From: Kent Spaulding (kents@trajecta.com)
Date: Fri Sep 15 2000 - 08:56:41 PDT
<snip>
> > --- that animals have never particularly needed
> > social "promotion" of cohabitation in order to make it work.
>
> Huh? My impression is that most species which pair-bond have social
> interactions which reinforce that. I don't have any data, though - do you?
>
Mating-for-life in other species has never been fully supported by observation.
Many of the 'canonical' examples have recently been disabused. Many biologists
would go as far to say that mating-for-life (as opposed to pair-bonding, which is
shorter-term, but crosses more than one breeding season) is a myth.
All that, and Lions can count and Chimps have culture... it's a complex social
world.
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