Everyday Biophilia

That’s right. Animals are thieves. I said it, I meant it, and I won’t take it back. (Sit down, Skippy.) But just to be clear we are not talking about ordinary examples of animal thievery, like when your dog nicks some potato chips when your back is turned, or when a cat grabs some trinket off your desk and wiles away a few happy minutes batting it around the kitchen floor until it goes under the stove and you never see again. No, what we are talking about is animal thievery with intention . An animal sees something it wants, sorts through the particulars, then goes and gets it. Our larcenous little buddies pilfer a wide array of objects for reasons that run the gamut from the obvious, to the seemingly impertinent, to the unfathomable. Marauding Monkeys Long-tailed macaques in Bali have fairly recently perfected a new way of getting tourists to give them food: they steal their stuff and then trade it back to the tourist in exchange for treats. Such simian shenanigans are commonpla...