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These horrifying epiphanies, along with the kidnapping of four student researchers by armed rebels, her divorce from her first husband, Hugo von Lawick, and the death of her grandmother, formed what she describes as "some of the most intellectually and emotionally challenging years of my life ... much of my world had been shattered." The violence of the Gombe chimps' "Four Year War" forever changed her view of their nature.

I had known aggression could flare up, sometimes for seemingly trivial reasons; chimpanzees are volatile by nature, yet for the most part aggression within the community is more bluster and threat than fierce fighting -- a whole lot of "sound and fury signifying nothing." Then suddenly we found that chimpanzees could be brutal -- that they, like us, had a dark side to their nature.

Some people told her she should not publish accounts of these behaviors, for fear of giving ammunition to those who argue that the urge to warfare is not only innate in our species, but also inevitable -- "an unfortunate and regrettable legacy from our brutal ape-like ancestors."

When I published the first observations of intercommunity killing at Gombe I came in for a good deal of criticism from certain scientists. Some critics said that the observations were merely "anecdotal" and should therefore be disregarded. This was patently absurd. We had watched, at close range, not just one but five brutal attacks ... Even more significantly, other field researchers had observed similar aggressive territorial behavior in other parts of the chimpanzees' range across Africa ... the behaviors of the Gombe chimpanzees provided fuel for much theorizing; and many scientists were eagerly arguing about them, using them -- or not -- to substantiate or refute their own theories on the nature of human aggression; whereas I, with my work at Gombe, was trying to understand a little better the nature of chimpanzee aggression. My question was: How far along our human path, which has led to hatred and evil and full-scale war, have chimpanzees traveled?

Goodall says in her introduction that the chimpanzees' brutal behavior did cause her to question whether there could be "some divine plan," but that she eventually overcame those doubts. The crisis of faith that she outlines at the greatest length is the one she experienced at the painful death of her second husband.

"Reason for Hope" suggests that Goodall's beliefs did not spring from her research, but from her upbringing. When speaking of how she reconciles -- or, rather, finds no conflict between -- the scientific outlook and religious faith, she speaks of her observation that most of her fellow scientists at Cambridge seemed to be agnostics or atheists. "Fortunately, by the time I got to Cambridge I was twenty-seven years old and my beliefs had already molded so that I was not influenced by these opinions." What comes from her work seems to be her urgency about animal welfare and about environmental destruction.

In service to these causes, Goodall now spends her life as a traveling guru, making appearances, speaking and writing in a life very far removed from the dream of Africa that guided the first part of her life. Her insights, if not for sale, are put to work raising awareness of these causes. A six-pack of yogurt for sale at my local grocery bears her picture. "Explore the Ocean's Coral Reefs with Eartha and Jane Goodall," it says on the wrapper. (Eartha appears to be a caped flying cow.) Goodall is down in the corner, saying, "Understanding animals and where they live helps us understand our relationship to the planet. Only if we understand can we care. Only if we care will we help."

The message is spread by our attraction to the messenger. It's an important message, and the way she tells it is particularly valuable. So often the messengers who come to tell us that the world environment is in trouble tell such a hopeless tale that we turn away in despair. What use is there in trying? Goodall, who with Roots & Shoots -- and yogurt packages -- is speaking to the young, is one of the few to tell us there is, indeed, reason for hope.
salon.com | Oct. 27, 1999

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