The hundredth monkey effect is a supposed phenomenon in which a behavior or thought spreads rapidly from one group to all related groups once a critical number of initiates is reached. By generalization it means the instantaneous spreading of an idea or ability to the remainder of a population once a certain portion of that population has heard of the new idea or learned the new ability by some unknown process currently beyond the scope of science. The story behind this supposed phenomenon originated with Lawrence Blair and Lyall Watson in the mid-to-late 1970s, who claimed that it was the observation of Japanese scientists. One of the primary factors in the promulgation of the story is that many authors quote secondary, tertiary or post-tertiary sources who have themselves misrepresented the original observations.
Read more about Hundredth Monkey Effect: Popularization of The Claim, The Original Research, The Effect Discredited
Famous quotes containing the words hundredth, monkey and/or effect:
“Grinder, who serenely grindest
At my door the Hundredth Psalm,”
—Charles Stuart Calverley (1831–1884)
“When there is no tiger on the mountain, the monkey becomes king.”
—Chinese proverb.
“The first general store opened on the ‘Cold Saturday’ of the winter of 1833 ... Mrs. Mary Miller, daughter of the store’s promoter, recorded in a letter: ‘Chickens and birds fell dead from their roosts, cows ran bellowing through the streets’; but she failed to state what effect the freeze had on the gala occasion of the store opening.”
—Administration in the State of Sout, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)