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Individuals, traditions, and the righteous

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 December 2018

Craig T. Palmer
Affiliation:
Independent Scholar, Macon, GA 31211. palmerct@missouri.edu
Kyle J. Clark
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, University of Missouri, Columbia, MO 65211. kjckbd@mail.missouri.edu

Abstract

Whitehouse's article posits several plausible hypotheses, but suffers from an unwarranted reliance on the importance of distinct social groups in the causation of self-sacrificing behavior. A focus on relationships between individual kin is better able to account for both the evolution of self-sacrifice and present forms of self-sacrifice. The practical importance of this point is discussed.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2018 

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