for several reasons. one, they live ni trees, devoid of most larger predators.
two, they have hair, protecting them somewhat in weather.
three, large communitites, which is the only acceptable trait we kept, yet a plane crash in the mountains with 10 survivors and well equiped still has a huge chance of none of them making it out alive. we are vey weak in the natural world, it is our created world that makes us stronger than them.
Leopards and large constrictors climb trees, and both regularly prey on chimps.
two, they have hair, protecting them somewhat in weather.
We're not talking about the summit of Kilimanjaro here.
three, large communitites
That's part of it. Their social behaviors contribute to their survival, but those social behaviors are learned, not instinctive. They can learn how to fit into their tribes, as well as learn how to deal with their environment, and they're better at it than their competition is because they're smarter than their competition is. That's how they get by with limited intelligence - because the competition is even more limited in intelligence. It's like the old joke - if you and I are walking across the African veldt, and a lion comes along, I don't have to be faster than the lion, I just have to be faster than you. The chimp doesn't have to be smarter than people to survive, it just has to be smarter than the competition it encounters in the wild.
we are vey weak in the natural world, it is our created world that makes us stronger than them.
Exactly. That's why intelligence is a survival trait, and like all survival traits, having a little bit is better than having none at all. In the kingdom of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.