So Much For The Naked Ape

It is a cliche of popular ethology that man is no more than an animal among animals, a naked ape dominated by his own savage biology and driven by killer instincts. More sophisticated scientists think otherwise, and one of them, Anthropologist Alexander Alland Jr., has now produced a ringing rebuttal. In a new book called The Human Imperative (Columbia University; $8.50), Alland counters the sophistry of Robert Ardrey (The Territorial Imperative), Konrad Lorenz (On Aggression) and Desmond Morris (The Naked Ape) with a view of man as a human animal, a creature whose biologically rooted nature can be modified by the uniquely human creation that sets man apart from the apes, his culture.

Prime Example. If Homo sapiens were innately and inevitably aggressive, Alland observes, all men would behave aggressively and in a predictable, stereotyped manner. In fact, some societies are nonviolent, and in others aggression is expressed in widely varying, culturally determined ways that are "a far cry from the rather automatic and highly patterned aggressive responses which occur in lower animals."

As a prime example of a pacific people, Alland cites the Semai of Malaya. A band of 12,000 farmers, the Semai adopt and name animals, talk to and caress them as if they were children, and even suckle them. Youngsters are never physically punished; they rarely see any form of violence, and so have no model of aggressive behavior to imitate. One result is that murder is unknown among the Semai. When angry, they generally confine themselves to voicing insults and spreading malicious rumors. True, they sometimes throw their own belongings around, but they are careful not to hurt anyone. Even throwing things is frowned upon because, says Alland, "it scares people."

By contrast, the Abron people of the Ivory Coast are more aggressive--"but in ways which no biologist could predict on the basis of instinct theory." Their aggression does not seem to arise from an inner, unalterable genetic program. Instead, it is generated by external situations and is released only through socially approved channels. Initially, Abron children are indulged and fondled by all the adults around them and show no aggression--until a new child is born. Then, Alland writes, having been abruptly displaced from center stage, "most babies who have been quite placid up to this point begin to show signs of rage and aggression." This new behavior is severely punished, however, so that the children learn to control their anger. As a result, Abron adults are rarely aggressive toward other people. Instead they direct their aggression in fantasy and ritual at imaginary beings, called deresgog, or witches.

Disciples of Ardrey's popular theory of territoriality--the notion that man's primary motivation stems from a biological urge to defend whatever area he regards as his--also get their comeuppance. Like aggression, territoriality can be proved natural for man only if it is universal, automatic and "imperative," as Ardrey would have it. In fact, says Alland, it is none of these, not even in the most primitive societies.

As an example, hunter-gatherers, those primitive peoples who live by hunting animals and gathering wild plant foods, "are the least territorial of all human groups." Furthermore, in Africa "there are innumerable situations in which peoples of different ethnic backgrounds live together in the same territory, often exploiting the environment in different ways." In fact, says Alland, territoriality is not inborn but is actually determined by the culture; he notes that most nations need such external reinforcers as the pledge to the flag and draft laws to ensure that national territory will have sufficient defenders.

Alland's most significant conclusion is that neither territoriality nor aggression is instinctive; thus war is not inevitable. "Culture is the major determinant in human existence," he says. For that reason, the "human imperative" is to develop a kind of culture in which war is impossible.

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