Given the current political penchant for touting war in this country, it’s difficult not to think about what animal behavior can teach us about fighting as a viable response to a real or imagined threat. Even those with only limited knowledge of animal behavior know that evolution rewards those species and individuals who get the job done using the least amount of energy: How does fighting to gain or hold on to resources rank as a valid survival strategy in terms of conservation of energy?
A major up-front energy-saver takes the form of the majority of fighting being done by males. This makes sense because females have much more energy invested in their potential and existing offspring. Maintaining that finite number of energy-rich eggs and developing fetuses requires a great deal of energy, and nursing and tending off-spring requires even more. Those females most likely to live long enough to get their genes into the gene pool are those the least inclined to squander their lives and those of their offspring needlessly. Male sperm, on the other hand, represent little energy investment and a 1:1 female-to-male ratio results in far more males than necessary to continue a species. Distinguishing himself in a fight may be the only way an otherwise nondescript male might rise in the ranks and gain the increased mating opportunities that go with that. Consequently, regardless of what lofty ideological reasons human males may give for fighting, the bottom is line is that males fight because, compared to females, they have the least to lose and the most to gain by doing so.
What ethologists and animals realize, and apparently some politicians and military folks do not, is that no one wins a fight. Fighting requires energy and the “winner” is merely that individual who loses the least amount of it. Because of this, the most energy-efficient fight is that which occurs between an obviously strong and an obviously weak combatant. The more equally matched the combatants, the more energy spent fighting. The more time spent fighting, the more chance of injury. The more time and energy spent fighting and the more injuries, the less likely the fighters will mate and add their genes to the gene pool. Put another way, fighting to achieve results is a self-eliminating behavior over time. It may appear to work in the short run (for example, long enough to get one elected or reelected), but it will ultimately destroy the population which uses this as a mechanism for gaining resources.
I sometimes give students the following behavioral problem to help them understand dominance and leadership. Two dogs sniff each other out and Dog A decides he should be in charge and claim all the rights and privileges of that position. He puts his front legs up on Dog B’s shoulders to signal this. However Dog B refuses to submit and a ritualistic fight occurs and doesn’t end until Dog A pins Dog B to the ground. Which dog is leader? The answer is that we don’t know. We can say that A is dominant, but leadership won’t be conferred until they meet again. If at that time all A has to do is look at B and B backs off, then we can say that A is leader. However, if they fight and even if A wins every time, he’s proven nothing about his leadership ability. In fact, were he truly a leader, he never would have had to fight in the first place. His presence alone would have sufficed to communicate his position during that first encounter.
So, and in case you wondered where the football came in, in true animal behavior terms there should have been one football season and one Super Bowl way back in neanderthalic times and that should have ended it. However, and most sadly for human civilization, the idea that winning the fight equals leadership is deeply embedded in our sports, and sports analogies are rampant in male-dominated politics. A football team who pounds another crows about its “leader of the pack” status while similarly naive politicians crow about winning floor fights in the Senate or Parliament and the need to fight to prove their country’s superiority. What all those who ascribe to such thinking fail to realize is that, were they truly leaders, they wouldn’t need to fight at all.
Finally, and most troubling, we have the ethological concept known as the bourgeois effect or, if you prefer a sports analogy, the home-team advantage. It turns out that no matter how hawkish one’s attack and how normally dovish or weak those whom one attacks may appear, it’s impossible for anyone to conquer those attacked in their own territory. This occurs because those in their own territory not only know that space intimately, they also stand to lose the most if they submit. Viet Nam, Israel-Palestine, Afghanistan, and Chechnya come to mind as possible human examples of this principal. Sadly those “leaders” who champion such attacks aren’t nearly as smart as animals when it comes to figuring this out.
Nineteenth century naturalist Honore de Fabre believed that humankind would be long gone before we learned all the gnat had to teach us. How ironic and yet how fitting that the insects might easily survive to claim the remnants of a planet and the senseless destruction of the human life caused by our arrogance and ignorance of normal animal behavior.
If you have any comments regarding subject matter, favorite links, or anything you’d like to see discussed on or added to this site, please let me know at mm@mmilani.com.
Given the current political penchant for touting war in this country, it’s difficult not to think about what animal behavior can teach us about fighting as a viable response to a real or imagined threat. Even those with only limited knowledge of animal behavior know that evolution rewards those species and individuals who get the job done using the least amount of energy: How does fighting to gain or hold on to resources rank as a valid survival strategy in terms of conservation of energy?
A major up-front energy-saver takes the form of the majority of fighting being done by males. This makes sense because females have much more energy invested in their potential and existing offspring. Maintaining that finite number of energy-rich eggs and developing fetuses requires a great deal of energy, and nursing and tending off-spring requires even more. Those females most likely to live long enough to get their genes into the gene pool are those the least inclined to squander their lives and those of their offspring needlessly. Male sperm, on the other hand, represent little energy investment and a 1:1 female-to-male ratio results in far more males than necessary to continue a species. Distinguishing himself in a fight may be the only way an otherwise nondescript male might rise in the ranks and gain the increased mating opportunities that go with that. Consequently, regardless of what lofty ideological reasons human males may give for fighting, the bottom is line is that males fight because, compared to females, they have the least to lose and the most to gain by doing so.
What ethologists and animals realize, and apparently some politicians and military folks do not, is that no one wins a fight. Fighting requires energy and the “winner” is merely that individual who loses the least amount of it. Because of this, the most energy-efficient fight is that which occurs between an obviously strong and an obviously weak combatant. The more equally matched the combatants, the more energy spent fighting. The more time spent fighting, the more chance of injury. The more time and energy spent fighting and the more injuries, the less likely the fighters will mate and add their genes to the gene pool. Put another way, fighting to achieve results is a self-eliminating behavior over time. It may appear to work in the short run (for example, long enough to get one elected or reelected), but it will ultimately destroy the population which uses this as a mechanism for gaining resources.
I sometimes give students the following behavioral problem to help them understand dominance and leadership. Two dogs sniff each other out and Dog A decides he should be in charge and claim all the rights and privileges of that position. He puts his front legs up on Dog B’s shoulders to signal this. However Dog B refuses to submit and a ritualistic fight occurs and doesn’t end until Dog A pins Dog B to the ground. Which dog is leader? The answer is that we don’t know. We can say that A is dominant, but leadership won’t be conferred until they meet again. If at that time all A has to do is look at B and B backs off, then we can say that A is leader. However, if they fight and even if A wins every time, he’s proven nothing about his leadership ability. In fact, were he truly a leader, he never would have had to fight in the first place. His presence alone would have sufficed to communicate his position during that first encounter.
So, and in case you wondered where the football came in, in true animal behavior terms there should have been one football season and one Super Bowl way back in neanderthalic times and that should have ended it. However, and most sadly for human civilization, the idea that winning the fight equals leadership is deeply embedded in our sports, and sports analogies are rampant in male-dominated politics. A football team who pounds another crows about its “leader of the pack” status while similarly naive politicians crow about winning floor fights in the Senate or Parliament and the need to fight to prove their country’s superiority. What all those who ascribe to such thinking fail to realize is that, were they truly leaders, they wouldn’t need to fight at all.
Finally, and most troubling, we have the ethological concept known as the bourgeois effect or, if you prefer a sports analogy, the home-team advantage. It turns out that no matter how hawkish one’s attack and how normally dovish or weak those whom one attacks may appear, it’s impossible for anyone to conquer those attacked in their own territory. This occurs because those in their own territory not only know that space intimately, they also stand to lose the most if they submit. Viet Nam, Israel-Palestine, Afghanistan, and Chechnya come to mind as possible human examples of this principal. Sadly those “leaders” who champion such attacks aren’t nearly as smart as animals when it comes to figuring this out.
Nineteenth century naturalist Honore de Fabre believed that humankind would be long gone before we learned all the gnat had to teach us. How ironic and yet how fitting that the insects might easily survive to claim the remnants of a planet and the senseless destruction of the human life caused by our arrogance and ignorance of normal animal behavior.
If you have any comments regarding subject matter, favorite links, or anything you’d like to see discussed on or added to this site, please let me know at mm@mmilani.com.