Book: Sex at Dawn

According to Sex at Dawn, bonobos do not practice infanticide. .

Yeah I used to think that too until I looked into other sources of information. Bonobos are highly romantisized (spelled wrong) and certainly stand out among primates. They do have all the usual tendencies of other primates though.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8487000/8487138.stm

"Metaphor

"But we now know they do hunt monkeys. So I think eating an already dead baby says little about bonobos in that respect.

"Bonobos are often used in a symbolic way, held up as the sexy, peaceful 'Hippy Chimps'.

"The fact that they eat monkeys and consume their own dead offspring may not accord with this view, but I personally don't see this as a problem."

"The idea of the 'Hippy Chimp' is more a metaphor than a scientific argument," he continues. "
 
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Just me :)

Bonobos also engage in fights, kill thier children and were largely studied in captivity...just saying.

Gotta love having that upper level thought processes and logic eh?

I find most of these points interesting but moot. My parents were happily monogamous. To argue against monogamy throws it in the face of those people.

Argue for your right to be non-monogamous, not "monos" misdirected belief that monogamy isn't natural. Good way to get their backs up. ;) :p
 
Mono, the parts you quote don't say that they killed their young, only that they eat them if they die. That's different, I think. It's still possible that they kill their offspring, but I don't think the quotes you shared prove that.
 
Mono, the parts you quote don't say that they killed their young, only that they eat them if they die. That's different, I think. It's still possible that they kill their offspring, but I don't think the quotes you shared prove that.

You're right actually. That is only one source and others mention that it is rare for Bonobos to kill their young. I can't find any documentation stating specifically that a bonobo was witnessed killing it's own young before eating it. They do however hunt other primates and eat them and unlike chimps the females also participate in hunting. I don't hate Bonobos, I just recognize that they are not all peace and love and commit acts of violence just like any other primate. Along a similar myth of seeing some animals as beautifully peaceful intelligent creatures is the documented studies of Bottle Nose Dolphins who are almost unique in nature for apparently killing for pleasure. Every species with intellect has it's dark side.

But enough hi-jacking :eek:
 
I remember watching that with you... not that I am a good source.

Just to shake it up more. I believe I remember seeing them have sex with their children too :eek:

Did we watch that with LB? Was it a library video? We watch so many science library videos they all blur after a time.
 
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My understanding is that they do fight less amongst themselves than chimps.

Humans, monogamous or otherwise, are pretty violent and have a long history of infanticide. I don't think poly will save the world, but I don't think monogamy is gonna do it either.
 
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Ah, bonobos, the crown jewel of God's creation! Let's not get me started on bonobos. Let's instead read this delightful article by Mr. Frans de Waal, a famed zoologist and bonobo enthusiast par excellence!

I have to quote myself now:

"Bonobos are the close cousins of both humans and chimpanzees, who surprisingly show very different behaviour patterns from both us and the chimps. In short, bonobos seem to have taken to heart the hippy byword 'Make love, not war'. Male bonobos tolerate both females and infants well, and although the discussion is still raging on, it seems that indeed females lead the bonobo societies through forming close, mutually co-operative alliances between non-related, adult females. Males inherit heir mother's rank and stay with their mother's group, whereas females migrate from their birth group upon maturity (this is a feature shared with the chimps, however, with totally different social consequences). In any case, bonobos are not as hierarchical animals as chimps, and use sex and grooming to relieve tension between members of the group instead of violence and dominance.

See http://songweaver.com/info/bonobos.html for

Bonobo Sex and Society

The behavior of a close relative challenges assumptions about male supremacy in human evolution

by

Frans B. M. de Waal

(Originally published in the March 1995 issue of SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN, pp. 82-88)

A more scientific article, where de Waal shows that bonobos engage in sex for other than reproductive purposes, appear to use sex as way to relieve intra-group tension, and speculates that non-reproductive use of sex might have evolved to enable more peaceful and co-operative male-female relationships (in less-scientific terms, female bonobos distract males with sex and help themselves during intercourse to the food the male has gathered) can be found in

de Waal, Frans B. M. (1995): Sex as an Alternative to Aggression in the Bonobo. In Sexual Nature, Sexual Culture (Paul R. Abramson & Steven D. Pinkerton, eds.), pp. 37-56. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press."

End bonobo ramble. Hope the link works.
 
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Is your hypothesis then that human behavior is non-evolutionary? It's important to keep science value-neutral in order to better understand the world and our species. Setting out under the assumption that men and women are exactly equal in all respects is fallacious - we are a sexually dimorphic species in form, and chemically dimorphic also - science has shown clearly the effect that different chemical landscapes have on the way our brains operate. I'll agree that drawing instant conclusions to support traditional gender roles is nonscientific and stupid, obviously... but I think it's important to consider our evolution when analyzing behavior.

Nope, my hypothesis is that ALL behavior in modern humans has an evolutionary basis but the exact basis is anyone's guess.

Also, human sexual dimorphism is less severe than in many other apes, mainly the gorilla and the orangutan. This I think offers good proof FOR (single-standard serial) monogamy developing at some phase in human evolution, or at least lessened competition between males.
 
Okay, this is my first attempt at multi-quoting.

I find most of these points interesting but moot. My parents were happily monogamous. To argue against monogamy throws it in the face of those people.

Argue for your right to be non-monogamous, not "monos" misdirected belief that monogamy isn't natural.

I have to disagree with you. I would never argue that monogamy is NOT natural for humans. It obviously is because we witness it in human populations. Arguing that something is 'more' or 'less' natural than something else, is, I agree, sort of pointless if sometimes entertaining.

Along a similar myth of seeing some animals as beautifully peaceful intelligent creatures is the documented studies of Bottle Nose Dolphins who are almost unique in nature for apparently killing for pleasure.

I also heard that Bottle-Noses rape people! The males appereantly misinterpret humans petting them as an invitation to mate. Bad Bottle-Noses!

Just to shake it up more. I believe I remember seeing them have sex with their children too :eek:

Yup, the second de Waal article actually counts the frequencies of an infant bonobo girl having sex with others in the group. The adults and juveniles, however, never seemed to initiate these events. Also in chimps, young females who are not yet or only sporadically fertile initiate sexual encounters with older males. Yet another proof that at least in humans, bonobos and chimps sex serves non-reproductive purposes.
 
I have to disagree with you. I would never argue that monogamy is NOT natural for humans. It obviously is because we witness it in human populations. Arguing that something is 'more' or 'less' natural than something else, is, I agree, sort of pointless if sometimes entertaining.

You are arguing off the premise that I am arguing that only one of the two (and many other options) are capable of being natural.

I don't hold that stance. I don't think one is better or worse, or one is more natural or not more natural. I don't believe natural has to be ONE thing.

I guess I am relationship-nostic (hows that for a completely made up falste word)... I believe monogamy is natural for some, and poly is natural for others...I believe its the people that are fucking it all up with their religious and pseudo scientific views.

Its the zealots of the world that annoy the fuck out of me. Religiouns, pagan, poly, scientific etc.. zealots are annoyances...
 
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According to Sex at Dawn, bonobos do not practice infanticide. Offspring are cared for by the tribe, and even nursed by multiple "mothers." Knowing what I do about lactation, this means the infant/toddler bonobo drinks in the DNA from several mothers, thereby, to an extent, actually becoming biologically the child of more than one mother!

Yes there are cells (and with the cells DNA) in breast milk but drinking the breast milk doesn't incorporate that DNA into the child's system. The cells are simply digested and become nutrients for the child.
 
I definitely think that a variety of relationship patterns are natural for humans, including monogamy, poly, etc. Pretty much the only science we have on the matter are statistics regarding fidelity in monogamous relationships, at which we, as a species, tend to fail miserably at. If society's premise is that "humans as a whole are only monogamous animals", their research on the subject has disproven their hypothesis.
 
I definitely think that a variety of relationship patterns are natural for humans, including monogamy, poly, etc. Pretty much the only science we have on the matter are statistics regarding fidelity in monogamous relationships...

Actually we have dozens of years of anthropological research on dozens of "traditional" (pre-agricultural) cultures still practicing a hunter/gatherer lifestyle as well.
 
Actually we have dozens of years of anthropological research on dozens of "traditional" (pre-agricultural) cultures still practicing a hunter/gatherer lifestyle as well.

Agreed, tons of cultural studies, even some science like caloric intake, hours worked in a day, but I haven't seen any data on successful relationships and mating patterns. If you know of some, I'd LOVE to see it! :)
 
Agreed, tons of cultural studies, even some science like caloric intake, hours worked in a day, but I haven't seen any data on successful relationships and mating patterns. If you know of some, I'd LOVE to see it! :)

Read Sex at Dawn. While you're waiting for the book, do a search here for the title. It's been discussed quite a bit.
 
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