Thomas Malthus
In the June 2012 issue of Discover, E. O. Wilson
authored a piece with the provocative title, "Is War Inevitable?
" Derived from his recent book The Social Conquest of Earth
, the narrative has a rather simple answer to the question implied in the title:
war is inevitable, because it is part of human nature, and, perhaps more provocatively, it shaped human nature.
John Horgan, who recently penned The End of War
, rebuts Wilson's argument in a point-by-point fashion in a companion article, "No, War Is Not Inevitable
." I find myself in a curious position: I agree with John Horgan in terms of the conclusion---that war is not inevitable---but not for the same reasons. While Horgan is right that Wilson relies on a particular, controversial group of ethologists to make the assertion that chimps have frequent inter-group conflicts and humans have always had wars, so ...
