Scientists Baffled by Future-Planning Apes, Clueless Humans

On the BBC: Bonobos and orangutans are capable of future planning, according to a study published in the journal Science. .."Traditional learning theory has a hard time explaining this, and several scientists had postulated that future planning is something beyond the capabilities of animals, so we were very surprised to see this," said Dr Call.

The scientists looked at bonobos and orangutans because they represent our closest and most distant great ape relatives, respectively. Humans and bonobos evolved into separate lineages about five to seven million years ago; orangutans about 14 million years ago. "Because both orangutans and bonobos showed the ability to future plan in these tasks, this means this skill could have been present in the common ancestor to all great apes," Dr Call told the BBC News website.

After analyzing these findings, Captain Future called the BBC to suggest that these scientists now study why humans seem to have lost the capacity to plan for the future. But his call was mysteriously routed to the Dr. Who set. Happily, this led to a very nice conversation with K-9, veteran robotic dog aide to the Doctor, who agreed such an inquiry is a good idea.