What are the differences between bonobos and chimpanzees?
Bonobos are more elegant, longer-legged, and smaller-headed than chimpanzees. There are other anatomical differences, but the biggest difference is in the behavior. For example their voices (click here to listen to bonobo vocalizations) sound totally different from those of chimpanzees. Bonobos are more sexual in everything they do, and adult females often dominate adult males, an unusual situation among primates. The bonobo is little known, but the more we learn about them the more they will help us reconstruct the last common ancestor (the ape from which humans, chimps, and bonobos derive). Some scientists try to keep bonobos on the sidelines, since they fail to fit certain “macho” scenarios of human evolution (which emphasize violence, hunting, and the like), yet bonobos are equally close to us as chimps hence equally relevant.
