Yeah, Right, Whatever

... for lack of a better word.

Researchers discovered that most chimps are lefties (handedness, not political inclination).

When it comes to fishing tasty termites out of their mounds, wild chimpanzees don't have the right stuff. Most, in fact, are southpaws. A three-year study of 17 wild chimps in Gombe National Park, Tanzania, found that 12 of them used their left hands when using sticks to probe for termites.

Four were right-handed and one was listed as ambiguously handed.

"Contrary to previous claims, wild chimpanzees show population-level handedness in tool-use," reported the research team led by William D. Hopkins of the Yerkes National Primate Research Center at Emory University in Atlanta. Population-level handedness indicates a preference for one hand in a large group.

In my mind, this raises evolutionary questions, but not the ones raised by researchers.

A larger question concerns the evolution of language, Hopkins said in a telephone interview.

Most people, right and left handed, use the left hemisphere of the brain to process language, he explained.

The argument has been made that if humans developed language after the split from apes, and language is related to handedness, then there shouldn't be handedness in apes, he said,

"This reinforces the view that the whole historical link between language and handedness is probably not a correct one and people need to rethink those ideas," Hopkins said.

Yeah, people need to rethink many ideas. A larger question is how... if most humans are righthanded (which they are) and chimps are mostly southpaws, then... how could that have possibly happened with consideration to evolution? Wouldn't that have been maintained through the process if it is indeed the stronger trait? Or... maybe... just maybe... God made them different?

Perhaps another... uh... monkey wrench in the theory.