no - human nature
"too ingrained in our human nature"
how ingrained is that? can we change if we make the right choices.
radiolab - where individual choice challenges destiny
are we - human beings - violent forever
people who say yes say yes because of our ancestors
robert sapolsky - studied baboons - esp stress
have a constant baseline level of aggression that take over their lives
frenzy/couch potatoes...
then others wanted it - so fighting
then one am - sickly
tb - infected meat eaten by baboons, kills nonhumans in weeks
garbage dump group and sapolsky's group both got it
while saprosky was heart broken - he noticed changes
grooming spiked - helping each other ie: tyson stopping to comb opponent's hair
scientifically they were ruined - so saprosky quit watching them
for 6 years
moment that changed things - by accident
showing future wife
then it hits him - there was only one mail left who had been there at the tb outbreak
mail baboons - usually leave at puberty - so rest of them came from outside with old expectations
- so the whole kum bah ya situation should have evaporated as soon as they showed up but it didn't
new guys were learning a new way
that means the old way - the violent way - isn't the only way
how do these guys unlearn their entire childhood culture of aggression
his hunch? the precarious moment when the new guy arrives... (ie: freshman yr in college)
people saying.... somebody groom him.. we have a cycle that has existed for a long time... but if we remove one thing
the key was the females - if they get to the new guy early enough
typically 3 months before the woman grooms you, here - 6 days.
if you are treated better - something about the aggressiveness melts away.
but - how long does this last?
nice ie of potential for some change, this isn't a natural context
a cultural influence that can last a bit of time
but the larger influence is the genes that last over time
so prof ? wants a genetic change
20 years and sabolsky's baboon troup is still acting in a kinder way
this has caused sabolky to hope
this got him so hopeful he sent it to foreign affairs magazine
after published - no one wrote him back
thank you @mwesch
more to come....
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