1. The document discusses research on baboon social bonds and what it suggests about long-term bonds between sexes. It finds that male baboons form friendships with females to protect them and their infants from aggression, and to help care for infants, providing social benefits. This increases reproductive success for both partners. 2. It argues this research shows long-term cross-sex bonds can form without economic factors like food sharing and do not require sexual exclusivity. It suggests ancestral human relationships may have been intimate friendships before institutions like marriage. Regarding fatherhood, it finds primate males provide social benefits to mothers and infants they did not father, and receive benefits like mating opportunities in return.

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INTRODUCTION TO ANTHROPOLOGY ANTH 2302 Dr. CHRISTINE R. ROBBINS
Roy Dixon
Assign. 2
09/15/2013
Smuts: What are friend for
1. If you are a male baboon, why be “friends” with a female?
2. What important findings can this research suggest about how and why long-term bonds are
created between sexes? What does this research suggest about fatherhood?
1.
If I am a male baboon, there are a plethora of reasons satisfying the paradigm of “why be
friends with a female baboon?” In support thereof, please see the following:
1. To protect them and their infants from not onlydetrimental male aggression butalso
from more commonplace aggression of other femalesand juveniles.
2. I may function as an alternativecaregiver to the infant during the weaning period and
in the event the mother dies (God forbid), there is a likelihood the infants will survive
due to strong bonding with moi.The adage “Friends First then Lovers”holds true in
this kingdom too, accordingly “friendship contributes to the reproductivesuccess of
both partners.”
3. Here, females prefer to mate with males who had alreadybeen friends. As a result,
friendshipswith mothers and their infants most likely willbe beneficial in thefuture
when the mothers are in estrus.
4. Prior friendship increasesmy probability of mating with a female from whatit would
have been otherwise due to femalepreferences. As expected,“friendship involves
costs as well as benefits.”

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2.
The important findings this research suggests about how and why long-term bonds are created
between sexes are as follows:
First and foremost this writer believes author Barbara Smuts goes a bit overboard in
attempting to convince her audience to think differently about the well-established norms of the
human male and femalelong-term bonds and nuclear family by her observing and examining “the
nonhumanprimate evidence.” She correctly observed that among nonhuman primates“long-term
bonds between the sexes can evolvein the absence of a sexual division of labor or food sharing
… such relationships rest onexchanges of social, not economic, benefits.” Of course, we humans
have adapted and ingrained upon our psychic the almost supreme notion and importance of
economic benefits for the simple reason we live in a financial world wherein our very lifestyle
and quality of life depends on our access to varied financial resources, including what we work
for, saved, or what may be given to us by someone else such as a friend or love one.
Moreover, Ms. Smuts urges that “primate research shows that highly
differentiated,emotionally intense male-female relationshipscan occur without sexual
exclusivity.” I concur, it is reasonable to conclude “ancestralmen and women may have
experienced intimatefriendships long before they invented marriage andnorms of sexual
fidelity.”
2. (b). Concerning fatherhood, this research suggests the following:
In the primate world “malesclearly provide mothers and infants with social benefitseven
when they are unlikely to be the fathers ofthose infants. In return, females provide a variety
ofbenefits to the friendly males, including acceptanceinto the group and, at least in baboons,

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increased matingopportunities in the future.” The author goes on to say:“This suggests that
effortsto reconstruct the evolution of hominid societiesmay have overemphasized what the
female must supposedlydo (restrict her mating to just one male) inorder to obtain male parental
investment.” Once again the author goes a bit over the edge in her subtle attempt to analogize the
human species with their nonhuman counterparts. It is well documented by scientists that it is
almost impossible for the average human male husband to tolerate a female partner who has
multiple male companions for mating purposes while on the other hand, it appears women across
various societies have no such qualms against being one of several sister wives.We see it even
today in Middle-Eastern societies, Mormon groups and various cults. This writer is yet to come
across any society or group where the human male husband tolerates a wife who has multiple sex
partners.