To speak of a cockroach’s personality or a marmot’s mood is no longer scientifically irresponsible in fact, many behaviorists consider it imprecise and behind the times not to do so. Nearly 20 years later, the animal behavior field has changed considerably. Llama, baboon, parrot, horse and grizzly bear friends had been documented by zoologists. Brown” and “Old Baggage,” two spotted hyena pals living in Tanzania. And scientists had observed special ties between animals for years, sometimes calling them friendships. It was a relatively outré concept at the time, and the article’s author, the anthropologist Joan Silk, made the most of her provocation with a cheeky title: “Using the ‘F’-word in Primatology.” As Silk observed, her field’s focus on “the negative aspects of animal behavior, such as competition, conflict, manipulation, coercion and deception,” made knowledge about friendship in nature “still quite limited.” Yet, she argued, data were starting to show an adaptive value to having close social bonds. Not “close affiliative bonds,” “special relationships” or “peculiar-proximate relations.” Just: friends. In the journal Behaviour in 2002, a primatologist threw down a loaded question: Do monkeys and apes have friends? Not friends with a protective cloak of italics, or “friends” with judgmental quote marks. FRIENDSHIP The Evolution, Biology, and Extraordinary Power of Life’s Fundamental Bond By Lydia Denworth

Friendship by Lydia Denworth