Introducing Genetics Unzipped
Big Biology
00:00
Is Cannibalism Really Common in Nature?
Many biologists thought cannibalism was rare in nature because of all these costs, the risk of disease or injury. Disease is a powerful force in evolution and as it's much easier to become infected by eating an individual of your own species than a different species, this should make it much harder for cannibalistic behaviors to evolve. They thought any cannibalism they saw must be a last resort, an act of extreme starvation. The more they looked, the more they saw that cannibalism is actually very common in nature.
Transcript
Play full episode
