and warlike behaviors, for a culture of violence as well as a culture of peace. The model is consistent with genetic inferences of population dynamics in Africa and Europe and suggests that these cultural changes may not solely reflect increased cognitive evolution. They include groups such as the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World. 1298) present a population model that shows that the development of modern behaviors may rely on the attainment of critical population densities and migratory patterns required for stable cultural transmission. Provocatively, it appears that warfare might have enhanced the emergence and persistence of altruistic behavior. 1293) constructed a model of conflict between groups of humans and extracted estimates of the critical parameters from archaeological and ethnographic data sets. During early human development, could the benefits of altruistic behavior have outweighed its costs (see the Perspective by Mace)? Bowles (p. An ongoing discussion centers on the origins and significance of human prosociality. People might fight and sometimes kill for personal reasons, but homicide, he argues, is not. Human Nature May Not Be So Warlike After All Given the long, awful history of violence between groups of people, it's easy to think that humans are predisposed to war. The earliest hints are seen in Africa about 70 to 90,000 years ago, but later in Europe about 45,000 years ago. In a study published in Scientific American, Ferguson argues that war may not be in our nature at all. Modern behavior, including the development of advanced tools, musical instruments, and art, seems to have arisen in humans in stages.

Warlike human grouos