Strength in Numbers: Power in Connection invites Duke alumni, families and friends to join this virtual event featuring Duke's Vanessa Woods, Research Scientist, Duke Evolutionary Anthropology.

Vanessa Woods is a New York Times bestselling author, researcher, and journalist. She is the author of Bonobo Handshake (Gotham 2010), which won the Thomas Lowell Award for nonfiction, and is a Research Scientist in the Department of Evolutionary Anthropology at Duke University. In 2005, Vanessa and her husband, Brian Hare, Professor of Evolutionary Anthropology at Duke, traveled to the Republic of Congo and entered the world of a rare ape, the bonobos, with whom we share 98.7% of our DNA. They soon discovered that although many of the inhabitants of the sanctuary are refugees from unspeakable violence, the bonobos live in a peaceful society in which females are in charge. In the bonobos’ society war, rape, and murder are nonexistent. Woods will update us on the fascinating recent research into the culture of these primates. She will also introduce her latest book, Survival of the Friendliest: Understanding Our Origins and Rediscovering Our Common Humanity, co-authored with her husband. In it they claim that their review of over 1,000 scientific research papers suggests a powerful new theory of human nature which indicates that our unique friendliness is the secret to our success as a species, and they offer us an astonishing new way to look at our culture.