ABSTRACT
Visions of a premodern or prehistoric past largely devoid of the miseries associated with war surely drove a lot of research, speculation, and public imagination about the invention or origins of human warfare. The present evidence suggests that warfare, in various cultural forms, has fairly deep roots, deeper than a general shift in subsistence patterns from more mobile, foraging lifeways to more sedentary and agricultural ones. After all, warfare encompasses a very wide range of cultural behaviors, views, values, and practices, and is not restricted to categories of societies. Taking an evolutionary approach to the question of warfare leads to the question of why it exists. The hypothesis of emergent warfare allows us to see its evolution as gradual rather than punctuated. Though destructive, warfare represents groups cooperating for certain mutual objectives. If killing is not the goal, perhaps there are other benefits to warfare.
