"Beware!" David Attenborough 1973 RI Christmas Lectures, Lecture 1

[Music] [Laughter] [Music] that noise that you've just made tapping your hands is a way of communicating with me those noises that you heard just before I came in some of them were made by geese some of them made by crickets some of them were made by ambulances some of them were made by traffic all of them were noises which were communicating they were languages and we're used to languages being made composed of noises because that's how we spread our language our language primary language the language II used most is a language of sound but of course there are lots of other languages that you can use as well as sound you can use vision by gestures or you can change your pattern in a sort of language or indeed you could use smell as a language and what we're going to do over the next six talks is to look at different kinds of languages sometimes of smell sometimes of gesture sometimes of sound and try and see what is being said by the animals and what we should understand from what they're saying to one another and so I'd like to start with one animal which is sending a message by sound which you will certainly I think even though you may never have encountered the animal before you will know immediately what it's saying I hope now then because because he's going to react with a sound I've got a microphone inside his cage so we'll see whether he actually does anything nothing now you see the important this is a rattlesnake this is a diamondback rattlesnake from North America the deserts of the west and he normally Lila's concealed on the sand and so he's colored in a sandy color way but if something comes along then the rattlesnake wants to give warning that he is dangerous and so he uses his rattle I wonder if he'll do it again wonder if I opened the back he'll do it again he does it without me opening the back so just I don't know whether you can see that his tail actually is the rattle he has scales over his body and those those scales have been modified to become Hollow little rattles and so every time I do that he rattles and that's a language let's take him away before he gets to bad-tempered thank you mr. Coates well that is a language of sound now why should he do that what is he actually saying he can afford to do that he can afford to rattle that loudly because of course he's very poisonous he can afford to attract attention to him saying with it with that rattle because those fangs that he's got in his mouth have contain a poison which could kill you or me if we were bitten in the right place but let's look at something else that can afford to say beware because that's what the rattle is doing Thank You mr. Coates well now you might say I think I heard someone say it's a skunk did you say it was a skunk yes I thought you did and as a matter of fact I would probably say it was a skunk if it wasn't for the fact that I know it comes from Africa and in fact it's a creature called a Zorilla which is exactly like a skunk I mean very very like a skunk because both are black and white and both actually have a language which is a warning language saying beware and he says it with pattern he is black and white and these black and white patterns saying beware is because not because he has a poisonous bite but because he beneath his tail he has got a gland like a squirter which he squirts the most disgusting smelling fluid that you've ever heard now you may say but who would care about a smell the fact of the matter is if you get Zorilla fluid over any part of you or any part of your clothes it is really disgusting what more can I say you want to jump in the river you want you can't get away from the smell it's it's awful and indeed this little chap knows this so well that when you see him walking across the plains of Africa he walks very boldly very upright with his hair and his black and white pattern well displayed because he knows his boss and there are even stories of other of lions killing a zebra and about to start to eat the flesh when along comes a Zorilla and the Lions actually stand back while the Zorilla law in a lordly way goes up to the kill and takes what he wants and then goes away and indeed he's of course he's a nice amiable Zorrilla from London Zoo and he's not a bit upset if I were to upset him which I hasten to say I don't propose to do partly because who would want to upset a gorilla and partly because even though he is in this box you wouldn't like a smell if you upset him he actually occasionally stands on his front legs and puts his rear in up in the air and displays his black and white hair just to make quite sure that you know that he's got this weapon so he's got another way of saying beware which he does partly by the pattern and partly by the action so let's take him back and now let's look at one more creature which also says beware in a very simple and straightforward way actually I'm not here we go now this one he's a cobra and he is not the Egyptian cobra which has a spectacle on his hood but he is a black and white Cobra from West Africa and but just like the spectacled Cobra if he gets really agitated he is inclined to rear up and extend the flesh at the back of his neck so it forms a great hood as it were outlining his fans and calling attention saying watch it careful I have poison so now we've got three ways that we've seen three ways in which animals say beware let's take him away for the moment now there's one other I don't want you to suppose that all creatures Sabre wear are immediately large aggressive angry frightening looking creatures here's a small one this is a mantis and although he's only small if you were an ant or a grasshopper or a fly he would be just as frightening to us as an elephant is and he says beware by putting up his forelegs his forelegs have got barbs on them you see see the way he says because they're great prongs on these front legs here and some mantids just to make quite sure that you know that they are same beware when they open their forelegs like that they expose bright patterns in the middle of their forearms just their pink spots sometimes so he too is ferocious now there we are now I regret to have to tell you how I regret to have to tell you that animals don't necessarily always tell the truth in the way that you and I are supposed to do sometimes animals actually Bluff sometimes what should we say they tell untruths sometimes they say beware I am ferocious when in fact they're not ferocious at all at least they're not dangerous now what's nice here we are now in here I've got a delicious animal this one thank you this one is a chameleon now of course if you are a small grasshopper or locust chameleons can look pretty ferocious I dare say but okay so you stay on the branch but actually they chameleons threaten human beings they threaten any animals they this this yellow and green pattern is partly camouflage but when they're very angry and I'm happy to say that this one isn't angry whoa when they're very angry they go black with fury and they they hiss and even though even though they can't do any harm to you or me if you see a chameleon that suddenly rears up and hisses and go black it can be very frightening and he is undoubtedly saying in his language beware watch out I'm dangerous even though in fact he isn't now this particular chameleon is a very big one from East Africa but in Madagascar they're even bigger in Madagascar there's one that is 2 feet long and the people in Madagascar come on then the people in Madagascar are quite convinced no matter what you say the village people are quite convinced that the this big chameleon is absolute death one bite for it they say and you will certainly die well we were once in Madagascar filming and we had a truckload of expensive cameras and recorders and one thing or another and one night thieves broke the glass broke the locks and went into the car and took a lot of our stuff fortunately they didn't take any of the camera gear but what they did do was to break all the locks and I wondered how on earth we were going to be able to secure our car and keep the rest of our things safe and that very day we caught one of these very big chameleons and I suddenly had an idea I took this big chameleon and I put him on the handle of our camera case in the back of the car and he's when anyone went to the car he sat there googling your eyes going black with fury and hissing and nobody but nobody went into our car except us so you see you can even get chameleons to send messages in their own language to say keep off and turn it to your own advantage so there he is a nice comedian and I'm happy to say sufficiently happy sitting on my arm not to wish to demonstrate the point that I bought him along which is to show how angry he can gets he gets and how black he goes when he does I'll put him back but he's a bluffer as I said and there are other bluffers what should I show you I'll show you this Bluff eye now you may think these are frogs oh and of course then they are they're actually toads and they come from Central Europe and they are called far bellied toads now he's not so much of a bluffer as a matter of fact because he's got a warty skin and on out of those warts come a very nasty fluid which makes him unpalatable they're lots of things which eat frogs as you probably know but very very few things eat a far bedded toad because he tastes these because of these warts he tastes so nasty now see it's not much good if you are a far better toad to be eaten by say a polecat and as he polecat swallows you you give him a nasty taste in your skin you say haha I taste nasty that's too late you have been eaten so you wish to tell the polecat fairly early on in the game that there is no point in him biting you in two because you're not worth it as a meal so what you do his in fact these things turn up they throw their little their four legs heave them up and expose this yellow stomach which is a sort of warning again to do anything which might interfere with them that they ought to be left alone and what's more it appears to work because in fact there aren't many half-eaten fire-bellied toads around most of them are left severely alone again because the far bellied toad has got a method of conveying of saying a language if you like of saying the way but there are real bluffers this this extraordinary thing is what mr. Coates who of the Royal Institution who makes all these demonstrations every year this is mr. Coates his idea of a moth and mr. Coates also has made this moth rather ingeniously so that if I hold him like that and give him a pull on his feelers he does that and I think you will agree that that's actually quite frightening I mean if you suddenly came across that I won't send the dark because you wouldn't see it but if you suddenly came across it hanging from a tree and it went you'll be fine will you now you may think that mr. Coates is sub laying it on a bit thick that that really you wouldn't actually get a moth to do that sort of thing but actually you do and to prove it let me show you some film on this screen moths hanging from a tree looks perfectly normal sort of camouflage touching and what happens just as mr. Coates showed and here these remarkable eye spots you see which really look like eyes it is the most extraordinary imitation as though there's they've been painted in perspective and what is more not only do they actually have an eye spot like that but if you touch them on the ground they do piss-ups which makes it even more frightening and there you see is is is an example of an animal which is really not dangerous at all because those moths don't do any harm to anybody which is telling stories which is which is bluffing now it's all very well bluffing but the fact of the matter is that sometimes you Bluff your bluff can be so convincing that you get a very bad reputation and then if you have an enemy who is stronger than you are he could do you a lot of damage the one of the most ferocious beasts of West Africa of the jungles of West Africa forests of West Africa used to be thought to be the gorilla the gorilla was only discovered in the middle of the last century and immediately there were stories of how strong he was and of how he would attack human beings and how when he went into the tack he beat his chest this is what he did watch him there's the big male at the back the boss this is him you see beating his chest a great tattoo there he goes again and when stories came back from explorers of them getting through the thick jungle of of the African forest in the Congo and they suddenly saw these things which hell broke off twigs and hurled them at them and squealed and and roared like that and then beat his chest everybody said it must be a most ferocious animal and so for years and years that poor beast was hunted and it was only the man who actually took these remarkable shots an American Naturalist neurologist called George Sala who really proved for the very first time that the gorilla is not actually a ferocious animal in spite of all those beware gestures and noises that he that he does then in fact he's a very gentle harmless creature which allowed George Saleh to go and almost live among a troop of gorillas and to take his camera so close that he could get shots like that well now we've looked at at animals that say beware watch out I'm dangerous both by smell and by color and by action and we've seen some animals that say beware I'm dangerous and they aren't telling the truth now let's have a look at one animal to summarize that sort of of message not mr. Coates [Music] goodness me he's actually a very friendly animal I think he won't come out to see here we are have some banana can I help [Music] he has his rear end towards us so he has to reverse to come out he doesn't seem to be very keen to do so now we've got his front end here what about a banana there is now he's got a little alarmed you see you see his erected his quills and what he is doing it is a porcupine as you can as you can see and he's got black and white quills which are just like the colors of the skunk and the Sevilla warning and he when he gets really angry he lifts them up so he was raising his hair so he looks even bigger and even more formidable and when he's really angry he's got a special little device in the back of his tail with rather loosely fixed quills on it so he spins it round like this and the quail the quills make a great rattling noise so he can actually threaten people he doesn't want to threaten anybody he's just having lunch on BET on banana here Oh see he puts his puts his quail his quills up as I go nearer a bit more he doesn't he doesn't he threatens people both with his colour with his outline and with his noise and of course the reason he threatens people is because actually he's a very dangerous animal I mean it so happens this one which is from the London Zoo is very nice and tame but if he got very angry he actually would be able to back into you he goes suddenly does a reverse and thrusts his tear his quills into your flesh which is very painful right I don't know whether we can get him out can we get him back do you think [Music] there [Music] right he's gone back now there is one character there's one thing about all the creatures I've shown you so far they've all been saying beware but they've all been saying it to creatures other than themselves they've been porcupines have been saying it perhaps to bears chameleons have been saying it to human beings snakes have been saying it to any other creature which interferes with them snakes don't say it to snakes in that by by erecting their their record by erecting their hoods but there are occasions when animals want to talk to their own kind and say not only beware but look out does danger geese for example when danger threatens them as is about to threaten these geese the first thing they do when danger comes is to stick their heads up up they go they know that there's danger and that communicates through the flocks so that the suddenly the flock is aware that there's something happening and what it is is a dog which might have been a fox perhaps and when they do that the message of alarm spreads among the flock and they don't run away they go out onto the attack and it's the dog was on the other side of the lake the geese take take to the water and in a sort of battle squadron by the way they're flying into the water in full line abreast they set off to do battle with the Google with the Fox when I say do battle to threaten the Fox so they're the geese language is able to do two things first of all by putting the head up in that way it's able to say watch out and secondly by sailing in that sort of way towards the dog they are able to threaten the dog and say keep off watch it but birds often are able to spread messages of warning to one another let me see what the most common way of doing that is what's called mobbing sometimes small birds will appear to be as it were trying to commit suicide because they will go to a much bigger bird which normally preys upon them and attack it an eagle in Africa for example is often the cause of the attention of little birds this is a big African Eagle sitting on its nest as it happens and you don't buy a tree there's a drawn girl I sort of styling like bird which is squealing angrily at the eagle and what's more the Eagles makes who is sitting on another tree here is being attacked by these drongos which are dive-bombing you to see and as they dive bomb they make a particular call now they can't hope really to injure people what they are almost certainly doing primarily is not even trying to drive it away but to tell other small birds around that there is danger so they are saying as they as they pranks upon it as they dive bomb it they are saying both by their noise and their action watch out there's danger now the calls that birds make when they mob are very interesting let me try and do an experiment and seek your help now I've got on this tape recorder to start with some sounds which not bird sounds there are electronic sounds that we've put together and up at the back I've got one two three speakers and what I want to do I can by fiddling these switches put the sounds through whichever speaker I like and the first sound I'm going to play you I'm going to put through one particular speaker and I want you to tell me which one it's coming from point that one is it you sure that one well as a matter of fact it came from the middle one you were pointing to that one and it actually came from there now let me play you another sound and once again I'll change the switches tell me which speaker this comes from yeah everybody's son let me let me just just check that yes quite right so that first sound which you heard which was very high-pitched and which was sort of started soft became loud and then faded away again you had great difficulty in saying where it came from some of you said it came from there some of you said it came from there in fact it nearly or it all came from there but the other kind of sound which is low and stabbing with a very precise start and end you all knew immediately where it came from now imagine yourself to be a bird if you see an enemy and you want to say watch out here in this particular place there is danger then what sort of sound would you make the first or the second the second indeed you would and if you were in fact a small bird in the sitting in the bushes somewhere and you suddenly saw let us say a weasel coming around and you were frightened for your life but you wanted to tell everybody else to keep out of the way while at the same time not giving away where your position was so that that weasel could come after you then you would use the first sound would you not well now actually becomes no surprise to now to know that that's textured that's just what birds do let me pay you at one sound now this is a sound that is made by a Robin no it isn't it's the last part of what I was playing before but the next sound will be a Robin do him yes now that is the sound that a Robin makes when it knows that there is enemies around and it seems take cover now if I go on and pay more we will come to a sound which is the one that it makes when he wants to say look out there is danger in this particular place that still take cover now you see much more precise there much more easier to identify does where it's coming from here it that's all coming from that little speaker and so the the sounds that birds make the language that they use is very precisely suited to the particular message it's either take cover and not to let the predator know where you are or else it's to say beware look here in this particular place there's danger now those recordings and birdsong in general has been studied to a great extent by Professor Thorpe and mrs. Hall Craggs who are world experts in the matter in Cambridge and they actually don't just do crude experiments in the way that I've done they make analyses of bird sounds on little plots like this this is made by a need a a pen which goes up and down on a revolving drum so that it the call starts there and goes along there just like musical notation and it's in the high frequency if it was a low frequency it's down there and that is the alarm the the call of a great tit like the first call you heard which means take cover and hear that also now that's a black bird I'm sorry it was a black bird not a great kid that's a black bird and there is the call of a black bird when he wants to say there is danger in this particular place so what I'd been describing to you can actually be analysed in considerable detail by scientists to see just exactly the shape and packing of bird calls right well now sometimes of course animals disagree amongst themselves times they quarrel sometimes there are there are Rao's as it were and then animals have methods of sending messages of as it were shaking their fists at one another of arguing also by gesture let me show you some film shot on an island a group of islands that Galapagus which is full of interesting animals of a very strange animal called the marine iguana a sort of lizard now he is nodding which means in his language I'm boss here over the rock comes another one who says no you're not I am and they both nod and then they clash heads now they could bite one another but they don't they just engage in a trial of strength like that until suddenly one of them will say that he's had enough and he does that by backing away the one on the right does and then slowly lowering his body onto the ground and retreated and that too is a message that message says I've had enough I don't wish to argue anymore please leave me alone now I'd like to just look at that again in slow motion so that we can see exactly what those gestures were you'll have to look up at your monitors to see it on a slow-motion replay up comes the they're fighting there you see slowly pushing one another they don't bite they don't harm one another in any way now what's the one on the right he's losing he's pushed back and when he decides he's hasn't had enough as he's going to do in any moment he lowers his body onto the ground there he's doing it now the other one lived himself up like the victor his his spines on his on his back are erect they knot at one another a bit more the one on the right is panting a bit and now he's going to retreat back he goes and notice that the winner the one on the left doesn't follow him he doesn't bite him he doesn't as we might say in a fight he doesn't kick a man when he's down he knows he's lost and that is one of the most important messages that you can learn from animals when they are fighting when they are gesturing of alarm and attack because animals do not very very rarely kill others of their own kind because they have worked out this method of arguing whereby one says I am boss they argue in a ritualized way and then one of them is able to say all right I've had enough and then they don't harm one another after that now you may say I don't really believe that because the fact is I have hamsters and I know that hamsters kill one another and that's exactly the opposite of what you're saying well the reason that hamsters kill one another or may kill one another when we have them as pets is because the hamster arrangement the hamster in the wild lives on the wide plains and he's got plenty of room and he has a language of gesture he has a language of signals so that when to make oral there is a a retreat process whereby the hamster can go away and will not be followed and not be killed if you and I keep them in cages which are too small at a time when they are likely to quarrel then that particular language of signals can't work that one of them can't get away and then one is killed but otherwise in the wild it is very very rare indeed for one animal to kill another of its own kind now let me show you one more delicious way in which animals can yes which animals can can fight Tammy this is Tammy from Bristol from Bristol Zoo and he is a ringtail Deema aren't you and I'm just gonna put you down there Tammy if I don't lose you because I want people to see don't go to the microphone and no come on come on it Oh would you like a bit of a grape yes now Tammy inside of Tammy's arms on his wrists he has he has Mukul look he's got little little glands and chew yes and on these glands there are what is it all right all right all right on these bands they'd give off a particularly strong smell and if Tammy wants to fight what he will do is to wipe his lovely black and white striped tail through those bands which are just on the inside of the wrist so that his tail is covered in in scent and then he were actually engaged in what's called a stink fight doesn't actually throw stink bombs but what he does do is to lift up his tail Epping apartment is to lift up his tail and and wave it over his back so that he creates a current of air which blows this nasty smell at his enemies you're too nice to do that I think I better give you back I'm happy they thank you very much and we'll have a look at some film of limas which only live in Madagascar that's the ring-tailed lemur and see them actually doing this they live mostly in low trees and sometimes on the ground and they live in troops and they're very playful as you see that Tammy was and they often Scoble amongst themselves and they do it with calls and they do it by waving their tail to have little scraps like that and there you see the one on the right wiping his tail with his wrists putting his tail through his wrists so it gets that scent all over it and now he's rubbing his wrist glands again [Music] [Applause] well you're that knowing noise they make that's one of the reasons they'll call cut really sometimes because they do actually are like cats and now they're going to go down onto the ground and on the ground you watch how they hold their tails of course they're black and white stripes which are which is a warning pattern but also they they vibrate those tails so that currents are there as I said go over their back and spread their smell towards the other one they're looking at in sometimes rival male lemurs will stand opposite one another and wave their tails at one another throwing this smell so that they actually fight by smell now as I said it animals have developed ways of making sure that their language of threat is understood and as far as possible prevents fighting it seems to be the rule that animals prefer if I can use that word prefer to advertise threat to say beware rather than actually get down to blows let me look at that in India for example this is the skull of a very small deer the musk deer and the male musk deer has this tiny little Arabic around the muntjac has this this long canine tooth here and when it's in life the lip of the of the deer comes over like that and so he exposes this this savage little tooth which hangs down at the bottom of his jaw and he displays that when they argue they the musk deer display that one to another now the monk Jack on the other hand has not got such a big canine tooth and instead has as it were put that long tooth on the top of his head so that it's easier to see so that this deer has not so much as a bigger tooth and the beginnings of an antler as it were a tooth on the top of his head so that he's not actually concerned so much with biting people as with brandishing it and saying beware look how powerful I am and of course big deer have enormous great antlers like this guitar no more nor less than advertisements placards which say I am big I am powerful don't interfere with me yet in fact although I dare say it could give you quite a nasty knock with his antlers these aren't really obviously they don't bite any more they aren't really powerful aggressive weapons they are much more Packard's which are saying keep away because I'm powerful well now I want to ask you to help me with another experiment is there anybody here who can wag his ears you can you can anybody else we can find that she can anybody else you can all right 1 2 3 who else was that for let's have the four of you down there and really see if you can waggle your ears just there who was the fourth there we are move along now then you what is your name Robert Robert Wagner is he can he can can you see turn around wacko very good you watch on him Phillips it it I think you're cheating about your eyebrows going up now oh no very good can you make a hair garden now how about you pretty good what is your name Steven Steven I think Steven you're using your jaw more than wagging your ears I would do it again now to be convinced my good and what about what's your name David David all right David wanna yes well I think the champion the Royal Institution champion earwig laughs a 1973 Guardsman thank you very much now I want to explain to you why I was wanted to have a wagging competition ear waggling is done with muscles in the top of your head and then in your scalp now it's very unlikely that we should have muscles in our scalp if we didn't want to use them for anything at all or didn't ever use them for anything at all so it could be that once we all would have ear waggling mechanisms we all had scalp moving muscles as Phillip had to a sensational degree if you ask me and it could be that we used them to erect the hair on the top of our head now if that was so if that was so and it's not proved it could be that that in itself in millions of years ago was part of man's mechanism or primitive primate mechanism of threat and one of the reasons that leads you to suspect that that could possibly be the case is the fact that the guards that's the guards have been wearing bear skins on top of their head for a long time now this is this is Guardsman Lloyd from the from the Coldstream Guards that is correct and you see that he not only has a bearskin I mustn't go to the buzzer be must I know it's a bearskin that's right and he has a scarlet uniform with gold buttons on it and you may think that that is only worn for changing of the guard or trooping of the color but actually the uniform that Guardsman Lloyd is wearing is very similar to the uniform that the guards wore when they actually went into battle the last time it was worn I think was in the Crimea war you may have heard of The Thin Red Line it was the guards it was the guards was it not good The Thin Red Line was called The Thin Red Line not because they wore khaki but because they actually did wear red coats and red coats and a big crest on the top of the head may well be precisely the sort of language of color and of size of signs and of shape which I've been describing in the other parts of the animal kingdom that we too have a language of sign and color a language of threat which for many hundreds of years was shown by the uniform of our soldiers thank you very much indeed Garvin good heavens [Music] [Music] now to show you that that it's not just the British who dressed up their soldiers to look threatening I've got here some other sorts of headdresses which I'd like to show you and I think actually I think we have to say that you were the champion Philip so I think I'm gonna have to ask you to wear that can you put that on and I'd like you to wear that and what else have I got in here I've got that whoops and I want you to wear that right now the reason I have asked him to wear these helmets is not just so that they can look different sorts of fancy dress but I want to start with Philips you stay there now dangling from this is a most extraordinary piece of lines called Kaplan Italy and that these are movable toggles in it and it ends with a sort of decorative acorn shaped bits like that and I'm no expert in military uniform but I'm told that this was worn the back of the neck came down at the back there and was tied round the waist and was worn by the cavalry actually by the Hungarian cavalry and this pattern was used about 1700 now what is interesting is that that which started as a purely functional thing it had a purpose it was to keep the hat on and what's more I am also told that occasionally it was thought not too good to have the to have the chinstrap because if you've got a lance or a spear going onto the helmet it could jerk your head back during a challenge so it was quite a good idea to have it without a chin strap and a tie around your waist now a few years later there was another kind of uniform invented and this one is as it were a descendant of that one and what has happened is that these cap lines have actually been wrapped around the cap now they've been made in gold they've still got the tassels on the end and they have become purely decorative or to put it a different way they've become threatening and this one that one you see has had the the the chin band which was there put up on the top so that you again become threatening now you remember those antlers from the moose and the mulch jack and for some curious reason which perhaps a fashion expert would be able to spare explain better than me it seems as though we have had in our military fashions just the same sort of development as animals have had with their antlers and I think you're a life Guardsmen are you exactly the same sort of thing the two have got really the hair on our your head if that was really threatening hiked up right on to the top so that everybody could see that you had a crest thank you very much indeed for demonstrating now we'll put those back [Applause] now I can hear you say while I've been talking look at that soldier there another Guardsman Guardsman Lloyd can you come in now Guardsman Lloyd's method of entry is quite different Guardsmen Lloyd didn't come and come in Divac apart from Guardsmen jordan didn't come in like Guardsman Lloyd he's in come in with a bang he just crept in silently because as you will be saying to yourselves if what I've been saying is true why don't we wear red uniforms anymore why is it that the modern soldier doesn't wear big plumes on his head but whereas instead a tunic which is camouflage and if he was going at the battle he might well have his face darkened well the reason of course is that whereas in the Crimean War a hundred and twenty years ago the weapons that we hand were they were guns it is true but nonetheless they did not prevent hand-to-hand fighting and the armies marched shoulder-to-shoulder across the battlefields of Europe until they actually met one another and engaged in hideous hand-to-hand fighting now under those circumstances the old animal signals the old animal languages that we've been describing really well that if you saw the Thin Red Line marching towards you a blaze and the chinking of armor and the plumes and the bear skins then it was worthwhile looking terrifying what has happened now is that mankind has been so clever that he has invented weapons like the rifle and others which with telescopic sights could actually kill a man at a distance of what would you say those lead to approximately two miles now at two miles there is no point in making any of threat because you won't even know that your enemy is there and so the modern soldier doesn't wear threat display he wears a uniform like this which is meant to conceal we have actually become too clever to take any advantage of our animal signals and that is perhaps something of a tragedy because just like the marine iguanas we also have signals which say spare me I've had enough and don't wound me now you can't say that with your animal signals on the battlefields of today thank you very much [Applause] but now let me just show you one more animal partly to remind you that what we're talking about is actually animal signals as well as humans or signals but primarily animal signals hello boys let's give you a banana these are monkeys very special and in charming monkeys called silly bees macaques how about that no no no no and the reason I show you them is is that they you see have there any young ones but you see the one on the right he's got a crest on top of his head which he can slightly erect so that what I mean no disrespect to Philip and all the rest of you champion ear wag lers but you see he can do what Philip was doing only a bit better he actually can erect a crest on the top of his head and when he grows bigger here I actually have quite a big helmet of hair on the top of his head which doesn't look unlike some of the bear skins that Guardsmen wear well I've been talking about animals the way that animals say beware keep away but that isn't the only things animals say animals of say of course sometimes be mine come over here and that's what we will talk about next time thank you very much [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] you

Channel: DRS_Education

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Id: YXHCckq8Drg

Length: 58min 47sec (3527 seconds)

Published: Wed Jun 03 2020