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From: rowe@pender (Mickey Rowe)
Newsgroups: sci.bio
Subject: Re: War and Peace and Chimpanzees
Message-ID: <19712@netnews.upenn.edu>
Date: 29 Jan 90 17:35:51 GMT
References: <12900@cbnewsd.ATT.COM> <1283@oravax.UUCP> <31315@shemp.CS.UCLA.EDU> <2440@leah.Albany.Edu>
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Reply-To: rowe@pender (Mickey Rowe)
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In article <2440@leah.Albany.Edu> ms361@leah.Albany.Edu (Mark Steinberger) writes:
>In article <31315@shemp.CS.UCLA.EDU>, frazier@oahu.cs.ucla.edu (Greg Frazier) writes:
>> There are many species of fish and reptile which prey upon
>> their own young.  

>But apparently felines do prey on their own young. I've heard it say
>about housecats, but can't give you a quote. But I do know
>that it is explicitly stated in the National Geographic special on
>tigers that tigers will prey on tiger young, and will also fight
>to maim over one another's kills. (Maiming can easily cause death
>in the wild.)
>
>--Mark

I'm afraid that I didn't see the National Geographic special in
question, but I kind of doubt that these are the same things.  Many
mammals do indeed kill the young of their own species, but usually
only under certain conditions; particulary when the infanticide will
give the killer another opportunity to reproduce.  

As it happens, I just read an article about this (Watts, David, P.,
1989, "Infanticide in Mountain Gorillas: New Cases and a
Reconsideration of the Evidence", _Ethology_, 81(1):1-18.), and it
seems that it occurs almost exclusively when a female and her young
have recently lost their mate/father.  In fact, female lions may take
their cubs and live in isolation from all other lions as a means of
protecting those cubs if the mate has been killed. 

This is very different from animals randomly eating the young of their
species (as many fish and reptiles do) as though they were just
another source of food.  It is also very different from the
infanticide by the female chimpanzees that were discussed to start
this thread.

As for humans and the war/peace thing, it turns out that in many
mammals (but not mountain gorillas) infanticide follows when a male or
group of males from one group attacks and kills the males from another
group.  Certainly there is a selective advantage for males that wipe
out the genetic contribution of other males and then contribute their
own genes in their place.  But this is grisly, and I don't even want
to think about it.  Please, no follow-ups.

Mickey Rowe      (rowe@pender.ee.upenn.edu)