Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors

1. Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan, or the Matter, Forme and Power of a Commonwealth Ecclesiasticall and Civil, Michael Oakeshott, editor (Oxford Basil Blackwell, 1960), Part 2, Chapter 30, p. 227.2. Charles Darwin and Alfred R. Wallace, “On the Tendency of Species to Form Varieties; and on the Perpetuation of Varieties and Species by Natural Means of Selection,” Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society: Zoology, Volume III (London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans & Roberts, and Williams and Norgate, 1859), p. 50. Here Darwin also describes sexual selection in which the males compete for the favors of the female, or she selects from among several males on the basis of some quality she finds attractive: “This kind of selection, however, is less rigorous than the other,” Darwin said; “it does not require the death of the less successful, but gives to them fewer descendants.”3. Curt P. Richter, “Rats, Man, and the Welfare State,” The American Psychologist 14 (1959), pp. 18–28.4. John B. Calhoun, “Population Density and Social Pathology,” Scientific American 206 (2) (February 1962), pp. 139–146, 148; and references cited there.5. Frans de Waals, Peacemaking Among Primates (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989)6. Richard Dawkins argues that lowered birth rates in response to overcrowding are explained equally well (not better) by individual as by group selection (The Selfish Gene [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1989], p. 119).7. John F. Eisenberg, “Mammalian Social Organization and the Case of Alouatta,’ in Michael H. Robinson and Lionel Tiger, editors, Man and Beast Revisited (Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1991), p. 135.8. Peter Marler, “Golobus guereza: Territoriality and Group Composition,” Science 163 (1969), pp. 93–95.9. John F. Eisenberg and Devra G. Kleiman, “Olfactory Communication in Mammals,” in Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 3 (1972), pp. 1–32.10. As first pointed out by Charles Darwin (1872) in The Expression of the Emotions in Man and the Animals (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1965, 1967), p. 119.11. C. G. Beer, “Study of Vertebrate Communication—Its Cognitive Implications,” in D. R. Griffin, editor, Animal Mind-Human Mind (Report of the Dahlem Workshop on Animal Mind-Human Mind, Berlin, March 22–27, 1981) (Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 1982), p. 264.12. Lorenz’s translation from cranish. Konrad Lorenz, On Aggression (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1966), pp. 174, 175.13. An example:“My friend and teacher, Bill Drury, invited me to go bird-watching one day on a small island off the coast of Maine. We left bird books and binoculars behind and strode to the nearest small tree growing alone in the open. He then made a series of high-pitched bird sounds and soon the tree began to fill up with birds, themselves making a series of calls. As the tree started to fill up, it seemed to attract more and more birds, so that as if by magic all small songbirds in the area were streaking toward the tree under which we were standing. By this time Bill was down on his knees, bent over, and most of the time making a deep kind of moaning sound. The birds actually appeared to wait in line to get the closest look at Bill they could; that is, they hopped from branch to branch until they rested on a branch about eight feet off the ground and not more than two feet from my face. As each bird hopped down, Bill, as if on cue, would introduce them. This is a male, black-capped chickadee. You can tell because of the black along the neck and shoulders. I would guess he’s about two to three years old. Can you see if there is yellow on his back between his shoulders? This is a good index of age.“For me the moment was utterly magical. In a matter of minutes Bill had reduced the distance between us and these birds by orders of magnitude, both physically and socially. Our relationship was so completely different that I was permitted individual introductions at a distance of a couple of feet. Obviously Bill was pulling some kind of trick and had induced some kind of trance through his bird song.… Bill was at first only imitating the mobbing calls of a couple of the small passerines in the area and interspersing these with occasional owl hoots. The owl is deadly at night but is vulnerable in the daytime, and groups of songbirds will mob it in order (presumably) to run it out of their area, or even harass and kill it on the spot. This drew them into the tree at an ever-increasing rate, since mobbing assemblages gain in individual safety with each new arrival (as well as gaining in power to harass the owl). Once they landed in the tree, however, they could see two four-eyed human beings but could not see the owl. Bill’s bending over and hooting from the ground was meant to suggest the owl was hidden underneath him. This drew them as close as they could get for a good look, which put them two feet from my face. Unlike some magic tricks, knowing how Bill’s was done did not detract from my enjoyment.” (Robert Trivers, “Deceit and Self-Deception: The Relationship Between Communication and Consciousness,” in Michael H. Robinson and Lionel Tiger, editors, Man and Beast Revisited [Washington: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1991], pp. 182, 183.)14. Mary Jane West-Eberhard, “Sexual Selection and Social Behavior,” in Robinson and Tiger, op. cit., p. 165.15. T. J. Fillion and E. M. Blass, “Infantile Experience with Suckling Odors Determines Adult Sexual Behavior in Male Rats,” Science 231 (1986), pp. 729–731.16. Marcus Aurelius, Meditations, translated with an introduction by Maxwell Staniforth (Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England: Penguin, 1964), II, 17, p. 51.