A group of researchers, based upon their study of two female chimpanzees, have hypothesized that man's ability to dance may have evolved from what they describe as being proto-dance behavior. The chimpanzees being studied were named Holly and Bakhari. They were both born in 1998, taken from their mothers, and transported to the St. Louis Zoo where they were introduced into another group of chimpanzees.
The researchers admit that their hypothesis does not explain how "dancing" diversified into so many different forms and styles, and that the so-called proto-dance was not influenced by any external forces [1] which would include music and rhythmic beats and that the "evidence for conjoined full-body rhythmic entrainment in great apes that could help reconstruct possible proto-stages of human dance is still lacking." [2] They also said that the proto-dancing behavior was not a learned behavior but a behavior innate within the two primates. [3]
The researchers went on to say that the synchronous bipedalism in the two female chimpanzees was rhythmically and positionally consistent and despite admitting lack of concrete evidence to support their hypothesis, still insisted that the behavior observed in the two female chimps may shed light on how man acquired the ability to dance, yet admitting that the most likely possibility for the proto-dance behavior, also called "entrainment" or "stereotypical" behavior may have been due to maternal deprivation, going on to say that similar behavior is also observed in children who have also suffered from maternal deprivation [4] but still go on to present their hypothesis:
The presence of sustained physical contact and proximity suggests that the individuals may have also drew on neurophysiological benefits where prosocial touch acts as a physiological regulator in presence of stressors, similarly to other pervasive behaviours across primates, such as allogrooming and consolation. This effect could help explain why individuals spontaneously engaged in the behaviour (in the course of several years) in the apparent absence of a visually-identifiable function or external reward.
It has been suggested that during our evolutionary history, humans have developed synchronized behaviours as a means for large-scale social bonding. Any speculative or putative large-scale mechanisms could not have evolved, however, in the absence of functional “small-scale” mechanisms that could have been targeted and selected for in the first place. Chimpanzee rhythmic entrainment indicates that some (social) benefits could have sprung bottom-up, starting at the lowest social level, i.e. between two individuals. Indeed, prosocial behaviour in human dancers (viz. how much they like each other, how they feel toward their group, how much they conform to each other’s opinion) emerges when synchrony is kept between specific individuals but not when synchrony is coordinated unitarily across a larger group. This indicates that, despite humans having evolved cultural means to synchronize the behaviour of large groups (e.g. marches), most physiological effects and benefits extracted from synchrony derive from the synced interactions at a small inter-individual level. Such between-individual effects are already observed in human children, where synchrony enables and increases prosocial behaviour in human infants and children. These human data and the case of chimpanzee rhythmic entrainment that we report here suggest, thus, that dance may have originally stemmed from dyadic interactions, instead of having emerged to meet the demands and needs of a large group of human ancestors.
Our findings could provide a bottom-up stepping stone for the “social cohesion hypothesis” for dance origins and evolution. Future agent-based computer models, or analyses of similar bipedal behaviours in other great ape populations (e.g. young chimpanzees in African sanctuaries, see Supplementary Material for video links) could allow examining the hypothesis that group-level behaviour derives from social propagation (e.g. via social learning or affective contagion) of entrainment performed initially between some members within the same group. [5]
But they also go on to confess that that only creatures that are able to perceive beat perception and synchronization are those with speech capabilities. [6] Parrots can mimic speech but are not known to dance to music or respond to rhythmic beats. The only creatures on the face of the planet known to naturally be able to dance to music and rhythmic beats and which possess speech capabilities are people.
Still the researchers hypothesized that in their "analyses demonstrating social entrainment, together with a cumulative body of evidence for vocal (production) learning in great apes, indicate that chimpanzees and other great apes ought to be included in the comparative framework at the basis of this hypothesis" [7] contradicting a previous statement in which they said that their hypothesis does not recognize apes as vocal learners [8] leaving the reader to ask the question: Are primates vocal learners or not? Do they process information by way of vocalization or not?
They further went onto say:
Contra what is generally believed, the present case of endogenous social rhythmic entrainment in chimpanzees suggests that dance may not have originally consisted of a multimodal suite of auditory, visual, and other sensorial behaviours, as it occurs today. Dance could have started off evolutionarily as a mute behaviour. The recruitment of other motor-cognitive capacities and, notably, of a simultaneous synchronous sound could have occurred at subsequent stages of dance evolution. [9]
But they admit that the stereotypical behavior was observed only in captive chimpanzees deprived of maternal nurture in an ongoing stress-filled environment. [10] There is no mention of behavior like this being observed in non-captive chimpanzees, but the researchers believe that the same behavior could have arisen in similar stressful situations in the wild based upon their study of the two captive:
paleo-climate change shifted food source availability and distribution, putatively driving physiological stress, intra- and intergroup competition, effects that would have been further exacerbated where ancestral hominins were constrained into pockets of remaining habitat or ecological refugia. These conditions could have perhaps caused confinement effects similar to those experienced in captivity. [11]
They also go on to give the outlandish suggestion that music could have originated under similar circumstances, [12] yet towards the conclusion of their article, they remind readers that their hypothesis on how dance could have originated is only speculative; [13] it should not be taken as fact. They believe that the entrainment behavior observed in the chimps may be a stress-coping mechanism and state the following:
Evolutionary inferences about human dance based on chimpanzee rhythmic entrainment are limited and should be taken thoughtfully. It is critical to note, however, that our data and interpretations contrast radically with scenarios previously put forward for dance and music evolution. Past scenarios have been typically inspired either in modern day human dance/musical expression or in communication systems in further related animal lineages, mostly because these were, at the time, the only living models available. Both (human, and non-primate animal) models misrepresent, however, what may have been the function and form of proto-dance among our hominin ancestors due cultural and biological distance, respectively. Somewhat paradoxically and anachronistically, virtually all dance evolution research has, thus far, tested humans or animals with modern 20th and 21st century music. [14]
So what can we make of the concluding remarks?
1. Evolutionary inferences cannot draw a solid conclusion. They are just speculation.
2. Past scenarios have only been inspired by observing modern dance and musical expression. (That cannot tell us anything about how dance and music originated)
3. Human and animal models do not necessarily reflect the so-called proto-dance functions that originated in the hominin species from which the researchers claim man and chimp descended.
4. All research was tested with modern music. If older styles of music had also been used in the tests, would the results have been the same?
Other questions that would also need to be asked are:
1. How did the hypothesized dance behavior end up evolving into the various forms and styles of dances that we see today?
2. How did dancing, which evolutionists claim originated as being a stress-coping mechanism, become dependent upon a mood triggered by music? Dancing is generally triggered by fast-paced, upbeat, and festive and is best triggered by positive moods and stress-free settings. Whenever anyone listens to a good song and a rhythm they like, they will naturally be moved to do things like tap their feet on the floor, or a hand on the steering wheel or dashboard of their car while driving down the road, or move their head to the beat and rhythm of the music they are listening to.
Dancing has not been known to be triggered by negative moods such as fear, anger, or sorrow though the researchers hypothesize that stressful conditions may have been the catalyst for the evolution of dancing?
3. And finally, how did dancing become associated with religious activities? People dance in their worship of a divine authority all the time.
Susan Gallagher, the public relations director for the St. Louis Zoo had said that the two Chimpanzees had been "dancing" since their infancy [15] and in a blow to the proto-dance hypothesis, also went on to say that the behavior observed in the two female chimpanzees was not unique to them, but has also been observed in other chimpanzees which have also been raised apart from their mothers, stating, "When infants are raised with peers, they often cling to each other, even when they are walking." [16]
So, it seems that the chimpanzees were seeking out comfort to fill the void of a vital comfort of which they were deprived when they were born. As Answers In Genesis founder Ken Ham pointed out, [17] the Chimpanzees were not really dancing at all. As for man, he has been dancing since the day festive, uplifting, and celebratory music was invented.
The behavior of the two female chimps was simply a consequence of lacking a mother's comfort, though their behavior is not necessarily anything new. It has also this author wondering: How is the development and behavior of an animal affected when raised and reared apart from its mother in comparison to those raised by their mothers?
More importantly, how does not having a mother in the home affect a child? We have all seen the statistics of the negative impact the absence of a father figure can have on a child, but what about the impact on a child who grows up without a mother figure? What does that do to them?
What is even less talked about is the emptiness we constantly feel that no matter what we try to fill it with, just cannot be satisfied. It is like a pit without a bottom to it. Material pleasures cannot fill it, nor can a job, career, or hobby. It is a void that cannot even be filled by even the closest and most intimate relationships shared between two people.
It is a void that requires being filled by something that goes far beyond ourselves and the worries and cares of this life; something that provides meaning and significance to our lives but to which we made blind and unaware until that which is able to fill that void in our lives which is otherwise never satisfied is revealed to us, but from which we have been alienated from the first day of our lives because there is placed between us an unseen separating barrier between us and that which is able to fill the void in us which is never satisfied and that barrier has ever been between man and that which can fill that otherwise unfillable void.
Just as men have basic physical needs to be able to sustain themselves, so we are also in need of a sense of purpose to give us meaning to our lives, a sense of direction to order our course, a set of standards for moral stability, assurance and peace regarding our future and the life beyond this present life, close relationships, especially marital in most cases, for psychological stability and to control unruly passions, but we are also in need of a relationship that cannot fail us.
Unfortunately the relationships that we expect to not fail us do fail us: Parents may abandon their children, a son or daughter may rebel and turn against their mother or father. A spouse may renege on his or her wedding vows, close friends may betray us, a trusted business partner may cheat you, a respected teacher or religious figure may lead you astray, and a fellow Church member may unjustly tarnish your name and reputation.
But there is a relationship that will not fail us, betray us, forsake us, or lead us astray whose outstretched hand offers love and mercy always, but it is a love and mercy that is so often rejected and spurned, and it is the very relationship around which every other relationship is to be built in order to be successful, and around which our entire life is to revolve and yet the relationship from which we are alienated because of an inherent condition within ourselves that has existed since day one of mankind's existed.
But before this inherent condition was acquired, that void within us which only this vital and important relationship can fill did not exist because man lived in perfect fellowship and harmony with the source of that relationship which is the God who made us.
When we were created, this world was a place of purity and goodness where man lived in perfect harmony with nature and was at peace with His Maker who came to visit and fellowship with His creation often, but man was given one command which he failed to keep: Not to eat the fruit of a certain tree called the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, being warned that in the day that he ate of it, he would die. (Gen. 2:16-17)
And when man did eat of that forbidden fruit, his sentence was pronounced. (Gen. 3) He did not immediately die physically, but the consequence of his transgression was a separation between him and His Maker. God would no longer walk with him in the way that He once did. And eventually, the bodily death of man did follow and from that man who ate from the forbidden fruit, all people inherited that corrupted nature which is called sin, (Rom. 5:12) because we are all descended from that man who is called Adam and because we all sin, we all die, (Rom. 6:23) but even worse, if we die in our sins, we are forever separated from our Maker who cannot dwell in the presence of sin.
Sin corrupts and defiles more than we can comprehend. Whenever we try to do good, sin is ever present with us, rendering even the best and purest of our deeds to fall short of God's standard of moral perfection. (Rom. 3:23) Sin not only corrupts our behavior, speech, and actions, but it also defiles our thoughts, corrupts our motives, and brings out the worst in everyone.
It produces in us all things inside and out that displease our God who must punish sin which requires the eternal and unimaginable torment those who die in their sin are destined for, because our Maker can neither allow sin to dwell in His presence, nor can He allow it to persist because of the grief and misery that it has wrought and continues to bring to all of humanity and the death and decay that it has brought upon the entire creation. (Rom. 8:19-23)
But because of God's love for mankind and the mercy He desires to give, He took the penalty upon Himself, coming to the earth as a man to die for our sins and to be raised from the dead so that we who place our trust in Him for our salvation and in no other name or means may be saved. It is in Christ Jesus, His son, who offered Himself up on our behalf that forgiveness of sins was made possible and the demand of justice was met. It is in Him, that we are liberated from condemnation by sin and receive entry into Heaven through His forgiveness, and it is through His forgiveness that we are reconciled to the Father, awaiting now the redemption of our bodies (1 Cor. 15:51-55, 1 Thess. 4:15-18), and a new world that will replace this dying world in which there is no sin, no death, nor any curse; all of which have caused all the grief, suffering, and pain that we experience in this present world, but will no longer exist in the New Heaven and the New Earth that will be created. (Rev. 21:4)
End Notes:
1. Adriano R. Lameira, Tuomas Eerola & Andrea Ravignani, "Coupled whole-body rhythmic entrainment between two chimpanzees," Nature; Scientific Reports 9, Article number 18914, December 12, 2019
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-55360-y
2. Ibid
3. Ibid
4. Ibid
5. Ibid
6. Ibid
7. Ibid
8. Ibid
9. Ibid
10. Ibid
11. Ibid
12. Ibid
13. Ibid
14. Ibid
15. Ed Cara, "Zoo Chimps Doing a 'Conga Line' Could Teach Us How Humans Evolved To Dance,"
Gizmodo, December 13, 2019
https://gizmodo.com/zoo-chimps-doing-a-conga-line-could-teach-us-how-humans-1840418546
16. Pat McGonigle, "STL Zoo explains chimpanzee tandem walk,"
KSDK (5 On Your Side), April 27, 2017, St. Louis Missouri
https://www.ksdk.com/article/news/local/stl-zoo-explains-chimpanzee-tandem-walk/63-434507764
17. Ken Ham, "Do Chimps in a 'Conga Line' Hint at the Evolution of Dance?'"
Answers In Genesis, December 23, 2019
https://answersingenesis.org/human-evolution/2019/12/23/do-chimps-hint-at-the-evolution-of-dance/
Scripture references:
1. Genesis 2:16-17
2. Genesis 3
3. Romans 5:12
4. Romans 6:23
5. Romans 8:19-23
6. 1 Corinthians 15:51-55
7. 1 Thessalonians 4:15-18
8. Revelation 21:4
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