Melissa Holbrook Pierson

“Ten years ago, researchers in the relatively new field of behavioral economics began running a series of experiments on a group of capuchin monkeys, and in no time had turned them into . . . us. One report on the results, which found that monkeys not only quickly grasped the concept of currency but knew exactly what it was good for, ran under the headline “Gambling, Prostitution, and Theft Rampant Among Yale Monkeys.” Indeed, the capuchins were observed horse trading, bargain hunting, practicing “utility maximization,” responding to shifts in the value of their coin, occasionally lifting an unwatched token, assessing risk in potential exchanges, and finally, in what was called the first observed example of paid sex among primates other than us, achieving parity with human society.‡”
― Melissa Holbrook Pierson, The Secret History of Kindness: Learning from How Dogs Learn