Darwin's apes and “savages”

Abstract

For my own part, I would as soon be descended (. . .) from that old baboon, who, descending from the mountains, carried away in triumph his young comrade from a crowd of astonished dogs -as from a savage who delights to torture his enemies, offers up bloody sacrifices, practices infanticide without remorse, treats his wives like slaves, knows no decency, and is haunted by the grossest superstitions.'' [1] (emphasis added).It is, of course, a provocative remark that comes from a man who has already shocked a conservative society by demonstrating in 1858 that humans are animals that evolve. However, beyond this provocation lies a genuine

Detection of Impending Aggressive Outbursts in Patients with Psychiatric Disorders: Violence Clues from Dogs

“…Collectively, our study further supports that the psychological behaviour of alerting dogs might, at least in part, resemble altruism behaviour seen for humans. In further support of this idea is the evidence for: (1) altruism across species for example: apes and birds 29 ; (2) altruism behaviour between unrelated species or unrelated animals including between human and canine 27,30,31 . Furthermore, gene polymorphism in the oxytocin system has been suggested to contribute towards altruism 32 .…”

A non-Darwinian Darwin: An introduction

“…With Darwin's theory of heredity through pangenesis [10] and his work on sexual selection [11][12][13], we are led to consider the consistency -or inconsistency -of his central enquiry on evolutionary mechanisms, his own position on the debates of naturalists about humans, and the prejudices of his day about women. It is striking that no unity can be found in his studies on humans and behaviour [14][15][16][17], and we can wonder how it is possible that his book on the expression of emotions in humans and the other animals was written with so little regard to their common descent. The invited editors of this issue feel deeply indebted to the contributors for having raised so many long-neglected issues in the field of classical Darwinian studies.…”