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Essential Building Blocks of Human Nature

:	Ulrich J. Frey, Charlotte Störmer, Kai P. Willführ
:	Ulrich J. Frey, Charlotte Störmer, Kai P. Willführ
:	Essential Building Blocks of Human Nature
:	Springer-Verlag
:	9783642139680
:	1
:	CHF 44.60
:

:	Biologie
:	English

:	166
:	Wasserzeichen/DRM
:	PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
:	PDF

To understand why we humans are as we are, it is necessary to look at the essential building blocks that comprise our nature. The foundations of this structure are our evolutionary origins as primates and our social roots. Upon these rest features such as our emotions, language and aesthetic preferences, with our self-perceptions, self-deceptions and thirst for knowledge right at the top.

The unifying force holding these blocks together is evolutionary theory. Evolution provides a deeper understanding of human nature and, in particular, of the common roots of these different perspectives.

To build a reliable and coherent model of man, leading authors from fields as diverse as primatology, anthropology, neurobiology and philosophy have joined forces to present essays each describing their own expert perspective. Together they provide a convincing and complete picture of our own human nature.

Ulrich Frey (philosophy), Charlotte Störmer and Kai Willführ (biology) work in an interdisciplinary research group at the University of Giessen, applying evolutionary theory to a broad range of fields. The following authors contributed to the chapters of this book: Karl Grammer, Benjamin Grant Purzycki, Peter Kappeler, Niklas Krebs, Ruth Mace, Elisabeth Oberzaucher, Frank Rösler, Michael Schmidt-Salomon, Mary K. Shenk, Richard Sosis and Matthias Uhl.

	Preface	7
	Contents	8
	List of Contributors	11
	Introduction	13
	Chapter 1 Our Origins: How and Why We Do and Do Not Differ from Primates	16
	1.1 Introduction	17
	1.2 Why Humans Do Not Differ from Primates	18
	1.3 How Humans Do Not Differ from Primates	21
	1.4 How Humans Do Differ from Primates	22
	1.5 Why Humans Do Differ from Primates	23
	References	24
	Chapter 2 Our Children: Parental Decisions How Much to Invest in Your Offspring	28
	2.1 Introduction to Parental Investment Theory	28
	2.2 Life History Theory and Tradeoffs	30
	2.2.1 Current vs. Future Reproduction	30
	2.2.2 Quantity vs. Quality	31
	2.3 Who Invests: Mothers, Fathers, Grandmothers, and Others	34
	2.3.1 Mothers and Fathers	34
	2.3.2 Grandmothers and Others	36
	2.3.3 Are Humans Cooperative Breeders?	37
	2.4 Parent Offspring and Sibling Conflicts	38
	2.4.1 Infanticide and Neglect	38
	2.4.2 Differential Investment and Inheritance	40
	2.5 Sons vs. Daughters: Sex Biases in Parental Investment	41
	2.5.1 The Trivers Willard Effect	41
	2.5.2 Local Resource Competition and Enhancement	42
	2.5.3 Marriage Payments as Sex-Biased Parental Investment	43
	2.6 Conclusions	44
	References	45
	Chapter 3 Our Social Roots: How Local Ecology Shapes Our Social Structures	50
	3.1 Adaptation and Maladaptation	50
	3.2 Testing Hypotheses About Adaptation in Human Cultural Behavior Through Cross-Cultural Comparison	53
	3.2.1 Ecological Correlates of Human Social Behavior	53
	3.2.2 How Social Behavior is Adapted to Subsistence Strategies	55
	3.2.3 Cultural Phylogenetics	56
	3.2.4 Transmission of Traits from Mother to Daughter Cultures	61
	3.3 Conclusions	63
	References	64
	Chapter 4 Our Selections and Decisions: Inherent Features of the Nervous System?	66
	4.1 Introduction	66
	4.2 Some Thoughts About Selection Decision Architectures	69
	4.3 Switching/Decision/Negotiation Modules	73
	4.3.1 Features of Conflict Negotiation Modules	73
	4.3.2 Evidence for Conflict-Negotiating Modules	74
	4.4 Representation of Decision-Related Intervening Variables	76
	4.4.1 BOLD Responses in Humans	77
	4.4.2 Single Cell Responses in Animals	79
	4.5 Summary and Some Implications	81
	4.5.1 Distributed Networks and Complex Interactions	81
	4.5.2 Nomothetic vs. Idiographic Descriptions	82
	References	85
	Chapter 5 Our Gods: Variation in Supernatural Minds	87
	5.1 Introduction	87
	5.2 Representing Supernatural Minds	88
	5.2.1 The Mindreading System and Attributed Domains	88
	5.2.2 Supernatural Minds, Variation, and Counterintuitiveness	90
	5.3 Variation in Domains of Supernatural Agents Knowledge and Concern	94
	5.3.1 Omniscience with Heightened Concern: Prosocial Behavior	94
	5.3.2 Imperfect Access with Acute Concern: Ritual Behavior	95
	5.3.3 Emphases on Faith, Practice, and Social Complexity	97
	5.4 Conclusion	99
	References	99
	Chapter 6 Our Preferences: WhyWe Like What We Like	104
	6.1 Darwin s Problem	105
	6.2 Evolutionary Constraints on Aesthetic Perception:The Body as an Evolved Form	107
	6.3 The Eight Pillars of Beauty	109
	6.4 Alternative Views: Neuroaesthetics	112
	6.5 Alternative Views: The Evolutionary Psychology of Ugliness	113
	6.6 The Future of the Adapted Mind	114
	References	115
	Chapter 7 Our Appetite for Information: Invented Environment, Non-Transparent Mind, and Evolved Preferences	118
	7.1 Introduction	118
	7.2 Old Cognition, New Playgrounds, and the Technological Fallacy	119
	7.3 We Don t Know that We Don t Know How We Perceive Media	121
	7.4 Still the Same Old Cues	124
	7.5 Reality and Media: The Boundary that Never Was	126
	7.6 The Old Stories Are the Best	127
	7.7 Conclusion	129
	References	130
	Chapter 8 Our Best Shot at Truth: Why Humans Evolved Mathematical Abilities	131
	8.1 Introduction	131
	8.2 The Mathematical Abilities of Modern Humans	132
	8.2.1 Number Sense	132
	8.2.2 Number Processing	134
	8.2.3 Mathematical Thinking in Terms of Relations	135
	8.3 Evolutionary Origins of the Mathematical Abilities of Modern Humans	137
	8.3.1 Evolutionary Origins of Number Sense	137
	8.3.2 Evolutionary Origins of Number Processing	138
	8.3.3 Evolutionary Origins of Mathematical Thinking in Terms of Relations	141
	8.4 Discussion: The Mathematical Nature of Modern Humans	144
	References	147
	Chapter 9 Our Way to Understand the World: Darwin s Controversial Inheritance	150
	9.1 Knowing Instead of Believing: Why the Theory of Evolutionand Traditional Forms of Belief Are Irreconcilable	150
	9.2 Errors and Misunderstandings: The Theory of Evolution and the Ghost of Biologism	156
	9.3 Huxley s Synthesis: How Evolutionary Humanism Comes into Darwin s Inheritance	159
	References	163
	Index	164