Posted on 10/26/2007 7:02:47 PM PDT by woofie
War— humanity's great curse— seems to have developed hand-in-hand with the better angels of our nature, new research suggests.
The strange combination of sharing with our neighbors while we engage in organized group killing of outsiders— two relatively unusual and puzzling human traits— could in fact go together, according to new research by a New Mexico scientist.
Groups of brutish warriors— fierce toward neighbors while nobly sharing among themselves— could have swept aside groups that otherwise would have prospered in peace, Santa Fe Institute researcher Samuel Bowles has found.
Bowles said in an interview this week that he finds the results of his research "unsettling."
But whether this aspect of human nature is genetic or cultural, Bowles said the fact that war is part of our nature does not mean we can't overcome it.
"Our legacy need not be our destiny," Bowles said.
Bowles, an economist whose career defies academic labels, has spent time in the field studying hunter-gatherer cultures in Africa and Latin America, trying to understand the basis of human cultural behaviors.
For his most recent work, he teamed with Jung-Kyoo Choi of Kyungpook National University in South Korea to try to explain two of the great puzzles of human evolution: altruism and war.
The results of their research are being published today in the journal Science.
In evolutionary terms, war has always been a bit of a mystery.
Evolution favors those who live long enough to have lots of offspring and who acquire the resources so those offspring can prosper and have offspring of their own.
Going on the attack against your neighbors costs resources and risks death, two behaviors that are generally bad evolutionary bargains.
(Excerpt) Read more at abqjournal.com ...
Yes, I know. I spent a two-year fellowship in Tanzania watching them.
What do you want?"
Babylon 5; It was the Vorlons and the Shadows
Origins of war - Cain and Abel
Cain and Abel, brotherly love
Exactly right. And because there will always be a percentage of the population of evil people who can convince other not-quite-so-evil people that they can gain something by following them, we will have war. But liberals do not believe in human nature, which is why they're always puzzled over origins of strife and war. Like the clown who did the study.
That's the neocon delusion. War is in our genes. It will be with us no matter what form of government we establish.
Not puzzling and certainly not new information. It's the pack mentality. People band together for strength while protecting their turf, goods and family from any real or perceived threat.
The whole reason humans walk upright is to free our hands to carry weapons. Almost every human trait can be traced to its advantage at war, especially our having intelligence far in excess of that needed to find food and shelter. For some reason leftists have real trouble accepting this idea that human means war-maker. Darwin wrote about about this subject a long time ago in his book The Descent of Man but this is seldom understood or acknowledged.
“Bowles, an economist whose career defies academic labels...”
Another way of saying he’s not accredited.
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