The Hundredth Monkey Effect

Note; May be I should've written this post in Arabic langauge, but for some reason I wanted for the content of my subject to reach out to my bilingual readers. Almost all the links included in this post are in Arabics.
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 I have read about this theory; The Hundredth Monkey Effect, for the first time in a booklet at my high school library back in Libya... I was lucky to have such a rich library in my high school, Al-majd Al-shamaly high school in Tripoli, may be it was because of the high education of the organizer of that Library, I hope that Library is still alive...
 I tried to recall the author of that booklet, I think it was for  Asadek Alnehoom الصادق النيهوم but I'm not sure ... The booklet was a summarized Arabic translation for an original English book.

Let me first share with you the idea of the theory, then I will tell you why I remembered it after this long time:

The Hundredth Monkey

by Ken Keyes, jr.

The Japanese monkey, Macaca fuscata, had been observed in the wild for a period of over 30 years.

In 1952, on the island of Koshima, scientists were providing monkeys with sweet potatoes dropped in the sand. The monkeys liked the taste of the raw sweet potatoes, but they found the dirt unpleasant.

An 18-month-old female named Imo found she could solve the problem by washing the potatoes in a nearby stream. She taught this trick to her mother. Her playmates also learned this new way and they taught their mothers too.

This cultural innovation was gradually picked up by various monkeys before the eyes of the scientists.

Between 1952 and 1958 all the young monkeys learned to wash the sandy sweet potatoes to make them more palatable.

Only the adults who imitated their children learned this social improvement. Other adults kept eating the dirty sweet potatoes.

Then something startling took place. In the autumn of 1958, a certain number of Koshima monkeys were washing sweet potatoes -- the exact number is not known.

Let us suppose that when the sun rose one morning there were 99 monkeys on Koshima Island who had learned to wash their sweet potatoes.

Let's further suppose that later that morning, the hundredth monkey learned to wash potatoes.

 

THEN IT HAPPENED!

By that evening almost everyone in the tribe was washing sweet potatoes before eating them.

The added energy of this hundredth monkey somehow created an ideological breakthrough!

But notice.

A most surprising thing observed by these scientists was that the habit of washing sweet potatoes then jumped over the sea..

Colonies of monkeys on other islands and the mainland troop of monkeys at Takasakiyama began washing their sweet potatoes.

Thus, when a certain critical number achieves an awareness, this new awareness may be communicated from mind to mind.

Although the exact number may vary, this Hundredth Monkey Phenomenon means that when only a limited number of people know of a new way, it may remain the conscious property of these people.

But there is a point at which if only one more person tunes-in to a new awareness, a field is strengthened so that this awareness is picked up by almost everyone!

(from the book "The Hundredth Monkey" by Ken Keyes, jr. The book is not copyrighted and the material may be reproduced in whole or in part).

What remind me of this is what I read in a blog for a fellow Libyan Blogger. I believe the efforts that are made by him and by many other fellow Libyans in the blog world or  elsewhere are going to make the hundredth monkey effect one day in my beloved society.

Now, upon a request which I read in Bumedian's blog, I am attaching  links for these two posts that he requested to be spread out,

The first one is about a charity work for the seek of preserving the old holy books of Quran, and keeping the book  from the effect of worn out, 

لو تمزق المصحف ؟

http://tripolitanian.blogspot.com/2010/06/blog-post_17.html

Watching these people shouldn't make us feel so small; althought it did for me, but in reality we should learn the concept and try to continue it by whatever skills we have in our different fields.

The second post is about the misuse of antibiotics in Libya. Old post but worth the renewal:

العقار المعجزة ... لكل داء

http://tripolitanian.blogspot.com/2009/10/blog-post_13.html

These efforts will never go in vain, I already saw the hundreth monkey effect prevailing while I was working in Tripoli medical center /  pediatric emergency room back in Libya, many Libyans don't like to start antibiotics for their children; not all but many, and many others get convinced easily when the doctor explain to them in simple words why it is inappropriate to start it.

Now, for the seek of honesty,I don't completely agree with all the posts which was written by Bumedian, and that is noraml, but I do like many of his writing,

Here are some posts that there were not any request for them to be spread, but I like the way the post is written, so I would like to share them with my Arabic readers,

I won't explain the idea of the following post, coz then I'll ruin the plot in the story,

من خلال عينيه ...

http://tripolitanian.blogspot.com/2010/05/blog-post_27.html

Another good one,

جارنا

http://tripolitanian.blogspot.com/2010/03/blog-post_02.html

The next link is for a  post which I never met anyone or read anything which touched the subject the way Bumedian did, I do know people who try to solve out this problem and they succeeded, but the way Bumedian put it in words was different for me,

حصن الحرائر

http://tripolitanian.blogspot.com/2009/07/blog-post_11.html

And many unique posts are there, I have not got the chance to check everything, I discovered this blogs only recently.

Keep going Bumedian, you and the rest of others who have intentions like yours will sooner or later reach-out the hundredth monkey and our socitey will change!

Whoever wants to read more about the hundreth monkey theory here is a link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundredth_monkey_effect

You will see that some researchers have discredited this effect, but I believe that the theory is stronger than the discerdit!

Zumeeta زميطة in a love package from Tripoli-home!

A package of Love from my mom

 

Whenever people ask me what do u miss from home. I say; apart from family and friends, I miss hearing the call for prayers five times a day and from different source at the same time, especially in Alfajer prayer. On my laptop I have two different accesses with two different account users, I have set the program of Athan to call by different Muezzin (مؤذن) in each of the two accounts. Sometimes when I go to sleep I leave both of the accounts on, on my laptop, in this way I could simulate the call for alfajer prayers as I used to hear it in the serenity of the early morning hours back home in my lovely city of Tripoli.

 

The second important thing which I miss here is Zumeeta! So, what is Zumeeta?
Zumeeta is a traditional food prepared from barley. I don't actually like any kind of Zumeeta, I like the one which is prepared from the fresh green barley, it is called Zumeetat makhdoor

( زميطة مخضور) it is more harder to prepare than the usual Zumeeta which is made from the old already dried barely. I am not the right person to describe how it is prepared, but basically it is a fried and finely ground barley. The flour of this fried and ground barley is called Zumeeta. It is kept as flour in-store and each time you want to eat some Zumeeta, you mix this flour with some water and olive oil. It is extremly healthy and delicious when you start your day with it.

After it gets mixed, I like to eat it with honey or sugar along with a cup of milk or green tea. I know that some people eat it with rub ( date syrup). Some others eat it with onion, I couldn't perceive this way of eating Zumeeta, I was raised on the fact that Zumeeta is categorized as sweet food. My father though started to eat it with onion in the last few years. If there is other way of eating Zumeeta that I don't know, feel free to enrich my knowledge about it.

 

Yesterday, I received a love package from my mom back home,  and guess what there is Zumeetat Makhdoor in the package, along with some headscarves as you see in the pictures up there. The headscarves are the other thing which I find difficult to get my choice here where I live in Seattle/WA . I can easily find the heavy thick one. But I'm not comfortable wearing those thick ones even in winter. And the other lighter designs which are available here are either transparent, or very short, with very limited choices, obviously not suitable for Hijab.

As my mom know me best, she sent me some love along with headscarves and Zumeeta .

Thank you Mom

PS: I tried to google Zumeeta on line to find if anyone talk about it in English, I only found this post for our old Libyan fellow blogger Libyano... I changed the spelling of Zumeeta in my post to be spelled in the same way as he wrote it, so in the future it might be easier to reach the resources if someone googled it in English.