I’ll post a large portion of the article now in case the link fails to work at some point. I don’t have much to add otherwise (surprise, surprise). Although at the bottom I’ll include a reply to a comment made on the article Mr. Guitchounts who specializes in neuroscience which I suppose accounts his championing of human cognitive prowess.

Give it up for in-laws. Those much-maligned meddlers helped spur an ancient social revolution that propelled human groups from savannas to cities, a new study suggests.

That conclusion stems from an analysis of genealogical and marital data indicating that, among modern hunter-gatherers, monogamous sexual unions between men and women from neighboring groups create networks of in-laws that spawn widespread cooperation and cultural learning, says a team led by anthropologist Kim Hill of Arizona State University in Tempe. Social groups organized in this way distinguish humans from other primates, Hill and his colleagues propose in the March 11 Science.

“Alliances between foraging groups are facilitated because unrelated males all associate with the same female, who may be their daughter, sister, wife, mother or daughter-in-law,” Hill says. “By friendly association with her, males begin to associate with each other.”

A social system of this type, which encourages collaboration among genetically unrelated individuals, originated approximately two million years ago as human ancestors began to hunt and gather foods that youngsters could not obtain for themselves, Hill hypothesizes. In this situation, females would have had an incentive to seek mates willing to stick around and provide food for offspring.

In contrast, female chimps mate with many partners. Males in adjacent chimp groups try to kill each other on sight, making cooperation between communities impossible.

“Differences in social structures, not necessarily cognitive advances, allowed our species to cross the barrier to cumulative cultural evolution,” remarks anthropologist Joseph Henrich of the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. In this process, cultural inventions become increasingly complex from one generation to the next.

Three social features characterize hunter-gatherer societies and are unique to humans, the researchers conclude. First, both men and women are as likely to stay in the bands they were born into as to move to new bands to find marriage partners. Second, adult brothers and sisters frequently reside together, along with lots of in-laws. Third, a majority of band members are genetically unrelated.

In a comment published in the same issue of Science, anthropologist Bernard Chapais of the University of Montreal argues that this monogamy-based social structure encourages males to circulate freely among bands in which they have kin and in-laws. Cultural innovations and traditions thus spread rapidly and unite bands into larger social units called tribes, Chapais proposes.

Cultural learning among hunter-gatherers led to the rise of agriculture around 10,000 years ago and the ensuing formation of states and complex institutions, Hill hypothesizes.

My response to a comment posted on this research on the Science News website.

Grigori Guitchounts says “This is hardly impressive in terms of importance and scientific credibility.” That’s a bit strong. Sounds like he’s defending human cognitive ability.

We are not that objective when it comes to judging ourselves. We are quite naturally species ego-centric. It’s a shame we can’t see that better than we do. If we did we might improve our own self understanding.

I’ve long suspected that the principle reason for our dominance on the planet was due to our social instincts much more than ‘intelligence’. In that regard, we are more like idiot savants. The blindness of expertise I call it.

This article goes a long way to uncovering the deeper reasons why we’ve ended up where we are today. Sure the brain, the thumb, the upright posture all played a role, but not as profound as the social aspect.

Our money is family money… really. It is one big pot from which each takes as needed. This is radically different from the independent model upon which my parents raised me. I did chores for which I got a salary. I suppose the idea here is to prepare the me (their child) for the employer – employee relationship that would lie ahead.

That was not to be my model for raising my kids. Here, everyone in the family did / does ‘chores’, but not as some ‘job’, but rather as part of what needs doing as part of practical daily living. A shared life involves shared responsibility (which makes life feel more shared). Here, each takes on what they are most naturally capable of doing. ‘It happened to us naturally.’

Having nature as my model, along with experience, has taught me that turning over to kids as much responsibility as they can handle, regardless of their age, makes them feel more responsible, and thus, I reckon, makes life more meaningful. I know that was my parents aim; they just didn’t understand that their approach often hindered this. Having the opportunity to have responsibility is the most direct way to feel connected and participating with others.  Needless to say, this fosters core life satisfaction and mental health. Perhaps the failure of culture to offer this avenue to kids is what makes drugs an attractive escape.

Over the years I’ve noticed a common desire to not delegate responsibility, but rather maintain control. I guess this stems from an innate paternalistic and materialistic instincts to control the situation, i.e., ‘protect’ us from ourselves and the mistakes we might make. The fact is, however, the control and responsibility go together. Giving one more responsibility means giving them more control and the freedom to stumble.

This short video about a 78-year old blind man living with his 13 family members in India and how they share one bank account hints at something our culture abandoned in its obsessive pursuit of self reliance. Ironically, we seem to be even more inclined to not take individual responsibility, but instead point the finger and ’sue their pants off’. I’ve heard people refer to our country increasingly becoming a ‘nanny state’.

Of course to be fair, our country is not alone in that by any means. My point is that the virtue of  ‘independence’ is an illusion. We are a socially interdependent species, period. Pushing an essentially un-natural virtue of ‘independence’ onto a people will always backfire. As that old TV add use to say, its not nice to fool Mother Nature. Why do we do it? Somehow it ties in with modern society which is set up to meet the needs of a capitalist, consumer oriented, growth based civilization. All I can say is, this is something which is liable to rebound. I mean, global warming may be the least of our problems going forward. But no worries, Mother Nature will rebalance it in the long run.

Eligible bachelors

There is a curious thing I notice in the life of my two sons. They are not chasing girls like I was at their age. They aren’t gay either, so what gives? I look back on my youthful lust and see a disconnected lad looking for companionship that my ‘independent’ upbringing (plus innate nature, I suppose) never provided. All I ever really wanted was intimacy and acceptance. And the only path to that deeper sense of connection was through a boy-girl relationship. That was true of my wife and most everyone I know (especially in Western cultures). Ironically, our culture’s love of ‘independence and self reliance’ actually leave its people with just the opposite, deep down anyway.

The radically different path my sons seem to be on is not that surprising when considered from a symptoms point of view. The boys get a level of acceptance and intimacy from me and my wife that only a ‘taoist’ paradigm can give. (Note, my use of small ‘t’ ‘taoist’, not Taoist.) They never felt the need to rebel as teenagers; how can you rebel against a ‘taoist’ point of view; how can one push back against nothing? By not pushing self reliance on them, self reliance happened to them naturally. In other words, to paraphrase chapter 2: It is because we lay claim to no self reliance, that self reliance never deserts us.

True, we do have a family business which gives them something to sink their teeth into. Also, I gladly let them take on any level of responsibility they wish (something neither my parents, nor any I knew, seem willing to do; parents want to maintain control). Come to think of it, a sense of responsibility also conforms to the view that we often get just the opposite of what we push for. Or, to paraphrase chapter 22: He does not consider himself responsible, and so is illustrious (i.e., responsible).

Much of what parents do in raising their children is in reaction to, and symptomatic of,  their needs and fears. I find most people need to think they are in control (i.e., free will), and end up pushing that ’story’ onto their kids. Teenager then just end up rebelling against this projection of parental expectations. Our vain struggle for free will and choice is such a waste of time and energy. I find I waste much less, now that I understand that my actions (or inactions) are simply reactions – symptoms of deeper causes. Being aware of this moment – to – moment ‘karma’, I can not help but be more tentative, hesitant, and vacant like a valley.

So when will my sons find their “significant others”? Unlike me, I am guessing they will seek a mate in earnest only when they feel the real inner pull to have a family of their own. Hmm, I better keep taking good care of myself if I ever want to see grandchildren!

Background
Memories become dimmer as the years fly by. Many are even too misty to write down without filling in the voids with poetic license (fiction). Still, I’ve set out to fetch what memories remain before they fade any further. See: The Further One Goes for background on this ‘Times of Yore’ series.

Mother and sons

One curious result of using a ‘taoist’ model of ‘virtue’ to raise my kids is seeing how naturally ethical – even to a ‘fault’ – they have turned out. Given the laissez-faire upbringing they had, it is a little odd to see how rigidly law abiding they can be at times. For example, we headed down the street to order a sandwich at the corner deli. I grabbed a beer to drink (rare for me) as we walked there. They protested, saying it was against the law to walk in public and drink beer. I thought that nonsense. Drink and drive no way, but drink and walk? All my life I have only obeyed laws I agreed with, so they didn’t pick up their highly law abiding ways from me (obviously). And, given the circumstances of how they were raised, I doubt they learned it from anyone in particular. This may be a testament to the deep underlying pull of the ethical paradigm that surrounds everyone. Most conform, some rebel, but everyone feels it.

From a Taoist point of view, virtue and ethics (as commonly viewed) are symptoms of great hypocrisy, not solutions. They are ineffective at best, and downright debilitating at worst, e.g., ‘A man of the lowest virtue never strays from virtue and that is why he is without virtue‘. True virtue is essentially mysterious virtue, and was the model I used as best I could. For example, I never told them to say ‘thank you’ when someone gave them something. I felt it best for them to say one day, “It happened to us naturally”. Granted, it was sometimes embarrassing for my wife and I when our ostensibly rude kids would not say ‘thank you’ when receiving a gift. The point was, I wanted them to ‘feel the need’, rather than being prodded into a show of virtuous rectitude and rites. So far this experiment is turning out just fine, bolstering my faith in the truth of this beautiful sentiment… One does less and less until one does nothing at all, and when one does nothing at all there is nothing that is undone. It is always through not meddling that the empire is won. Should you meddle, then you are not equal to the task of winning the empire.