormous seagoing mammal, an exotic bird, and one of humanity鈥檚 closest genetic relatives. Safina has observed these animals in their natural settings; in addition to fascinating dispatches from the ethological front lines, large chunks of 鈥淏ecoming Wild鈥� also double as first-rate nature writing.

We meet chimpanzees, about which Safina warns against thinking about in purely human terms. 鈥淲e see in them partially formed prehumans caught between being and becoming, a harbinger of humankind,鈥� Safina writes, noting, 鈥淐himpanzees are not our ancestors; the last species ancestral to chimpanzees and humans is extinct. Chimps are our contemporaries. They are complete chimpanzees, not half-baked humans.鈥� It鈥檚 a theme sounded throughout the book.聽

The main reason for this caution is also one of the central endeavors of 鈥淏ecoming Wild鈥�: deconstructing the idea of human exceptionalism. For centuries, scientists and philosophers have pinned that exceptionalism on one thing after another: Humans are the only animals that have language, humans are the only animals that make tools, etc. These have all boiled down to the same notion, that only humans have culture.聽

Safina鈥檚 book shows what naturalists have known for centuries: Nothing could be further from the truth. Human beings have only recently begun to recognize the animal cultures around them. 鈥淗umans use language so much that it swamps our own ability to recognize subtle and not-subtle nonverbal signals that we ourselves continually display and respond to,鈥� Safina writes. 鈥淭he world is awash in layers and waves of communication.鈥�

鈥淏ecoming Wild鈥� teems with communication of all kinds, with complex, empathetic creatures solving the problems of their worlds. Some birds, Safina reminds his readers, have toolmaking skills equal to anything possessed by apes. 鈥淣ew Caledonia crows make hooked tools, something even chimpanzees don鈥檛 do,鈥� he writes. 鈥淎pes don鈥檛 have much, if anything, over macaws and ravens.鈥� Juvenile macaws spend years learning tool-fashioning聽from their parents. Sperm whale clans include each other in sonic webs extending over half the planet, webs full of syntax and vocabulary and even regional dialects. Chimpanzees mirror all the interpersonal complexity of humans.聽

Safina imparts a naturalist鈥檚 sense of unending wonder. 鈥淥ver the towering kapok tree shines one bright planet, the indelible sight of Venus above the Amazon,鈥� he writes at one point. Marveling at the sheer beauty of macaws, he asks, 鈥淗ow could such profligate colors exist? Why would birds evolve such beauty?鈥�

He also returns to the idea that humans are not the center of the universe. He recognizes that this makes some people uncomfortable. Among its many virtues, 鈥淏ecoming Wild鈥� eases such discomfort. It takes the concerns of Safina鈥檚 incredibly moving 2015 book, 鈥淏eyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel,鈥� and puts more faces on its聽common-sense revelations. One of those聽faces has a bright red cap of feathers; another is as long as your living room; and the third has expressions very like your own. All have cultures. All have societies. All are kin.