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Altruism is a fundamental problem for evolutionary biology
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The lecturer counters the author's ideas about the altruism by listing a series of facts that debunk the basis of the reading, i.e. the examples regarding the meerkats and human beings. The main pontspoints are described and summarized herein.
The author of the reading sustains that the sentinalsentinel of a group of meerkats, animal found in green lands in Africa, is a great example of altruism behavior as they perform the task of surveillance others before eating. However, the professor, based on a closely study on meerkats, explains that the eating habit of this animal is to consume their food before hunting.
Furthermore, still discussing about meerkats, the reading highlights the selfness character of sentinels by saying they are more
In this observation, the purpose is to understand ethology, which is the study of how an animal’s
First Friend: A History of Dogs and Humans, by Katherine Rogers, articulates the history of the relationship between dogs and humans. Wild Justice: The Moral Lives of Animals, by Marc Bekoff and Jessica Pierce, investigates if and how dogs exhibit morality. In both texts, anecdotes and observations are used to portray instances of dogs displaying cooperation, empathy, altruism, and, by extension, morality. Consequently, it stands to reason that dogs have a capacity for sociality, but how can the sociality of dogs be described? A dog’s capacity for sociality is the ability to form long term relationships with members of the same or other species. Dogs, in particular, dogs who hunt as well as dogs who play, are able to form long term relationships with humans and other dogs through trust, love,
We will give Hobbes’ view of human nature as he describes it in Chapter 13 of Leviathan. We will then give an argument for placing a clarifying layer above the Hobbesian view in order to account for acts of altruism.
Predators of the meerkat include eagles and hawks, who can easily scoop up the tiny fellows, who weigh only two pounds. This danger requires at least one meerkat to be kept on “watch duty” at all times. This is quite the sacrifice, for the meerkat keeping watch is almost universally killed and eaten. However, the unfortunate meerkat will have already signaled an alarm to the rest of its manor before it is caught, thereby protecting its family and relatives and, in turn, fulfilling its only true purpose in life – passing on its genes.
Meerkats are cooperatively breeding mongooses that live in groups of three to 33 individuals (Manser, 1999). These diurnal animals inhabit open-semi desert areas and forage five to eight hours per day while frequently scanning their surroundings for possible predators (Hollén and Manser, 2007). Group members also take turns guarding the area from a raised position while the others continue foraging (Manser, 2001). Meerkats live in a harsh environment with limited food resources and are also exposed to a high predation risk by many different types of predators (Manser, 1999). To lower the risk and to increase the efficiency of foraging, mee...
“Is it right, in the deepest moral sense, for one conscious being to eat another?” Throughout Eating Apes, Dale Peterson takes the readers through what he experienced, saw, and the issues presented with trying to protect the apes to gear us to answer that question. He was able to do this with the stories of Karl Ammann, who took the photographs presented in the book, and Joseph Melloh, a gorilla hunter from Cameroon. Prior to taking this class, my knowledge of apes going extinct went as far as being aware that we needed to save them from extinction. However, I was unaware of neither how brutal apes were treated nor how pivotal they were to people in Central Africa’s diet – until I began reading Eating Apes. Eating Apes is a descriptive but difficult book to read through that describes why the ape population was diminishing and the various stakeholders involved.
To ascribe an entity with moral status ― whether an adult human, infant, foetus, or non-human animal ― is to declare that its treatment by other moral agents is mo...
In the article, “Bonobos Protect and Console Friends and Kin” shows how Bonobos can assist each other and why they tend to show reciprocal help of one another, especially when two or more Bonobos work together to face a problem when solving tasks. The study explores the main possible functions of how bonobos help each other and solve conflicts with some of the Authors’ techniques — which correspond to four hypotheses along with predictions that can be derived from them. The four hypotheses are The Self-Protection Hypothesis, Victim-Protection Hypothesis, Relationship-Repair Hypothesis or Substitute for Reconciliation Hypothesis, and Relationship-Repair Hypothesis and are very essential to the methods used to the conducted study done to determine
Some if not all of the meat eater had some form of morals or emotional concerns towards the animals that they are consuming. This led to the paradox of eating meat because some or most people felt emotions such as pity, sympathy, guilty, sad, and disgust towards the animals that they are eating. Even when they felt emotions for certain animals, people still ate it. The article elaborated on this meat paradox controversy, and it focused on the aspects to support why people eat meat. The article connected how people’s rating of animals’ pain related to people’s decisions to whether they eat meat or not eat meat. People’s rating of animals’ pain also related to their moral concerns for that animals. People would more likely rate the animals which
In the short story “Do Seek Their Meat From God”, the author, Charles G.D. Roberts comments on the theme of human nature. First, the author shows how humans are compassionate towards others. As the settler was walking home and heard the cries from the boy, rather than ignoring him and continuing home, he felt compassion for the scared child, and stayed back to help. Next, the author shows how people can be prejudice. When the settler heard the boy, he assumed it was his drunk neighbour’s kid, he muttered, “‘I reckon his precious father’s drunk down at ‘the Corners’, and him crying for loneliness!” (page 194). But, in reality, it was his own son, and he was being quick to judge. Finally, the author demonstrates how sometimes humans do things
When animals overthrew the men, the governance of whom had long been oppressing them, they finally broke the chains of perpetual slavery. They no longer had to work extremely hard in the excruciating conditions solely for the benefits of cruel and greedy men, but for the benefits of themselves. They attained the freedom they were desperately striving for. The times of abuse and maltreatment came to its end. In these new hope-inspiring conditions the animals set up to establish the farm in which there would be no injustice and suffering, but it would be the place where everybody is equal and happy. They knew that establishing such farm would be extremely difficult, nevertheless the thoughts of giving in never crossed their minds. They gradually, step by step started to overcome all the obstacles and hardships on their way to prosperity. Those hardships made clear that the pigs were the most appropriate for a position of a leader. Indeed, the pigs were most intelligent, it was them who were guiding the animals and giving effective advises in farming. Undoubtedly, had it not been for them, the animals would have starved to death not being able to solve the problems regarding ploughing and harvesting. Under their governance the farm was thriving, there were no quarrels and arguments, every animal was happy and contented with their lives. Unfortunately, it did not last for long, the society which was supposed to be just, and where everybody is equal, transformed into the tyrannical society, where everybody lived under strong oppression and in total misery. The reasons why this transformation happened are manifold. This paper will show the main reasons of this.
Society is an ever-changing, constantly evolving phenomenon that occurs naturally throughout human history. Each time period in which a group of humans is born is called a generation. Many generations are defined today, including the Baby Boomers, the Silent Generation, the Millennials, and so forth. The generation that I was born into, Generation Y, is defined as those who were born in between the years 1980 and 2000. There is an ongoing discussion over whether Generation Y is more narcissistic or altruistic compared to the previous Generation X. Though many examples of self-centered narcissism come forth from the actions that all generations provide, I believe that Generation Y displays a more service-oriented, altruistic sentiment and attitude compared to previous generations.
In this essay, I will discuss and define both speciesism and moral individualism according to Paola Cavalieri’s book, The Animal Question. Additionally, I will provide my opinion on which is the strongest argument for speciesism and why I still disagree with it.
" Society & Animals 18.2 (2010): 183-203. Academic Search Premier -. EBSCO. Web. The Web. The Web.
The Animalism regime begins very encouragingly, with all the animals working vigorously to improve the farm, and enjoying the feeling ...