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Religion, Practice and Science of Non-Violence
apparent conflict. A similar situation prevails in the forest, although observation is more difficult there. The general impression gathered is of a very wide range of tolerance for other species.
While the above observation applies to animals belonging to other species, this does not apply to the animals belonging to the same species. Avoidance, agonistic display (fighting position) and violence often occurs among animals of the same species. This is well illustrated when monkeys are crowded into a small area near a water hole at the end of a dry season. Hogs, deer, stags and other ungulates might be mixed among the monkeys, but if two monkey troops are at the water hole at the same time, they remain separate and no mixing occurs. If a large troop comes to the hole, a smaller troop will move slowly away, feeding as it goes. Conflict between groups of monkeys (rhesus) living in different places in the cities of India is not an uncommon phenomenon. One such conflict reported among three groups of monkeys living in close proximity, in a temple is interesting and informative. Here the areas that the three groups occupied overlapped to such an extent that groups frequently came in contact with one another and there was not much space available to the groups to live apart. For various day-to-day activities such as gathering and taking food, clinging from the branches of the tree, and for occupying territory, there were occasions for conflict which were settled more by display of anger than by actual fighting. It is impossible to watch a group of monkeys for any long period of time without observing conflict over food or inter-personal relations. Actual fighting among these animals is rare; this is because the animals know each other and their hierarchical positions in the group are already determined.
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How and why the animals generally limit themselves to a display of aggressiveness we shall now see.
When an animal is aggressively aroused, a number of basic physiological changes, through its autonomic nervous system, occur within its body so that it is geared for action. But it does not launch an immediate attack. The enemy provokes aggression as well as fear; aggression drives the animal on, the fear holds it back. An intense state of inner conflict arises. It begins by threatening to attack. If, in this state, it presents a
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