When the same parameters and quantitative theory
are used to analyze both termite colonies and troops
of rhesus macaques, we will have a unified science of
sociobiology. I have been increasingly impressed with the
functional similarities between insect and vertebrate
societies and less so with the structural differences that
seem, at first glance, to constitute such an immense gulf
between them. Consider termites and macaques. Both
form cooperative groups that occupy territories. In both
kinds of society there is a well-marked division of labor.
Members of both groups communicate to each other
hunger, alarm, hostility, caste status or rank, and
reproductive status. From the specialist's point of view,
this comparison may at first seem facile—or worse. But it
is out of such deliberate oversimplification that the
beginnings of a general theory are made.