Friday, April 8, 2016

The Return of the Brutal Savage and the Science for War

The Right are always trying to convince us that we are very violent creatures by nature and war is natural to mankind. The mega rich want to plunder the Earth, and convince us that everything is about win or lose. They're been putting this BS about rugged individualism for years, so a few can get away with taking everything. They use scientists like Steven Pinker to push their Right Wing nonsense, and authoritarian suckers fall for it.

April 8, 2016

The Return of the Brutal Savage and the Science for War

by Stephen Corry

http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/04/08/the-return-of-the-brutal-savage-and-the-science-for-war/

Extract:

The last few years have seen an alarming increase in claims that tribal peoples have been shown to be more violent than we are. This is supposed to prove that our ancestors were also brutal savages. Such a message has profound implications for how we view human nature – whether or not we see war as innate to the human condition and so, by extension, broadly unavoidable. It also underpins how industrialized society treats those it sees as “backward.” In reality though it’s nothing more than an old colonialist belief, masquerading once again as “science.” There’s no evidence to support it.

5 comments:

Matt Franko said...

"The Right are always trying to convince us that we are very violent creatures by nature and war is natural to mankind."

Textbook Darwin 101.... survival of the fittest.... they are simply believing what they have been taught and putting it into practice.

Tom Hickey said...

Textbook Darwin 101.... survival of the fittest.... they are simply believing what they have been taught and putting it into practice.

Actually, that's group selection, not natural selection in current theory. Group selection holds that the groups of cooperators that understand the power of organization are the one that thrive.

However, group selection is controversial and not all evolutionary theorist accept it as scientific.

Where "survival of the fittest" would apply in evolutionary theory is sexual selection, which is an aspect of natural selection. Males that "present' the best in the view of females get the most mating opportunities. Physical strength to win in combat plays a role but probably the predominant role is looks, which is why humans of both sexes are still very interested in sexual parts. Beyond that there is height, weight, build, etc. and the type of appeal differs culturally and geographically based on environmental conditions.

The odd thing is that while wealth does seem to play a part in sexual selection, number of children seems inversely correlated with wealth, and the children of those that have accumulated great wealth seldom do so on their own, which is why the wealthy are so interested in endowing their offspring with wealth, since inherited traits are insufficient.

lastgreek said...

Group selection (E.O. Wilson) vs natural selection (Dawkins)

Wilson tossed the ultimate insult at Dawkins, just over a year ago, by calling him a "journalist." Taleb had a field day with that one on his twitter account since he has no respect for Dawkins, and doubly so for the "journo" Pinker ... lol

Matt Franko said...

Tom I'm just tellin' ya that from this side I'm over on, I can see this 'survival of the fittest' thing is operative in these people they rely on it...

So if it is not correct or something within the evolution paradigm, I think that should be elevated and corrected if possible by the evolution people ... might not be possible and the genie is out of the bottle for good we have probably 2 generations now brainwashed on this...

Tom Hickey said...

Believing something doesn't make it true scientifically no matter how much handwaving. They all believe the opposite of the truth wrt economics and finance and it is drive many species to extinction and causing ecological havoc, social turmoil and political conflict.

There is no guarantee that they will prevail either. Marx argued that they need to be terminated to set the ship on even keel.