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paolo
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24 Mar 2007, 4:19 pm

Among evolutionary psychologists there is this view, which I share, that empathy (not sexual passion), is tied to the amount of DNA in common. The more your genetic structure is the same, the more you feel empathy for the other. That does not mean that you necessariy love the other, but having DNA in common is an element that weighs in the relationship. So:
Mother – her child
Twins
Brothers
Blood relatives
Humans
Mammals (particularly chimps, apes)
Other living critters along a ladder

There is this expression often used: “blood of my blood”, “flesh of my flesh”.
Children who have never known their fathers (it happens more rarely that they have never known their mothers) that start searching for their parent at some point in their life, and think that it is important, also if they are normally disillusioned.



cecilfienkelstien
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24 Mar 2007, 5:23 pm

Good point, I agree with this theory. There is so much we have to learn about the animal genome!



paolo
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24 Mar 2007, 6:20 pm

A mother who has lost her child in an accident on in some bombing behaves very much as if she has been stripped of a limb or a piece of her body: her grief and despair is even more acute. Same happens often with some animals: they defend their offspring sometime at the cost of their own life. For animals this feeling is the only way to gain immortality in a way. For humans the same is true, also if in some layers of the populations immortality is looked for in some more abstract entities (religion, fatherland, ideals). But life is generally a relay system. Biological continuity is not pursuable through individuals. The relay system gives the species that flexibility it needs to changing environments.