From: Gar Lipow
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prehistoric_warfare I don't think you can have war without a horrible imbalance of power between genders, and without some sort of national/cultural/racial oppression happening as well. Also since (at least until the development of capitalism) once warfare occurs, the warriors end up as an elite you have the development of class or at least caste society. ^^^^ CB: Yes, the origin of warfare is pretty much the same thing as the origin of the state. As you suggest, the male supremacist family is mixed in with the origin of the state. Also, this is the time when private property arises. Engels basic idea that the male supremacist family, private property and the state arise together as a complex is still basically correct in terms of the longview of history. They arise in the same era , relatively, in terms of the big picture of history, even though specific timing is what gets bounced around with modern archaeology. ^^^^^^ Also on hunter-gather/forager. And there is an important paleoarcheological minority who does insist on forager for early humans, reserving hunter-gatherre for later one. I don't insist on it, but it makes an important point. Before the existence of distance killing, it is likely that most animal protein was not from hunting as we usually think of it; scavenging, insect eating, finding young in nests, perhaps some fish or shellfish. Forager avoids invoking the macho-romanticism of the humanity the conquerer. ^^^^^ CB: A main point is that early hunters were not macho ( there was equality of sexes; not "genders"'; gender means male supremacist). Also, hunting small game is hunting. And they are _not_ conquering. They are not territorial with respect to other humans. That's the point. Humans are designed to run long distances at a slower rate ( thus modern jogging fits our physiology) compared with the species they prey on which are quick in short distance but tire when humans _track_ or _trek_ them down. This is _hunting_. The key thing in dealing with meateating big mammals is social labor, not the particular weapon. With this they can handle big predators. The key institution signalling this sociality is kinship systems - naming individuals and tracing their connections to each other through dead ancestors. By this also, science is initiated. The current generation learns from the experiences of dead generations.All this is much more powerful than a particular weapon. Human adaptative superiority is socially caused. Superior technology is only possible because of the social structure and culture-tradition ( which is "social" across generations, social between dead and living generations).
