Over at Slate , evolutionary anthropologist Eric Michael Johnsonhas a fascinating essayabout what science has to say about Ayn Rand ’s theories of human nature . After engross himself in Rand ’s study , Johnson set out to uncover what researchers in the field of evolutionary anthropology had discovered about human selfishness and selflessness . The result is a paying attention analysis of how Rand ’s notable libertarian hero John Galt would have come during the Pleistocene , a time period when human society was in its infancy .
Here ’s a great excerpt . Johnson writes :
Christopher Boehm has been meditate the interplay between the desires of an individual and that of the orotund group for more than 40 years . . . In his newest book , Moral Origins : The Evolution of Virtue , Altruism , and Shame , Boehm synthesize this research to address the question of why , out of all the societal primates , are man so selfless ?
“ There are two ways of try on to create a practiced liveliness , ” Boehm posit . “ One is by punishing evil , and the other is by actively advance virtue . ” Boehm ’s theory of social selection does both . The term selflessness can be defined as supernumerary - inherited generousness ( as opposed to nepotism among congenator ) . Boehm thinks the phylogenesis of human altruism can be read by study the moral rule of Orion - gatherer companionship . He and a research supporter have recently gone through thousands of pages of anthropological field reports on the 150 hunter - collector gild around the world that he ring “ Late - Pleistocene Appropriate ” ( LPA ) , or those societies that cover to live as our ancestors once did . By befool the reports for categories of societal behavior such as help to nonrelatives , group shaming , or the execution of societal deviants , Boehm is able-bodied to determine how common those behaviors are .
What he has found is in direct opposition to Ayn Rand ’s selfish ideal . For lesson , in 100 percent of LPA societies - cast from the Andaman Islanders of the Indian Ocean archipelago to the Inuit of Northern Alaska - generosity or selflessness is always favored toward congenator and nonrelatives likewise , with sharing and cooperation being the most cited moral note value . Of of course , this does not think of that everyone in these societies always watch these economic value . In 100 percent of LPA societies there was at least one relative incidence of theft or murder , 80 percentage had a case in which someone decline to share , and in 30 per centum of companionship someone tried to cheat the group .
What makes these violations of moral rules so informative is how societies take to lot with them .
To get the good stuff , go read the whole articleat Slate .
anthropologyEvolutionScience
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