Actually Apes have volitional thinking like humans. Chimps have the most like that of humans.
And you know this how? Via introspection we each identify our own volitional consciousness, and we infer the same in others of our kind based on our observations that they too act in accord with our nature as human beings. On what scientific basis do you assert that “Apes have volitional thinking like humans?”
Um Behaviorism of BF Skinner and Ed Thorndike is scientific by default. You really need to read up on the basics of Psychology. There’s two major fields of study. 1. Behaviorism[instead of trying to figure out the thought processes of an organism, a behaviorist tries to figure out how an organism responds to stimulus…this eventually lead to…]2. Cognitivism[A body of work in psychology that has validated that all organisms, even mice, has internal processes going on in the brain that tend to be independent of stimulus response. This has been observed with mice acting on ‘mental maps’ of mazes that were altered but were similar to previous mazes they’re encountered]… So really you claim two major movements in psychology aren’t scientific? What rubbish, come back and prove that claim or you can simply retract your claim. I think you really don’t get science. 
You do not do justice to my claim. I do not claim that just “two major movements in psychology aren’t scientific,” but rather that the entire field of psychology has been self-contradictory since its inception and that no major movement in psychology has ever risen to the level worthy of being called scientific in principle. That is not to say that experimental psychology has not accumulated a broad range of scientific data over the past century, but by “major movement in psychology” I mean a coherent set of principles and ideas that are induced from these facts of reality and that are consonant with the nature of the volitional consciousness possessed by man. In this regard, in terms of psychological theories to explain the behavior of man, the entire field of psychology has been an absymal failure.
You seem to have bought into a whole bunch of nonsense which passes as science in the field of behavior and psychology. I would advise you to take the time to study the Objectivist writings which provide both a philosophic and scientific context for these fields. There are many detailed articles in The Objectivist Newsletter, The Objectivist, The Ayn Rand Letter, The Objectivist Forum, as well as numerous compilations in books and lectures on tape, all of which are available from the Ayn Rand Bookstore. Specifically, in regard to Skinner and behaviorism, Ayn Rand wrote a series of brilliant critical articles prompted by Skinner’s book Beyond Freedom and Dignity. There were four articles starting in the January 17, 1972 issue of The Ayn Rand Letter and continuing through the February 28, 1972 issue. Some, if not all, of that material is reprinted in her compilation book Philosophy: Who Needs It.
In the Objectivist corpus there are many, many other articles on psychology, consciousness, volition, determinism, etc. that might help you to gain a proper perspective on these issues.
Still consciousness isn’t merely some magical property of ‘organic matter.’ It’s obviously a natural phenomena built on natural premises. You can’t devoid consciousness from the constraints of reality. To do so is to be a transcendentalist and not an objectivist with regard to acceptance of reality.
Reality shows us that the existence of consciousness depends upon the brain of the biological entity in which that brain resides. That does not mean, however, that consciousness is reducible to matter. Life is reducible to the biochemical processess of organic matter, but consciousness is not reducible to the neural processes of the brain. AI, in the sense that you continue to use it, is an arbitrary myth devoid of meaning and significance.