The Five Monkeys

Darwinism is a theory of biological evolution developed by the English naturalist Charles Darwin who lived between 1809 and 1882, Mona Radwan writtes...The Five Monkeys.

In a nut shell, he stated that all species of organisms arise and develop in the form of small groups. Darwin’s theory was always linked with apes or monkeys.

I am not going to discuss the theory stated above, it has been debated for decades; rather I am going to share an interesting experiment that also involved monkeys, it is widely known as The Story of The Five Monkeys.

A group of scientists placed five monkeys in one room, they have put a ladder in the middle of the room with some bananas placed on top of the ladder.

As soon as one of the monkeys noticed the bananas, he immediately climbed up the ladder to grab some of them and eat it, before he reached them, the scientists would sprinkle some very cold water on the rest of the monkeys, when another monkey tried to do the same, another sprinkle of cold water was sprayed on the group.

After this was repeated few times, the group of monkeys would prevent and beat any monkey who tries to go up the ladder.

Then the scientists started to replace one of the five monkeys and put a new monkey in place. The first thing the new monkey did was going to the ladder, quickly the group of old monkeys pulled him back although no cold water was being sprayed, after several times the new monkey understood that going up the ladder is a wrong thing to do although he did not know what reason behind that is.

The scientists kept replacing old monkey with a new monkey until all the five were new, the same behavior continued.

If we had asked any of the monkeys why are they beating the one trying to reach to the bananas, their answer would probably be: We do not know but that is what we found the group doing so we followed their league.

Looking at the grand scheme of things, this experiment is an exact replica of what many people do, they follow things without understanding the reason behind it.

Think of the many customs and traditions around us that are repeatedly done or think of when someone tries to change the way others work in an organization, so many anti change people become very destructive to try new ways and they encourage the survival of old schools just because they are familiar with it.

Moral of the story : If at any point in time you try to do something in a different way and you get discouraged, challenge why it is done the way it is and if you do not get answers , go ahead and try things your way and do not forget to tell the people who resisted the change the story of the five monkeys.

Contributed by Ahmad El-Assasy

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