Don’t get me wrong, this is very interesting, but there is something very funny about the idea that “give a chimpanzee stuff and see if they like it” is academic research.
This could absolutely be a headline on The Onion.
Sure seems stupid on first glance but most science seems pointless. It’s only when several loosely interconnected ideas that prove something MIGHT be commercially viable do we find out that it was the first curious question that … again seems stupid… was the seed of inivation
What are some examples of questions that at first seemed stupid yet became brilliant when connected with other seemingly stupid ideas?
Rather than a singular "question" that seems stupid, consider prime numbers. People toyed with prime numbers for centuries, asking all sorts of questions, with little-to-no impact on the vast majority of humans. Fast forward to the age of telecommunications: suddenly massive innovations in cryptography are being built on knowledge of prime numbers that previously was a novelty.
A lot of early work into physics seemed like dumb questions at the time. When taken to the extreme “Do heavy objects fall faster?” tells you quite a bit about how the world works. And critically people intuited the wrong answers to many such questions before careful experimentation.
"Breaking: Animals Have Preferences"
> But he’s also very interested in “the impact of crystals on the history of art and the history of mind,”
This made my eyes roll a bit.
unsurprising, since they're also into Monoliths
wait until they hear about microservices
Full article share link: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/03/04/science/chimpanzees-cryst...
Share links need accounts anyway? Is this new?
"You have free access to this story. Continue reading with a Times account"
archive.ph isn’t working for me, but .is works
I'd gladly trade you a banana tomorrow for a crystal today.
You're talking ** Karl, PLAY A RECORD
They're also into bananas
It's mentioned in the article that the chimpanzees only relinquished the crystals in exchange for many bananas, so it seems they're more into crystals...
so are people! we overthrew multiple countries for banan
"Bananoi", please. They aren't Latin.
What's wrong with bananas?
They're a nightmare for atheists!
I thought this was going to be the amazing atheist banana clip, was pleasantly surprised to be reminded of this instead
This is clearly a parody. right? right? please say yes.
The intelligent design controversy during the mid 2000's were a fun time. I still have some Flying Spaghetti Monster merch.
A sizable percentage of the human population is deathly allergic to bananas.
I'm mildly allergic to bananas, but I don't think the number of people allergic to bananas is "sizable."
My son is not, and he will let you know how not allergic he is to Bananas if he sees any that he is not eating.
And this is relevant how?
Me too.
What if you place a whole bunch of similar crystals in a pile, with only 1 or 2 smooth rocks?
I’m willing to bet they will go after the smooth rocks and it’s about rarity, not crystals.
If you read the original paper (https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10....) then they go into more detail on the piles of pebbles and what got taken; the graphs in figure 4 (https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10....) make it very obvious that the chimps loved the crystals.
(an "euhedral" crystal is one with lots of obvious facets, an "anhedral" one is one that's been rounded down into a more pebble shape.)
You have a question, a hypothesis and designed an experiment to test it.
The study had a harder question: "What properties of crystalline stones attracted them?". The abstract has this answer: "We found that transparency and geometric shape were the two attractors guiding chimpanzees."
Maybe this is scientific proof for the diamond industry.
> I’m willing to bet they will go after the smooth rocks and it’s about rarity, not crystals.
Why? Crystals are pretty, rocks are not. We clearly prefer shiny colorful things to dull beige things, even if shiny things are abundant.
Well.. Some rocks are definitely shiney. It would be interesting to see if monkeys have any affinity for well polished rocks with pretty colors. Humans do like them, maybe not as much as crystals but they're nice nonetheless.