Science: The Undemocratic Goat

Scientists generally study animals to learn more about people. Goats, for example, live under a simple social system that may contain clues to the complexities of human society. In the current issue of Physiological Zoology, Dr. John Paul Scott of the Jackson Memorial Laboratory at Bar Harbor, Me. (looking for causes of human unpleasantness), reports, that the tranquillity of goat society can be destroyed by frustration.

A flock of goats (like a flock of chickens —TIME, May 31, 1937) usually has a "system of dominance." Every goat has butted every other goat until it is obvious which goat is boss. After an...

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