Occupy Occupy Occupy
Donna created a performance & video piece for Govanhill Baths conference Occupy Occupy Occupy.
Interviews with Rae McKinlay (Govanhill Baths); Jim Chestnut (Faslane Peace Camp); Helen Kyle (Kinning Park Complex); Jack MacDonald (Faslane, Occupy Glasgow, Free Hetherington); Jimmy Cloughley (Upper Clyde Shipbuilders), discuss their experience of occupying, demonstrating and of a work-in.
Music was performed by Gary Duncan & Donna Rutherford ('Which Side Are You On' written in 1931 by Florence Reece - the wife of Sam Reece, a union organizer for the United Mine Workers in Harlan County, Kentucky).
Donna's script delivered live in between interviews:
Social Behaviour In Animals
Social behaviour consists of a set of interactions among individuals of the same species. A wide range of sociality occurs among animals. Some animals rarely if ever interact with one another, even when it comes to issues of parental care. Examples of relatively asocial animals include mosquitoes and polar bears. Highly social organisms live together in large groups, and often cooperate to conduct many tasks. Examples of social groups include packs of wolves and schools of fish. The most highly social animals form tightly knit colonies and include all ants and termites, some bees and wasps, and a few other organisms.
Group-living is widespread in the animal kingdom
Although many species form temporary associations, such as flamingo colonies and zebra herds, some species such as African elephants snapping shrimp and superb starlings form more permanent social groups and live together year-round.
Organisms are inherently competitive, yet cooperation is widespread. Genes cooperate in genomes; cells cooperate in tissues; individuals cooperate in societies. Animal societies, in which collective action emerges from cooperation among individuals, represent extreme social complexity. Such societies are not only common in insects, mammals, and birds, but exist even in simple species like amoebas.
Many social behaviours of animals are adaptive, meaning that being social ultimately increases an animal’s reproductive success. One example of how social behaviour is adaptive is aggregation against predators. This concept applies to caterpillars feeding together on a leaf, a herd of wildebeest, schools of fish, and flocks of birds.
A landscape filled with solitary wildebeest will offer easy pickings for large predators such as lions. If the wildebeests gather into a single group, then the risk of any single individual being eaten is reduced. In the circumstance of an attack by a predator, the odds of one individual being targeted are 100% for solitary individuals, 1% in a group of 100, and 0.1% in a group of 1000.
Altruism
The benefits of social life typically occur when one individual is the benefactor of an act of altruism. An altruistic act is one that increases the welfare of another individual at an actual or potential cost of the individual who performs the act.
An example of altruism comes from ground squirrels, who may warn other members of their group about a predatory hawk overhead. This brings the hawk’s attention to the individual giving the warning call. This risky behaviour benefits other individuals in the squirrel’s group.
Living in groups involves a balance of conflict and cooperation, which is mediated by the costs and benefits associated with living socially. When the benefits of living socially exceed the costs and risks of social life, scientists predict that social cooperation will be favoured.
MORE COMMUNITY BASED WORK
Occupy Occupy Occupy
Donna created a performance & video piece for Govanhill Baths conference Occupy Occupy Occupy.
Interviews with Rae McKinlay (Govanhill Baths); Jim Chestnut (Faslane Peace Camp); Helen Kyle (Kinning Park Complex); Jack MacDonald (Faslane, Occupy Glasgow, Free Hetherington); Jimmy Cloughley (Upper Clyde Shipbuilders), discuss their experience of occupying, demonstrating and of a work-in.
Music was performed by Gary Duncan & Donna Rutherford ('Which Side Are You On' written in 1931 by Florence Reece - the wife of Sam Reece, a union organizer for the United Mine Workers in Harlan County, Kentucky).
Donna's script delivered live in between interviews:
Social Behaviour In Animals
Social behaviour consists of a set of interactions among individuals of the same species. A wide range of sociality occurs among animals. Some animals rarely if ever interact with one another, even when it comes to issues of parental care. Examples of relatively asocial animals include mosquitoes and polar bears. Highly social organisms live together in large groups, and often cooperate to conduct many tasks. Examples of social groups include packs of wolves and schools of fish. The most highly social animals form tightly knit colonies and include all ants and termites, some bees and wasps, and a few other organisms.
Group-living is widespread in the animal kingdom
Although many species form temporary associations, such as flamingo colonies and zebra herds, some species such as African elephants snapping shrimp and superb starlings form more permanent social groups and live together year-round.
Organisms are inherently competitive, yet cooperation is widespread. Genes cooperate in genomes; cells cooperate in tissues; individuals cooperate in societies. Animal societies, in which collective action emerges from cooperation among individuals, represent extreme social complexity. Such societies are not only common in insects, mammals, and birds, but exist even in simple species like amoebas.
Many social behaviours of animals are adaptive, meaning that being social ultimately increases an animal’s reproductive success. One example of how social behaviour is adaptive is aggregation against predators. This concept applies to caterpillars feeding together on a leaf, a herd of wildebeest, schools of fish, and flocks of birds.
A landscape filled with solitary wildebeest will offer easy pickings for large predators such as lions. If the wildebeests gather into a single group, then the risk of any single individual being eaten is reduced. In the circumstance of an attack by a predator, the odds of one individual being targeted are 100% for solitary individuals, 1% in a group of 100, and 0.1% in a group of 1000.
Altruism
The benefits of social life typically occur when one individual is the benefactor of an act of altruism. An altruistic act is one that increases the welfare of another individual at an actual or potential cost of the individual who performs the act.
An example of altruism comes from ground squirrels, who may warn other members of their group about a predatory hawk overhead. This brings the hawk’s attention to the individual giving the warning call. This risky behaviour benefits other individuals in the squirrel’s group.
Living in groups involves a balance of conflict and cooperation, which is mediated by the costs and benefits associated with living socially. When the benefits of living socially exceed the costs and risks of social life, scientists predict that social cooperation will be favoured.
MORE COMMUNITY BASED WORK
