Fun_People Archive
30 Oct
A Question About Primates

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From: Peter Langston <psl>
Date: Mon, 30 Oct 100 16:29:36 -0800
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Subject: A Question About Primates

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From: Gene Spafford <spaf@cerias.purdue.edu>
From: mib@juno.com (Mort Bernstein)

	A Question About Primates

 On the letterhead of:
 The Anglican Church of Canada
 Office of the Primate

 John Hearn, Director
 Wisconson Regional Primate Research Centre
 1223 Capitol Court
 Madison, Wisconsin
 U.S.A.    53715-1299
 				  December 11, 1991

 Dear Dr. Hearn:

 Thank you for your letter of December 4 addressed to Dr. George Cram of
 the Primate's World Relief and Development Fund in which you seek
 information for your International Directory of Primatology.

 I should perhaps inform you that the term "primate" in our context refers
 to the senior archbishop and chief pastor of the Anglican Church of Canada.
 The Relief and Development Fund over which he presides is an agency for
 the alleviation of global poverty and hunger on behalf of Anglican
 Christians in this country.

 I think the primates in your study are perhaps of a different species.
 While it is true that our primate occasionally enjoys bananas, I have
 never seen him walk with his knuckles on the ground or scratch himself
 publicly under the armpits.  He does have three children, but this is a
 far cry from "breeding colonies of primates" as your research project
 mentions.  Like you we do not import our primates from the wild, however.
 They are elected from among the bishops of our church.  This is
 occasionally a cause of similar, though arcane, comment.

 The subject of primate biology might be of great importance in your field
 but, alas, not so in ours.  There are a mere 28 Anglican primates in the
 whole world.  They are all males, of course, but so far we have had no
 problems with reproduction.  They include such distinguished persons as
 the Most Reverend and Right Honourable George Carey, Archbishop of
 Canterbury and Archbishop Desmond Tutu of Capetown, South Africa.  Have
 you sent letters to them?  Most importantly, have they responded?  They
 can, I believe, all read and write by themselves so perhaps this might
 distort your data.  Thank you for writing.  I wonder if your extremely
 efficient database might need just a little refining?

 	 Kindest Regards,
 	 The Reverend Michael Ingham
 	 Principal Secretary to the Primate
 -------
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