Wild chimps struggle with tool use in old age

3 Qem 2 7/22/2025, 2:16:09 PM mpg.de ↗

Comments (2)

Qem · 16h ago
Full paper: https://elifesciences.org/articles/105411

This checks out with the common experience of elderly humans struggling to get proficient adopting new tech, like cellphones. It feels quite unfair, given at old age people must be more reliant on tools to offset the loss of function that comes with ageing. Think about glasses, canes, vehicles and all the appliances one gets more dependent later on.

Another counterintuitive aspect of ageing is risk tolerance. People are reckless and take lots of risks while young, with many years to lose if things go wrong, and become progressively more cautious and risk averse as they have less years left. Rationally the opposite should be expected. There was a skydiving senior comics I saw once that illustrated it nicely, but I couldn't find it anymore.

ahazred8ta · 13h ago