ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book introduces the concepts of inclusive fitness and parental investment strategies from evolutionary biology. It highlights the somatic costs of reproduction for female mammals and the inevitable trade of short-term loss for long-term gain inherent in mammalian reproductive effort and greatly elaborated in the rearing of slowly developing young. The book presents a crucial concept in evolutionary biology and relates it to the presence or absence of maternal surrogates in the form of paternal and sibcare systems. It proposes a formulation to identify the optimal parental investment strategy for a given human society. The book provides a formulation to identify the optimal parental investment strategy for a given human society. It focuses on social behavior and discusses biology in the sense that reproduction or aging are biological events.
