Scientists Say Sharing Child-Rearing Duties Helped Make Us Altruistic
Say you meet some guy in a business suit. Maybe he’s got slicked back hair and a ponytail, maybe he reads a lot of Ayn Rand. And that guy tells you that it’s a dog-eat-dog world out there, that a person is just a miserable animal only in it for itself, and that you have to screw over others before they screw over you? Don’t believe him. Science has repeatedly shown that humans are by nature altruistic and cooperative. And new research has provided some insight into why. According to an article in The New Scientist, a new study by anthropologists Carel van Schaik and Judith Burkart of the University of Zurich in Switzerland supports the theory that humans developed altruistic traits, at least in part, because we were forced by harsh environments to help take care of each other’s kids. This is called cooperative breeding, and it’s seen in several species including humans and marmosets, but the theory is a bit controversial because it’s not found in great apes like