Evolutionary Psychology Naturally!

The brain and its associated mind are in constant flux. This is right and normal. They are hardwired to this end. Their ‘purpose’ is to gather info about the external environment (as far as this can be known given the limitations of the human sense organs) and to relate this to past experiences. Those who learn from experience survive, those who do not learn do not survive.

There are different kinds of learning. The most ancient is by imitation – girls hang around with their mothers and other female relations – boys hang around with their fathers and other in-group males.

Most human groups have initiation rites of passage. These can be emotional and severe. The idea is to quickly and thoroughly change the individual’s view about purpose. “When I grew up I put away childish things.”


When language (and song/chant) was very young it is easy to imagine ceremonies based around the cave paintings in their splendid seclusion. There would appear to have been cultural patterns and agents giving ‘meaning’ to what might otherwise be a very scary place. Much to know.


As language matured there would have been more rational states of mind perhaps relating to detailed points about the practicalities of hunting and gathering. And as the evening fire turned to ashes thought may have turned to putting the world to rights through dealing with abstract concepts such as truth, beauty, justice, compassion; and with anger, greed, jealousy, status etc. Those groups that communicated more effectively had better survival value.

From the point of view of evolutionary psychology most of these thoughts, moods and emotions will have evolved to be as they are today for a given, adaptive, purpose.  Evolution would have been running at the level of individuals and groups. First stone axes and then, a few minutes later, manned spaceflights to the moon and robots on the surface of Mars.

So what is the point of telling this story? The idea is to breathe air into the thought pattern labeled as ‘evolutionary psychology’. Take it for granted. Treat it as ordinary. The story’s made by talking.

Back in 1997, Leda Cosmides & John Tooby, in “Evolutionary Psychology: A Primer” noted that the older and empiricist Standard Social Science Model (SSSM) had been replaced. These days, “All normal human minds reliably develop a standard collection of reasoning and regulatory circuits that are functionally specialized and, frequently, domain-specific. These circuits

• organize the way we interpret our experiences,
• inject certain recurrent concepts and motivations into our mental life, and
• provide universal frames of meaning that allow us to understand the actions and intentions of others.

Beneath the level of surface variability, all humans share certain views and assumptions about the nature of the world and human action by virtue of these human universal reasoning circuits.”

In short, although great learners, human beings are hard-wired in many ways. Our genes express themselves as ‘instincts’ and there are many specific examples of these, especially relating to social relations.