Fred Foldvary wrote: > > Let me propose a signaling story. The young try more to signal to > > each other that they would be good allies and mates, while the old > > are already matched more and need to get along. ... > >Some adults in tough neighborhoods place much value in "respect," ... >Many adults remain unsophisticated in that they do not filter emotions ... >So it seems to me that cooperation is something that, in part, needs to be >taught as manners.
John Hull wrote: >Perhaps it is an evolutionary artifact: dominance >hierarchies are established when young, and children >are just doing what evolution has hard wired in their >brains. ... >Considering that if you look a dominant macaque in the >eyes he'll jump on your head and rip your face off, >perhaps child social behavior better represents the >null hypothesis (so to speak) and adult cooperation >represents the break from "nature" that needs to be >explained. The theory that modern adults must learn to be more cooperative because the modern environment differs from the environment we evolved in could be tested by comparing child vs. adult cooperativeness in hunter-gather tribes today. If children are less cooperative even there, it would look more like their behavior is more of an adaption for children to act less cooperatively than adults. Robin Hanson [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://hanson.gmu.edu Asst. Prof. Economics, George Mason University MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444 703-993-2326 FAX: 703-993-2323