Hattori and Tomonaga (1) report that seven captive chimpanzees moved in response to piano sounds, more so than in silence. On this basis, they argue, “some biological foundation for dancing existed in the common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees ∼6 million years ago.”

Music's universality suggests it has deep phylogenetic roots (2). Understanding music-like behavior in nonhuman animals is therefore valuable for understanding the evolution of music (3). But such a claim of shared ancestry for music or dance is unjustified, for three reasons.

First, the effects were heterogenous across a small sample (1). The most active chimpanzee (Akira) moved more than 50 times longer than the least active chimpanzee. Such dramatic variability …

↵¹To whom correspondence may be addressed. Email: sam{at}wjh.harvard.edu or mila_bertolo{at}g.harvard.edu.