Every individual can make a difference every day by making conscious choices.

My mother always taught us that if people don't agree with you, the important thing is to listen to them. But if you've listened to them carefully and you still think that you're right, then you must have the courage of your convictions.

Chimpanzees are incredibly intelligent. They can learn more than 400 signs of American Sign Language. They have memories for spatial distribution, like numbers on a TV screen, way better than ours. You come onto the emotions: happiness, sadness, fear, and despair - all the things for which I was accused of being anthropomorphic when I ascribed them to chimpanzees.

If everybody on the planet today had the same standard of living as the average European or American, we would need three new planets. But we don't even have one new planet. We have this one, and with the way we're polluting it, the shrinking water resources, the climate change, the experimentation with plants... the outlook is grim.

I think anything is better than war. The extent to which one can negotiate with fanatics, I have no idea. I don't know.

I think the most important thing to do is to be willing to listen, willing to care, and willing to admit mistakes and change your ways for the better!

I don't even think of chimps as animals. I think of them as beings.