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Comment by perrygeo | Hacker News Reader

Not really. Bonobos share roughly the same amount of DNA with humans as do Chimps. And Bonobo societies are matriarchal and mostly lack the group warfare dynamic.

It seems that cooperative altruism and out-group violence are both innate to some extent. Ecology and society determine how we realize those traits - in times of intense competition, we resort to tribal warfare. In times of plenty, we cooperate.

It should also be noted that Chimps and Humans are among the few species (perhaps the only mammal species?) that exhibit this tendency to wipe out their competition with systematic violence. IOW it's not just competition for resources in the moment - all animals do that. It's the sustained desire to wipe out the competition completely (effectively, genocide) that make both Human and Chimp violence rather unique in the animal kingdom.

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> Not really. Bonobos share roughly the same amount of DNA with humans as do Chimps. And Bonobo societies are matriarchal and mostly lack the group warfare dynamic.

Unless you mean group warfare as in terms of internal warfare; this is incorrect. Bonobos are noted to be peaceful within their groups but are similar to chimpanzees in being observed engaging in conflict with other Bonobo groups to a more limited extent.

> Ecology and society determine how we realize those traits - in times of intense competition, we resort to tribal warfare. In times of plenty, we cooperate.

Ecology creates evolutionary pressures for a genetic predisposition to tribal violence. Those genes are still there in times of abundance. They might be activated less in times of abundance, though.

I agree with the "society" part of your comment. Sapolsky's study of Bonobos shows that cultural change via the death of alpha males can have a lasting impact on the level of violence in later generations.

> It seems that cooperative altruism and out-group violence are both innate to some extent.

Some extents are longer than the others, seeing as of the societies we see in the animal kingdom and are currently able to be studied with current tools point to "patriarchal" societies being more common than "matriarchal". In the case of bonobos, which are known to be unusual in the ape world.

> Ecology and society determine how we realize those traits - in times of intense competition, we resort to tribal warfare. In times of plenty, we cooperate.

Please state this is an opinion, it looks like you're asserting it which is rather large mistake.

> It should also be noted that Chimps and Humans are among the few species (perhaps the only mammal species?) that exhibit this tendency to wipe out their competition with systematic violence. IOW it's not just competition for resources in the moment - all animals do that. It's the sustained desire to wipe out the competition completely (effectively, genocide) that make both Human and Chimp violence rather unique in the animal kingdom.

Unless you cite this, I would also lump it similar to above.

> this tendency to wipe out their competition with systematic violence

Is there a term of art for researching this from a biological perspective?

When a lion takes over a pride, job #1 is killing any kid who's not his. This is not uncommon in the animal kingdom. One way, or another, the goal is to create an environment where your have a reproductive advantage.

So the base is genetics, but also you have to remember that humans and chimps understand timelines. So if you see a strange redhead by the watering hole, you slink back home and get the lads, gonna need to make an example out of him. After all, you only speak your tribes dialect, can't talk to him, and if even you could, what would you say?

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

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