From: Kenneth Van Oost (Kennethvanoost@belgacom.net)
Date: Fri 15 Nov 2002 - 19:47:19 GMT
----- Original Message -----
From: "Grant Callaghan" <grantc4@hotmail.com>
> Most mammals are social animals that live in family groups and cooperate
> with each other. Even predators such as lions and wolves. Chimps and
> monkeys have a social order. Any animal that has a pecking order implies
> they have the rudiments of a society of some kind. To assume they are all
> individuals is to assume the opposite of what appears to be true in the
> wild.
I think you missed my point Grant !
My hypothesis is that sociality/ groups/ cooperation/ social order/ pecking
order/... are the second step of the process, the initial ' natural ' order
is
since long gone !
That is to say, in the early days of what ever existed then there was no
plural,
no groups, only one- celluar organisms... everything evolved out of those,
that is to say, out of individualism.. collectiviness/ groups/ etc evolved.
What you say above are examples of already evolved ' individualistic'
lineages.
Grant,
> I think it's a mistake to assume that social order and cooperation are the
> exception rather than the rule.
It would be if I putted it in such context, that is not the case, social
order and
cooperation are, according to Goulds proposal of the Full House, the
second step, " the way up " of the process.
That is of course what I see what the Full House implies if you turn things
upside down.
Social order and cooperation are not in my view exception to any rule,
I just want to make you understand that what we know today as society,
culture/ groups/ collectiviness/ togetherness/ etc all initial were
individualis-
tic.. in the words of Joe, less complex.
I tried to connect this given to the origins of man, especially to the out
of
Africa- theory, that lacks a decent reason why we ever left the continent.
I say, it was an individualistic step.
Regards,
Kenneth
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