Less than Human

https://barryhisblog.blogspot.com/p/less-than-human.html

This is the title of a book by David Livingstone Smith, a Professor of philosophy at the University of New England in Biddeford, Maine. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of London, Kings College.

More details are available from the Amazon entry for the book @ https://www.amazon.com/Less-Human-DAVID-LIVINGSTONE-SMITH/dp/1250003830 and his more recent https://www.amazon.com/Making-Monsters-Uncanny-Power-Dehumanization/dp/0674545567/

Livingstone-Smith addresses a problem that has always concerned me. If we are Homo sapiens sapiens, "wise man", how come we can't get it together to reap the benefits of cooperation, and instead spend obscene levels of resources and effort on conflict with such wasteful and tragic consequences? It seems that populist politicians find it easy to mine and exploit what appears to be a cognitive defect in our natures.

Trying to understand this led me to the study of evolutionary psychology. Why are we as we are? Given that evolution is true, are there any clues in our evolutionary history? 

I am a teacher who qualified to teach at an English college that was founded by Christians. They had no problems with evolution and even took us on trips to visit Down House, Darwin's home and centre for his investigations and studies. I got on to a discussion group that included a number of prominent American academics in the field of evolutionary psychology. This was some 20 years ago. I was astonished to be told that a significant number of, mostly Americans, reject the idea of evolution entirely! I thought that this had been all been settled in the 19th century! I still don't understand this peculiar quirk of mostly American history, though Karen Armstrong's Battle for God provides some clues. https://www.amazon.fr/Battle-God-Fundamentalism-Judaism-Christianity/dp/0006383483

Our closest living relatives are common chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) and bonobos (Pan paniscus). Perhaps understanding these species can help us understand ourselves better. Both species are capable of cooperation and mutual aid, but also conflict, depending on circumstances. What I struggle to understand is why troglodytes in particular is highly cooperative and emphatic, rivalry aside, within their troupe, but their attitude to non-troupe members is highly xenophobic, and results in vicious murder - that's the only word for it - of members of different troupes who are unfortunate enough to stray into the "foreign" troupe's territory. Even brothers who end up in different groups for romantic reasons end up being deadly enemies. I wish I could remember who said it, but someone said that if you took a bunch of chimps from different troupes for a coach ride, when the coach came back, only one of them would get off alive. Franz de Waal, who sadly died just recently WRT the time of writing this, had spent his life studying our fellow primates. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frans_de_Waal. I have read most of his popular works, but I am still left with trying to understand the basic reasons for their and our behaviour.

The one thing that I am convinced of is that evolution-denial is, to say the very least, unhelpful.

https://www.amazon.com/Less-Human-DAVID-LIVINGSTONE-SMITH/dp/1250003830