Grooming, Gossip, and the Evolution of Language by Robin Dunbar & Robin Ian MacDonald Dunbar

Author:Robin Dunbar & Robin Ian MacDonald Dunbar [Dunbar, Robin & Dunbar, Robin Ian MacDonald]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Language Arts & Disciplines, Linguistics, General, Science, Life Sciences, Evolution, Social Science, Anthropology, Cultural
ISBN: 9780674363366
Google: nN5DFNT-6ToC
Amazon: 0674363361
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Published: 1998-09-15T23:31:26+00:00

Grooming, Gossip and the Evolution of Language

Up Through the Mists of Time

larger and more widely distributed political and military power

to these kinds of problems as to predation risk. It is just the kind

base. Old habits, it seems, die hard - though in the latter case it is

of situation in which an arms race occurs: the raiders form bigger

worth reminding ourselves that all the parties involved

groups to raid more successfully, so you need to form even bigger

(Europeans, Americans and Australians alike) were the direct

groups to protect yourself, so the raiders need to form bigger

descendants of those ero-Magnon invaders from Africa.

groups still, and so on until ecological constraints impose a limit

We are left with one last puzzling question: what drove the

(perhaps in terms of the number of individuals that can be fed) .

increase in group size ? The short answer is, we don't know. But

A third possibility may stem from the fact that early i n the secwe can hazard some guesses. The conventional wisdom on priond phase of human evolution ( following the appearance of mates is that there are only two likely pressures that select for

Homo erectus two million years ago), a dramatic change in ecolarge group sizes: one is predation risk, the otqer the need to logical behaviour occurred: our ancestors became nomadic. They

defend food sources. But if baboons can cope with groups of

crossed the Arabian land bridge into Asia for the first time and

around 5 0, then it is difficult to see why the later humans and

within a few hundred thousand years had reached China and the

their immediate predecessors should have needed groups that

islands off the south-eastern coast of Asia.

were nearly three times bigger. The fact that they were larger than

Nomadism on this scale suggests that the groups foraged over

baboons (and carried passable defensive weapons in their hands)

large ranges, but were not afraid to step into the unknown beyond

should have meant that they could get by with smaller groups in . .

their everyday boundaries in search of new food sources. Animals

the same habitats. And indeed, this i s pretty much what you see.

face two problems in these situations. One is that they are unfamil

Baboons typically live in groups of 50 to 60 in woodland habitats,

iar with the lie of the land and don't know where the safe refuges

while hunter-gatherers in eastern and southern Africa typically

or the good feeding places are. The Swiss biologists Hans Sigg and

live in temporary camps of around 30 to 3 5 .

the late Alex Stolba showed that when the occasionally nomadic

Of course, our ancestors may have invaded even more open

hamadryas baboons are travelling outside their normal territory

habitats than those currently occupied by the woodland-based

they are significantly less likely to find water-holes and food trees

baboons and the forest-loving chimps, and so might have needed

than the groups resident in the areas concerned. The other is that

larger groups to offset the greater predation risk. Some evidence

resident groups may actively exclude them from access to such

to support this suggestion is provided by the modern gelada. This

essential resources (and

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.