Part II: Why we Fight: the self-fulfilling prophecy of human Belligerence

Part I introduced the problem: the mistaken ideas that human nature is fixed and bound to fight, that warfare is part of human evolution and therefore, inevitable. This false idea both suppresses the older evolutionary truth of humanity's peaceful and co-operative pre-history but leads to the self-fulfilling myth that we are compelled to fight by both our very natures and our history of warfare. In this section, I refute this false idea and thereby undermine the self-fulfilling prophecy which leads to bloodshed.

A more accurate picture of ancient humanity is offered by ancient-origins.net :
"The earlier Stone Age seems to have been a time of peace and not war, says an anthropologist specializing in war who has studied the published work of dozens of researchers. Unfortunately for many millions of victims of death, wounding, displacement, hunger and loss, humanity began to make war compulsively, some groups as early as 13,000 years ago.

"My argument is that war regularly -- not always -- leaves archaeological traces, if a people are known by a substantial record of skeletal remains, and/or settlement remains, sometimes supported by weapons or art. Looking at the archaeological record around the world typically shows that those signs eventually show up, but usually after a more or less long stretch when they are not present. When this appears as a recurrent pattern around the world, the straightforward explanation is that war has beginnings.

If forced to answer the question: globally, when did war begin? I would have to say between 11,000 BC and 1400 AD."

Brian Ferguson in War, Peace, and Human Nature/2013.

The tragic irony of the Agricultural Revolution, which produced the world's first abundance, led to war, the struggle for surplus.

"The First Agricultural Revolution, also known as the Neolithic Revolution, is the transformation of human societies from hunting and gathering (more accurately, gathering and scavenging) to farming. This transition occurred worldwide between 10,000 BC and 2000 BC, with the earliest known developments taking place in the Middle East. This is when the first evidence of war and the first images of war appear. Before this era, there is neither evidence of the massacres that typify the violence of war or images of war."

Ancient cave drawings show people hunting but never at war. There is no way to hide the scars of war: broken bones, crushed skulls, accompanied by the propaganda of war, images of battles and slaughters. Why would there be no evidence of war in early man if not for the truth that there were no wars? Why would there be no images drawn on caves if there were no memories to recapture?

Next Page  1  |  2  |  3  |  4