Let me add to Carroll Cox's point (on how little of human prehistory we
know/how minimal or negative is any evidence for any human genetic
predisposition toward war)--and to this general thread--a few thoughts.
1. As a zoologist friend pointed out during the '60s, no scientist would take
seriously the sort of examples and lack of controls/large-samples/etc.in most
"human nature" arguments
2. Though on the other hand, we, as humans, I WOULD argue back, do, and
probably should, find in our own reactions/feelings, (insofar as we can
separate these from discourse/social-expectations/etc.), "human nature"
3. There seems to be a "bonding" experience among groups of humans in most
any "extreme" situation--including, as Don brought up, childbirth; I should
think THIS, rather than war (or, in prehistory, perhaps the hunt, the staving
off of predators--or disease/cold/famine, the harvest, the bringing into the
world of a child?), (and also, incidentally, perhaps the creative-extreme
bonding of, eg, this sort of arguing, when everyone's working/playing toward
finding whatever of truth ("truth"?) rather than "owning" points or
ego/position-competition), is where whatever "natural" element of combat
veterans' bonding may be found;
4. --including, NOT incidentally, the bonding of those upon the protest or
the picket lines;
5. someone mentioned Foucault's arguments--as if we should HAVE to argue
through his/postmodern convolutions first before finding a way through the
thicket of war-speak to begin to reach the possibility of war as NOT human
nature. May I suggest--having just edited a book on "postcolonialism"--that
this is one more way the establishment/discourse of academia works ITS
colonization on our discourse; let's avoid this snare, too;
6. the REAL culprit, I fear, would be if there's some "human predisposition"
to hierarchy--on the other hand, or paw, we're NOT identical with either
certain canids or certain primates.
In any case, it's childbearing- not menstrual- envy; amniotic fluid's thicker
than blood.
Great being back on the list and hearing you people.
Peace and caring anarchy,
Paula
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