The Dissenter cover image

#685 Kim Sterelny - The Pleistocene Social Contract: Culture and Cooperation in Human Evolution

The Dissenter

00:00

The Role of Ritual in Managing Conflict?

Rituals play an important role in managing social conflict, you know, in reducing tensions. I think of ritual as something that probably came on stream between 100 and 2000 years ago. If different people are off doing different things during the day, there's lots more opportunities for sexual intrigue. You won't be terribly surprised that people to get suspicious about sexual intrigue - sex is a violence flash point at any society. The first sort of really convincing piece of evidence for ritual in the archaeological record comes from Europe 170, 180,000 years ago.

Play episode from 36:09
Transcript

The AI-powered Podcast Player

Save insights by tapping your headphones, chat with episodes, discover the best highlights - and more!
App store bannerPlay store banner
Get the app