Life without war

An emerging evolutionary perspective suggests that nature and human nature are less "red in tooth and claw" than generally acknowledged by a competition-based view of the biological world. War is not always present in human societies. Peace systems, defined as groups of neighboring societies that do not make war on each other, exist on different continents. A comparison of three peace systems--the Upper Xingu River basin tribes of Brazil, the Iroquois Confederacy of upper New York State, and the European Union--highlight six features hypothesized to be important in the creation and maintenance of intersocietal peace: (i) an overarching social identity, (ii) interconnections among subgroups, (iii) interdependence, (iv) nonwarring values, (v) symbolism and ceremonies that reinforce peace, and (vi) superordinate institutions for conflict management. The existence of peace systems demonstrates that it is possible to create social systems free of war.     

景迈山茶祖故事中的历史与族群关系

茶史和茶马古道研究中的一个重要问题,是茶叶出产区与茶叶消费区之间的联系如何建立起来。关于茶叶贸易与茶叶消费的很多历史研究已经涉及这一问题,但较少论及作为茶叶生产者的当地人对茶叶消费者等他人的态度。本文讨论了云南景迈山布朗族和傣族的两种茶祖故事,它们都说本民族/族群的祖先是茶文化的发明者,本民族/族群种茶的历史大约有2000年,但没有讲述与对方民族/族群的关系。本文的研究表明,这两种茶祖故事是最近才产生的,它们之间不仅互相矛盾,而且与其他地方及族群的茶祖故事也不一致,很多内容与已知的历史不符。这些现象显示了这两种茶祖故事是在“以言行事”,通过宣称本民族是茶文化的发明者,来吹捧本地、本民族所产的茶叶。这一行为中隐含了“发明者即最佳者”的观念,凸显了这两个民族/族群之间的市场竞争关系。     

Chimpanzees recruit the best collaborators

Humans collaborate with non-kin in special ways, but the evolutionary foundations of these collaborative skills remain unclear. We presented chimpanzees with collaboration problems in which they had to decide when to recruit a partner and which potential partner to recruit. In an initial study, individuals recruited a collaborator only when solving the problem required collaboration. In a second study, individuals recruited the more effective of two partners on the basis of their experience with each of them on a previous day. Therefore, recognizing when collaboration is necessary and determining who is the best collaborative partner are skills shared by both chimpanzees and humans, so such skills may have been present in their common ancestor before humans evolved their own complex forms of collaboration.     

Origin of human bipedalism as an adaptation for locomotion on flexible branches

Human bipedalism is commonly thought to have evolved from a quadrupedal terrestrial precursor, yet some recent paleontological evidence suggests that adaptations for bipedalism arose in an arboreal context. However, the adaptive benefit of arboreal bipedalism has been unknown. Here we show that it allows the most arboreal great ape, the orangutan, to access supports too flexible to be negotiated otherwise. Orangutans react to branch flexibility like humans running on springy tracks, by increasing knee and hip extension, whereas all other primatesdothe reverse. Human bipedalism is thus less an innovation than an exploitation of a locomotor behavior retained from the common great ape ancestor.     

The coevolution of parochial altruism and war

Altruism-benefiting fellow group members at a cost to oneself-and parochialism-hostility toward individuals not of one's own ethnic, racial, or other group-are common human behaviors. The intersection of the two-which we term "parochial altruism"-is puzzling from an evolutionary perspective because altruistic or parochial behavior reduces one's payoffs by comparison to what one would gain by eschewing these behaviors. But parochial altruism could have evolved if parochialism promoted intergroup hostilities and the combination of altruism and parochialism contributed to success in these conflicts. Our game-theoretic analysis and agent-based simulations show that under conditions likely to have been experienced by late Pleistocene and early Holocene humans, neither parochialism nor altruism would have been viable singly, but by promoting group conflict, they could have evolved jointly.     

Big and mighty: preverbal infants mentally represent social dominance

Human infants face the formidable challenge of learning the structure of their social environment. Previous research indicates that infants have early-developing representations of intentional agents, and of cooperative social interactions, that help meet that challenge. Here we report five studies with 144 infant participants showing that 10- to 13-month-old, but not 8-month-old, infants recognize when two novel agents have conflicting goals, and that they use the agents' relative size to predict the outcome of the very first dominance contests between them. These results suggest that preverbal infants mentally represent social dominance and use a cue that covaries with it phylogenetically, and marks it metaphorically across human cultures and languages, to predict which of two agents is likely to prevail in a conflict of goals.     

Phylogenetic relations of humans and African apes from DNA sequences in the psi eta-globin region

Sequences from the upstream and downstream flanking DNA regions of the psi eta-globin locus in Pan troglodytes (common chimpanzee), Gorilla gorilla (gorilla), and Pongo pygmaeus (orangutan, the closest living relative to Homo, Pan, and Gorilla) provided further data for evaluating the phylogenetic relations of humans and African apes. These newly sequenced orthologs [an additional 4.9 kilobase pairs (kbp) for each species] were combined with published psi eta-gene sequences and then compared to the same orthologous stretch (a continuous 7.1-kbp region) available for humans. Phylogenetic analysis of these nucleotide sequences by the parsimony method indicated (i) that human and chimpanzee are more closely related to each other than either is to gorilla and (ii) that the slowdown in the rate of sequence evolution evident in higher primates is especially pronounced in humans. These results indicate that features (for example, knuckle-walking) unique to African apes (but not to humans) are primitive and that even local molecular clocks should be applied with caution.     

Co-residence patterns in hunter-gatherer societies show unique human social structure

Contemporary humans exhibit spectacular biological success derived from cumulative culture and cooperation. The origins of these traits may be related to our ancestral group structure. Because humans lived as foragers for 95% of our species' history, we analyzed co-residence patterns among 32 present-day foraging societies (total n = 5067 individuals, mean experienced band size = 28.2 adults). We found that hunter-gatherers display a unique social structure where (i) either sex may disperse or remain in their natal group, (ii) adult brothers and sisters often co-reside, and (iii) most individuals in residential groups are genetically unrelated. These patterns produce large interaction networks of unrelated adults and suggest that inclusive fitness cannot explain extensive cooperation in hunter-gatherer bands. However, large social networks may help to explain why humans evolved capacities for social learning that resulted in cumulative culture.     

Subterranean waterworks of biblical jerusalem: adaptation of a karst system

Ancient Jerusalem has long been known to possess a system of subterranean waterworks by which the spring of Gihon, which issues outside the walls, could be approached from within the city, and its waters diverted to an intramural pool. Most scholars regarded these waterworks as man-made, but the techniques of underground orientation and ventilation employed by the builders, as well as the numerous anomalies and ostensible mistakes in design, mystified investigators. Geological investigation has revealed the waterworks to be part of a well-developed karst system, a network of natural dissolution channels and shafts, in the limestone and dolomite underlying the city. Thus, it was not through primary planning but by means of skillful adaptation of these pre-existing natural features that the city was ensured of a dependable water supply during both war and peace. Likewise, knowledge of the subterranean access may have played a role in David's capture of the Jebusite city.     

Mnemonic function of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex in conflict-induced behavioral adjustment

Our cognitive abilities in performing tasks are influenced by experienced competition/conflict between behavioral choices. To determine the role of the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC) and dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) in the conflict detection-resolution process, we conducted complementary lesion and single-cell recording studies in monkeys that were resolving a conflict between two rules. We observed conflict-induced behavioral adjustment that persisted after lesions within the ACC but disappeared after lesions within the DLPFC. In the DLPFC, activity was modulated in some cells by the current conflict level and in other cells by the conflict experienced in the previous trial. These results show that the DLPFC, but not the ACC, is essential for the conflict-induced behavioral adjustment and suggest that encoding and maintenance of information about experienced conflict is mediated by the DLPFC.     

Hierarchical classification by rank and kinship in baboons

Humans routinely classify others according to both their individual attributes, such as social status or wealth, and membership in higher order groups, such as families or castes. They also recognize that people's individual attributes may be influenced and regulated by their group affiliations. It is not known whether such rule-governed, hierarchical classifications are specific to humans or might also occur in nonlinguistic species. Here we show that baboons recognize that a dominance hierarchy can be subdivided into family groups. In playback experiments, baboons respond more strongly to call sequences mimicking dominance rank reversals between families than within families, indicating that they classify others simultaneously according to both individual rank and kinship. The selective pressures imposed by complex societies may therefore have favored cognitive skills that constitute an evolutionary precursor to some components of human cognition.     

民事责任竞合法律选择的价值冲突及其平衡

涉外民事责任竞合因其牵涉的双重法律关系及涉外因素而呈现出法律选择上的多元价值的竞逐，不仅表现为法律的确定性与个案适当性的博弈，而且表现为合同的预期价值与弱者利益保护的公正价值上的冲突。区分合同类型和损害类型进行法律选择才是解决价值冲突的应然途径。     

Religious and sacred imperatives in human conflict

Religion, in promoting outlandish beliefs and costly rituals, increases ingroup trust but also may increase mistrust and conflict with outgroups. Moralizing gods emerged over the last few millennia, enabling large-scale cooperation, and sociopolitical conquest even without war. Whether for cooperation or conflict, sacred values, like devotion to God or a collective cause, signal group identity and operate as moral imperatives that inspire nonrational exertions independent of likely outcomes. In conflict situations, otherwise mundane sociopolitical preferences may become sacred values, acquiring immunity to material incentives. Sacred values sustain intractable conflicts that defy "business-like" negotiation, but also provide surprising opportunities for resolution.     

Hallucinogen-tranquilizer interaction: its nature

Study of the competition between hallucinogens and tranquilizers at cerebral synapses and on behavior in various species of animals indicates a continuum of effects from protection to dominance of tranquilizer toxicity as the dose of tranquilizer increases. Data on cat and monkey behavior, supplementing that on the rat, show that it is possible to arrive at a tranquilizer dose that can aggravate instead of protect, in accord with the competitive inhibitory nature of the interaction of hallucinogen and tranquilizer.     

导入矮秆基因的小偃麦材料的细胞学和储藏蛋白研究

用小麦 -中间偃麦草部分双二倍体与含Rht1 0的小麦品系杂交回交 ,培育了稳定的株高在 5 0～ 70cm左右 ,农艺性状较优的矮杆小偃麦品系。我们对其中的 2份材料进行了细胞学和醇溶蛋白分析。结果表明 ,材料攀890 74- 1 - 1 - 1 - 1、攀 890 74- 3- 2 - 1的染色体数分别为 2n =5 6和 2n =5 0。利用种子醇溶蛋白电泳分析表明它们与“中 5”均具有反应偃麦草供体的特征带 ,在Gli-B1和Gli-D1上表现一定的差异 ,攀 890 74- 3- 2 - 1还含来自黑麦的 1RS蛋白带 ,攀 890 74- 1 - 1 - 1 - 1缺少“中 5”的一条Gli-B1带。在高分子谷蛋白亚基上 ,攀 890 74- 1- 1 - 1和攀 890 71 - 3- 2 - 1与“中 5”在Glu -A1和Glu -B1上表现了较大的差异。结果认为 ,品系攀 890 74- 1 -1 - 1和攀 890 74- 3- 2 - 1是四川及南方麦区小麦育种中利用中间偃麦草基因的优良品种资源     

南方铁杉群落物种多样性及乔木优势种生态位初步研究

对黄桑坪自然保护区南方铁杉群落的物种多样性和乔木优势种的生态位特征进行了研究,结果表明:(1)在南方铁杉群落中乔木层优势种比较明显,灌木层比较均匀;(2)南方铁杉的生态位宽度最大,与其它种的生态位相似性比例值较大,但生态位重叠值却较小,说明南方铁杉在种群中与其它乔木优势种利用环境资源的相似程度较大,而与其它种的潜在竞争关系较小。     

国际政治冲突的新问题——生态环境问题探析

生态环境问题的全球化给国际关系和国际安全带来严重的影响,轻者表现为环境纠纷和经贸冲突,重者表现为 资源争夺,甚至武装冲突或战争。为解决国际环境争端,避免冲突,寻求合作,需要人类在思想上和体制上进行一次重 大改革。     

Raptor nest decorations are a reliable threat against conspecifics

Individual quality is often signaled by phenotypic flags, such as bright plumage patches in birds. Extended phenotype signals can similarly show quality, but in these cases the signals are external to the individual, often taking the form of objects scavenged from the environment. Through multiple manipulative experiments, we showed that objects used for nest decoration by a territorial raptor, the black kite (Milvus migrans), act as reliable threats to conspecifics, revealing the viability, territory quality, and conflict dominance of the signaler. Our results suggest that animal-built structures may serve as signaling devices much more frequently than currently recognized.     

Mechanisms in the Competitive Success of an Invading Sexual Gecko over an Asexual Native

The competitive displacement by a sexual gecko species of an asexual resident gecko has been documented over a wide geographic area. To test hypotheses concerning the detailed mechanism of this displacement, an experimental system was developed to follow populations of geckos in a duplicated, controlled environment that closely approximates the natural arena for the competitive interaction. Asymmetric competition occurred only in the presence of light, which attracts a dense concentration of insect food sources. The mechanism of competition was partly due to the behavioral dominance of the larger sexual species over the smaller asexual species in areas near the concentrated food. However, this behavior resulted from an avoidance response of subordinate asexuals rather than overt aggression by the sexual species.