Funny, I'm trying to have my children legally declared animals!

I've fucked lots of chimps and have yet to produce any viable offspring, so by most biological criteria, I'd say they're not people.

Just dead sexy.

Chimps are a lot smarter than alot of people I know.

The fact that the court ruled that he was "neither mentally impaired nor in danger" would indicate that the courts were applying rules of human rights to the chimp. It is a precedence at that point and should allow further argument for his case.

That's a really good point, actually.
While I don't believe that the Chimp should be legally declared as a person, since chimps are in fact, not people by any reasonable definition, I think that the austrian court and the people involved in this case are making this far more difficult than it needs to be. Allow the person claiming responsibility for the animal to recieve the gifts and donations.
Basically, if the chimp case has a website, under the donations page it should now say "Please make all checks payable to Johann Chimp Lover, not to Matthew Pan". Bing, simple as that, IMO.

umm... the second video is of a bonobo, so that completely invalidates your argument.

Ever heard of the chimp named Oliver? He walked upright, and look much more human than most chimps. They called him the Humanzee. I think he lives in San Antonio, Tx now.

Yeah, and it sucked at pacman anyway, and that game is easy.

Just so we know... would you be the uptight conservative or the slovenly liberal?

Seriously, $7000 a month! What are they feeding it, caviar? I say give it a typewriter, even though the numbers are way below infinite, I bet just the one chimp banging away at random could produce better scripts than the recent Transformers movie.

Ironically I think creationists should be declared apes, in a legal sense.

where's Michael Jackson when you need him?

But i dont get it: what happens if he doesn't get personhood? Is he "deported" to Sierra Leone? Euthanized?

I'm pretty sure that chimps and greater apes have emotions, self-awareness, fears, etc (and even other animals can show signs of these solely "human" traits), but that doesn't make them a person. I mean, would he have to be prosecuted if he committed a crime, like perhaps, being naked in public?

however i do think that this is just another example of how protective we are of our human traits. For so long, it was thought that we were the only species to use tools and defined humans as such, but it was discovered that apes can use tools and then that other species could too, like some birds and other monkeys. And in terms of feeling emotions, I'm sure any dog owner can tell you when their dog is "happy" or "sad" or "scared."

stop antrhocentrism! emotions for some miniature american flags for others!

Actually, all it does is invalidate the intelligence of whoever posted the video in the first place. They put "chimp" in the title.

-TM

I don't see why this organization doesn't adopt him and bear responsibility for him. They could take donations on his behalf.