@article{ref1,
title="Did warfare among ancestral hunter-gatherers affect the evolution of human social behaviors?",
journal="Science",
year="2009",
author="Bowles, S.",
volume="324",
number="5932",
pages="1293-1298",
abstract="Since Darwin, intergroup hostilities have figured prominently in explanations of the evolution of human social behavior. Yet whether ancestral humans were largely &quot;peaceful&quot; or &quot;warlike&quot; remains controversial. I ask a more precise question: If more cooperative groups were more likely to prevail in conflicts with other groups, was the level of intergroup violence sufficient to influence the evolution of human social behavior? Using a model of the evolutionary impact of between-group competition and a new data set that combines archaeological evidence on causes of death during the Late Pleistocene and early Holocene with ethnographic and historical reports on hunter-gatherer populations, I find that the estimated level of mortality in intergroup conflicts would have had substantial effects, allowing the proliferation of group-beneficial behaviors that were quite costly to the individual altruist.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="0036-8075",
doi="10.1126/science.1168112",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1168112"
}