Morale is the ability to sustain an action in the face of adversity. How many great designs have come to nought because some single person's nerve failed them. If only John Wayne or Rambo had been there, all would have been fine. They are "born" warriors, they love to hunt and kill. They would not have failed. or would they? The origin of the word morale, and the writings of both Napoleon and Gandhi, suggest that good morale has more to do with being a morale man than being a born killer. Most people do not see this point. Most people think that humans are some kind of Instinctive killers that just have to fight or they would explode. This calls to question the whole idea of instinct into the discussion on morale. If instinct is what drives men to fight, then those who fall their morale are biologically weak. in terms of Darwin's theory, they are not good candidates to reproduce since they lack the ability to "take it." Such men are called "women" since we culturally think of women as being weak and ineffective. The Rambos of the world get rated as "born hunters" who are true men. Obviously they will propagate the species (probably by rape). If all this were true, then I doubt very much that the word morale would have derived from the word moral. After all, holy men are often thought of as being weak and effeminate. That is why they consistently amaze the bulk of humanity with the depth of the compassion, willingness to give, and to self sacrifice. Or to put it another way, I think that Jesus' morale was a lot higher than the "born hunter" Rambo's. The following article looks at what instincts do effect human conflict. BIOLOGY Biology is the study of living organisms "vital processes". In other words, how they live. This consists of looking at physiological processes of a subJect and seeing how they relate to - external behavior. Simple enough. So what does this tell us about humans? Humans are not biological hunters. I say that right off the bat, because it is important to know that Rambo is not a "born hunter" nor are any humans. in fact biological hunters are remarkably poor hunters of their own species due to their hunter instincts. It is rather our lack of "hunter" Instincts that make us much more dangerous. Human physiology shows that we walk upright, so that we can see far away. We have excellent vision, but a comparatively poor sense of smell. Because of the way we are built, we can walk forever, but we are poor runners. Our teeth are mixed. We have incisors and canines, which are good for eating meat. But most of our teeth are molars, which are good eating grain, grubs and other nasty things. We have the remnant of a second stomach in the form of an appendix and our dietary needs require us to eat vegetables. If we didn't have tools, I doubt we would make it as hunters. Carnivores look a lot more like dogs or cats. They have 4 legs to walk on which are low to the earth. This makes them very fast and maneuverable. They have a keen sense of smell as well as keen eye sight. More of their teeth are canines than molars, so that they can eat raw flesh with ease. They have only 1 stomach rather than the 2 or 3 required to digest grass or grain. They have an instinctive hunting method that does not allow for Innovation. in short they are good at what they do, but they would be miserable rocket scientists. Paloanthropology proposes the Idea that we are biologically omnivors. As little brown people in prehistoric Africa, wandered around in leading a hand to mouth existence. I Imagine them sitting around the camp fire eating grubs and other disgusting things and talking about the weather. Occasionally they would find a carcass with meat still on it, left by some lion or other. They way I figure it, humans ranked higher on the food chain than the buzzards, but probably had to wait behind the hyenas and jackals. Primitive clubs may be good at driving off the buzzards but they are poor hunting tools. Human hunting was a purely technological invention. Carnivorous lack spears and bows. It is true that we learned to be good hunters. We did help to hunt the mastodons to extinction, as well as other animals. Then when they were gone we learned how to kill other critters. Instinctive hunters tend to die out with their prey. For all our learning though we are instinctively simple omnivors who just got smart. FIGHT FLIGHT AWARE Have you ever picked up a hamster that did not want to be picked up? Three things happen. The hamster squeals, then he bites, then he empties his bladder. Most people then drop the hamster and start cursing. The hamster has just defended himself. No one would claim that hamsters are instinctive killers, cute yes, killers no. The above reaction is not hunting aggression, it is defensive aggression. You got too close so he bit you. Defensive aggression is an instinct present in all mammals, Including humans. We have to have it, since it is very beneficial for survival. At its root defensive aggression functions as follows ... Imagine that a man is surrounded by three, ever larger Circles. The first circle 15 little more than an arms length from him. The second is maybe 10 yards out to his front, but it swings in closer to his rear behind him. After all he relies on his sight heavily, and he can not see behind himself. The final circle stands about 100 yards In front of him and again swings in close behind his rear, out side of his peripheral vision. When a threat passes within one of these zones we experience an Instinctive reaction. The first zone is for awareness. So when the lion come within 100 yards of the man's front, he notices him. Unfortunately for him he does not notice the second lion sneaking up on him 50 yards to his rear! The man goes about his business of collecting berries and grubs but keeps an eye on the potential threat. Because humans are so easy to sneak up on, men learned early on to travel in packs, so a couple of them could keep a lookout while the others ate. In that way the second lion might be spotted before it was too late. If the lion to our man's front were to move closer, the man would back off. Since lions walk no faster than men (remember, humans are excellent walkers) the hunt would end right there. It is the second lion that might have a shot at making the kill. You will notice that the awareness distance and second zone are nearly the same to the rear of the man. If the second lion has stalked the man well, then it will be right on top of him. The lion springing to action may be the first the man hears of his killer. Or the lion may step on a twig and alert the man before the trap is sprung. Either way the second instinctive reaction will be sprung, flight. Humans are not good runners. We are slow to accelerate. we have difficulty turning rapidly, and we are not built to go through thick brush well. On top of that we are not very good at climbing either. The only advantage we have when being chased by lions is that once our flight reaction is triggered we get a shot of adrenalin through our body that gives us concentrated energy to escape. The man can run faster than he can at any other time. He breaks out into a cold sweat that makes him slippery should the lion make a grab for him. If he got any fore warning of the lion, he might get up to full running speed before the lion is on him. If the lion got the jump on him, he will still be accelerating when he is tackled from behind. Carnivores can not charge for very long distances. If the man got a good enough head start he might be able to "out run" the lion. Once the lion stops running the man is relatively safe. That is if the second lion was not herding the man toward the first lion all along! If man did not get away then he will experience the last instinctive reaction, fight. If the man trips and falls, if he is tackled, or If he runs into a dead end, then the lion will come within 1 yard of him. His arms and legs are not good weapons. He lack good claws and his teeth are poor in a fight. But he can use them whenever a threat gets within one arms length. Like the hamster though, hitting is not his only way to fight. He also makes horrendous yelling noises and empties his bowels. The smell alone might save him! Adrenalin helps the man fight at his best. The lion has all the advantages in this fight. It is bigger, stronger, meaner, and hungrier! The mans only advantages is that he does not have to kill the lion to win. If he can sting the lion hard enough, then it will let him go and he can try running again. The lion on the other hand must knock the life out of him. If the man were fighting a wolf rather than a lion, he might be able to fight it off more easily. But once up, would face another wolf immediately. Wolves always hunt in packs. So one is facing 4 wolves that have one surrounded, making escape near impossible. Regardless of the hunter though, the man's life rests on his ability to run. only groups of humans can fight off predators. That is where those primitive clubs come into their own. Predators will not attack groups of men. They are not easy kills. Such an attack would invariably leave some of the hunters wounded, which is tantamount to dead in the wild. They have no sense of self sacrifice for the greater good. So they leave humans alone. After all carnivorous have always preyed on the weak, old and sick. It is their instinct. PHYSIOLOGY OF HUNTERS The lab section looked at defensive aggression. Now I will compare that with hunting aggression. First off, all animals have defensive aggression instincts. If an animal is threaten it will fight back. But by and large defensive aggression leads to running. So the notion that Rambo is more likely to reproduce because he doesn't run is wrong. Running promotes survival. Carnivorous have wonderful physical tools to kill with. Strong muscles, teeth, claws, so why is it that they do not kill one another? They do fight one another for dominance, but for some reason these fights do not lead to death. Quite the contrary carnivorous are remarkable gentle and playful with one another. In fact carnivorous have non-aggression toward other of their species hard wired into them by instinct. They can fight to defend themselves like other animals, but with their own kind they do not. They don't need to. When a carnivore is threatened into defense, it bares its teeth, its ears lay back, and it growls. Hunting carnivorous do none of these things. Hunting carnivorous have their ears perked to hear. They only bare their teeth when they strike, and they NEVER growl. On the internal level they do not get the surge of adrenalin that defenders get when they are threatened. This is why humans can sometime out run lions! Hunting has more to do with stalking than with killing. The joy of the carnivore is in the chase not the kill. After all, the kill is just food, the chase is the hunt. So let us leave to rest this idea that men are carnivorous and that is why we kill. Cannibalism is anathema to most humans. Those who do eat humans mainly do so in religious contexts, and interestingly only eat members of the immediate families! War and battle activate men's defensive aggression, and that alone. And that is plenty. We did after all drop an atomic bomb on people to defend ourselves. CULTURE, LEARNING AND DEFENSE Humans, being smart omnivors, are excellent at learning from our experience. We transmit this learning to our children. Eventually if one idea gets transmitted far enough it becomes part of a culture. The Earth is rich with cultures. And each culture effect the way its people respond to threats and physical space. The first major effect on defensive aggression by culture is the realization that not all humans are a threat. Members of our Immediate family are safe. Sometimes even people from our same clan are safe. Lord, sometimes even complete strangers are safe! But our defensive instincts are still there, but now they play out in a different way. Now when a human comes into our awareness zone, we do not move off if they move closer. In fact, unless something about the situation cues us that something is wrong then we generally do not think twice about it. As the other draws closer to us we make eye contact but say nothing. Then when they come within the flight zone we say "hello." If the other does not return our greeting we feel hurt or slighted, but we don't run away. If a person is always rude to us then we are like to avoid them (they are becoming defined as threats). If a person walks up to the edge of our fight zone, we stop and talk to them. It is only when a person begins to come within our fight/comfort zone that we begin to get nervous. Culture can only go so far to subvert our instincts. Different cultures say hello in different ways, so we humans often have trouble getting along with one another. I may begin to read difference as a threat if I am confronted by too much newness at once. With a little time and learning though and people are able to adapt to other cultures. Though they man never feel completely at ease in them. The most obvious difference I routinely see in my work as a psycho therapist is the difference in comfort zones between people of Northern European descent, and Mediterranean folks. British, Germans, Poles, Russians, etc, tend to have a 1 arm length (1 yard) comfort zone. Italians, Greeks, Jews and Arabs on the other hand tend to have a 1/2 arm length comfort zone. This tends to cause communication troubles between these 2 groups since neither is comfortable with where they are standing. The Mediterranean tends to find the Northerner cold and distant. While the Northern tends to find the Southerner loud and pushy. Neither view is completely correct. A great example that nearly everyone has experienced is being at a party where someone stands "too close." Everytime you take a step back, he takes a step forward. Eventually he can walk you around the room. We tend to find such people to be rude and obnoxious. We tend to avoid such people in the future because they make us feel uncomfortable. Therein lies the second part of our social learning. Personal experience teaches us what feel safe and what feel dangerous. Again at work, I notice lots of people who feel comfortable with more than one arms length of space. They can stand at one arms length if they have to but they report feeling like someone is in their face. I've found the people who like having 2 arm-lengths of space have generally been physically abused. People who prefer 3 arms lengths tend to have been sexually abused. If a person requires more space than that they have probably been ritually abused. Wanting more space is very functional for people who have been abused. The need to be more vigilant about potential abuse because it is a real possibility to them. 2 arms lengths gives a person a chance to out run an angry father/mother. 3 arms lengths prevents a person from touching in any way. I do an exercise to teach people about this, so that they can learn to read their own physiological signs of defensive aggression. I step into people's space so they can see what it feels like (by the way I don't do this with sexually abused folks because that triggers off abuse memories). What I've found is that even people watching me step in another person's space feel the same physical reaction. They also feel the reaction from verbal attacks, and being ignored during a conversation. So our defensive instincts are very fine instruments to measure risk in the world around us. we ignore them at our peril. Rambo and those of his ilk are always shown straight faced without any concern in the face of danger. People can actually do this, but at a cost. That cost is the topic of the next article. FIGHTING BEARS The macho stoic image shown in most war movies says that one always fights, never back down. This is not always the best rout to survival. Running is shunned as cowardly, okay maybe it is, but there are other options. Gandhi talked about not fighting but also not backing down in the face of the enemy. Sometimes that is the best option. If you are out in the woods are happen to run across a bear. You are probably safe. Bears are omnivors like us. But if for some reason you are attacked, then not fighting is your best chance to survive. Even more than a lion, bears have all the advantages in a fight. You will not win If you fight back without a weapon. But, bears have a neat physiological requirement to strike. The victim has to be struggling. If you can lie there perfectly still then the bear does not know what to do. You are not a threat and it will eventually get tired of chewing on you and leave. Think how difficult it must be to lay still in the face of such a threat! What kind of morale it must take. It is harder to sit still than it is to fight. That is why non-violent resistance is so much harder to organize than war. That is something to think about the next time you are playing a game. Related Morale: What is It Anyway? Back to Experimental Games Group # 23 Table of Contents Back to Experimental Games Group List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1993 by Chris Engle This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com