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← Conclusion | Contents

"Spent" by Geoffrey Miller -- a discussion of evolutionary psychology

 "Spent" is a good book by evolutionary psychologist Geoffrey Miller, looking particularly at consumer behaviour, including purchasing and marketing, through the lens of evolutionary psychology, concluding with some recommendations for a healthier, happier life based on his insights.  

There are parts of this book where he gets carried away, or makes what I thought were absurd suggestions, but overall I find him an important author and scientist to be aware of.  

Some of the content here reminded me a little bit of a book I previously reviewed called "The Case Against Education" by Bryan Caplan.  In this book, Caplan, an economist, argues that much post-secondary education provides only "signaling value" rather than tangible skills, expertise, or even enjoyment.  In this way, education can become akin to a peacock's tail -- offering a sign to employers or peers that you are intelligent or capable or "fit."  This may indeed be an accurate sign of fitness, but Caplan argues that it is a needlessly expensive one, in terms of time, money, effort, and emotional investment.  The time spent labouring to get your degree could have been spent doing something you found more enjoyable, productive, meaningful, or lucrative.  The intelligence it required to finish your degree could theoretically have been measured before you did your degree, allowing you entry to your career destination without wasting several years of your life in a program you didn't find useful or enjoyable.   Finally I disagreed with Caplan, since he goes too far in his condemnation of post-secondary education, but I have to acknowledge that he is at least partially right, that many of us pursue post-secondary courses that are more "hoops to jump through" to get a degree rather than providing any sort of benefit that we would use for any esthetic or job-related purpose later on.  

Miller looks more broadly at signaling, particularly with respect to consumer behaviour.   Many of the products we buy are chosen not because of their objective utility, but because they have a signaling value of some sort.   That is, they demonstrate either personality traits, or some intrinsic attractive characteristic such as health, stability, capacity to be caring, or humour, that would be desirable or compatible in a relationship partner.  For example, owning a luxury car would be a signal of financial well-being, which would often be found attractive in a a mate.  Different brands of car are more likely favoured by people with different personality traits, hence brand choice could advertise your personality style.  A degree from a prestigious university would advertise intelligence, and perhaps also stability and financial wealth, which are attractive features in a partner.  A diamond ring demonstrates financial stability and the willingness to sacrifice for your partner.  But the business of diamond rings for weddings is a relatively novel human cultural invention, leading to people sacrificing months of their income, further magnified by group norms about this, just to demonstrate a character trait that both partners should have known about each other just through the time they spent together.  

Miller's overarching thesis is not necessarily that these signaling phenomena are intrinsically bad, but that they are often needlessly or absurdly "expensive" which then causes harm to individuals or even to the world.  If everyone is chasing after expensive objects just to show that they are stable or a good catch, it is depleting to the world, and it is depleting to people's time and energy and money, often with small special interest groups (such as those in the sordid world of diamond mining) making huge profits.  

He argues that simple, wholesome signaling is the best and healthiest way to go.  If you would like to signal your personality traits, it is best to simply have sincere conversations with people so they can get to know you.  In conversation, you don't have to boast about yourself, you just have to "be yourself."    You don't have to demonstrate your character through the purchase of a car, or organic produce, or an Apple computer, or designer shoes.  A better signal about character integrity might come from activities, such as the manner in which you conduct relationships with your friends or family, or volunteering, or taking care of a pet.   

Some types of signaling that are meant to be "deceptive" could backfire.  Spending vast sums of money on cosmetic procedures to make yourself look younger and healthier, could in some extreme cases show others that you are overly preoccupied or insecure or "lying" about your appearance.  But wholesome and enjoyable and sincere self-care that is consistent with your interests and personality would always attract the people who are best for you, since it is honest, uncomplicated, non-deceptive signaling.  

In a concluding section, he makes the point that much of human evolution occurred over hundreds of thousands of years during which we lived in small groups surrounded by wilderness.  Effective signaling would have mostly required conversation, simple daily social or individual actions in the community, acts of work or service that would be seen and appreciated by others, demonstrations of particular interests or talents true to our character, and negative social or community consequences for people who behaved badly.  

Instead of buying expensive objects as gifts, Miller argues that it is more meaningful and authentic, healthier for society, and also more effective signaling, to do personalized activities as gifts, such as making someone something using your own efforts and creativity, or taking them on a special outing.  

Activities we would see as daily features of early human communities, such as playing with children, spending time with the elderly, preparing food, doing simple home maintenance for self and others, going for walks in the forest and identifying the bird calls and the plants by name, and managing the duties of daily life with warmth and humour rather than complaint, is a good foundation for a happy and healthy life and a good source of esteem from others.   Demonstrating skill and prowess and enjoyment in these areas would be a universally attractive thing, and hence is much more effective "signaling" than buying an expensive car or obtaining fancy credentials.  I'm a big fan of recommending such simple activities as a foundation of maintaining good mental health.  

"Determined" by Robert Sapolsky

 Robert Sapolsky is a great scientist with deep wisdom to share about humanity.  His recent book, Determined, is another must-read.  

The first half or so of the book details the many factors causing a given behaviour which are outside of what could be called "free will."  For example, hereditary factors, evolved traits, endocrine factors, social and cultural factors, childhood adversity, abuse, poverty, neglect, or discrimination, or on the other hand extreme enrichment through wealth and having good parents, home, and family; and the environmental conditions of the day or the hour.   Sapolsky reminds us, with evidence to back it up, how influential these factors are.  One chapter is dedicated to the Libet experiments, which demonstrate some degree of neural evidence of a decision before a person is subjectively aware of having decided, therefore calling into question whether our sense of making a decision is something like an illusion.  Other chapters are devoted to physics, such as about quantum mechanics and chaos theory; he argues that free will is not to be found in these areas.  

His strongest thesis, which he states a few times in the book, is that even if free will does exist, it is less influential than we believe it is -- that is, we underestimate the impact of other factors.  But often he strays from this strong thesis, into a state of denying the existence of any free will whatsoever, and then reflecting about the moral consequences of this.  

I think in many areas he is overconfident about findings that are quite debatable.  While the many genetic and environmental factors mentioned above are all indisputable, there could be a lot of debate (which he does not engage in) about the magnitude of some of these particular factors, or about the soundness or biases of the existing studies on these matters.  Just as in his previous book (also a great book), Behave, he quotes study data that really ought to be debated vigorously rather than accepted as the final truth on a matter.  In the current book, he even acknowledges these issues with Behave, but then he proceeds to do the same thing again anyways.  I'm not saying he's wrong about these claims, only that he overstates, at least through insinuation, the certainty of the evidence supporting them.  

 In quantum mechanics, for example, the most common view is that events in the quantum realm take place in a truly random fashion; such randomness eliminates the possibility of deterministic precision.   At the very least, there may be certain deterministic statements that are almost undeniably true (such as that you or I will die in less than 100 years; or that the sun will enter a red giant phase in several billion years), but there will always be a shadow of uncertainty around the specifics, or even the tiniest flicker of uncertainty about the event itself; some of this uncertainty is not due just to incomplete information to make a prediction, it is fundamental to physics itself.     Such quantum events I think are relevant to human events, as for example they could determine whether a particular DNA mutation takes place at a particular time, with very important consequences regarding an individual's survival, disease state, or passage of genes to the next generation.    Mind you, I discovered one group of physicists espousing an idea called "superdeterminism," which accounts for some of the peculiarities of quantum experiments (such as those dealing with Bell's inequality) by positing that apparently random quantum events are all completely determined, thus one cannot actually modify an experiment in a truly arbitrary manner, since the decision about the supposedly randomized experimental manipulation was already completely determined in advance.  Yet, I think we would have to agree that this is far from a settled matter in physics, and we would need to step back from making strong claims about this area.  

The strongest conclusion Sapolsky makes based on his thesis about determinism is that we therefore need to be more empathic and gently understanding about all human behaviour (of course, his thesis really takes away the possibility that we could somehow "choose" to be more understanding, since if this empathy occurred it all would have been determined in advance).  The best we could do to analyze this moral issue, while accepting his thesis of an absence of free will, is to consider an ideal moral code (in some kind of Platonic "realm of forms") which would have optimal fairness and justice.  This is in fact what moral codes, including those in the legal system, strive to do.  But in the light of our knowledge about free will, what changes if any would be best in terms of modifying moral or legal rules?  

He argues that dealing with criminal behaviour in a blaming or punitive manner is not rational, since the causes for crime have been determined not by the individual's "free will" but by genetic and environmental factors outside that person's control.  He similarly argues that praising people or celebrating great accomplishments is irrational, since the accomplishments, or capacity for hard work, etc. were also determined by factors outisde the individual's control.  So basically when we congratulate someone for a great accomplishment,  we are granting the person credit for factors that were really the product of millions of years of prior good luck.  

But of course, is this how we would really want to live?  To stop congratulating people after they do good things?  Or to always be meekly understanding when people do terrible things?  I agree with Sapolsky that improved scientific understanding about causality should prompt us to be more humble, and to be less inclined to reflexively blame or punish bad behaviour while motivated by reflexive emotions.   

But part of normal life involves congratulating people.  Admiring accomplishment is like admiring beauty in nature.   Maybe there should be a little bit of humble acknowledgement of those factors that contributed to the accomplishment outside of one's own "free will."  But this is part of the etiquette in almost any awards ceremony, though most people don't go into remote evolutionary causes for their good fortune--they tend to stop at family, friends, and teachers.  

Sapolsky cites various egregious examples of recklessly excessive violent punishments through history, leading to his own stance of advocating leniency in the justice system.  He has a very admiring tone around Norway's approach to having what most in the world would consider a shockingly lenient prison sentence for a notorious mass murderer.   While there is much to admire in Norway's civilization and justice system, I think this practice of strictly limited sentencing fails to address a massive component of consideration in criminal sentencing, which is the psychological impact of the sentence on victims, and families of victims (who are also victims) of the crime.  A reason to keep a mass murderer in custody permanently is to treat and prevent anxiety and distress among victims or families of victims.  It need not be motivated by our base (but highly evolved) urges to punish, or by irrational overestimation of subsequent criminal risk (scientific estimates of recidivism risk should obviously impact management of criminal offenders, though the accuracy of recidivism risk estimation is way less than 100%). It should definitely be influenced by considerations of the impact of the sentencing on the health and psychological well-being of victims.  

So all in all, a very important and impactful book.  I have to admit I find it disturbing to know that "free will" even if it does exist, is rather less complete in determining behaviour than most of us believe.   But in dealing with scientific findings, we need to be prepared to consider things if the evidence supports them, even if the findings might be disconcerting.

How does this book guide our understanding of mental health, or of therapies for mental health problems?  For one thing, we should be reminded to reflect on our tendency to be reflexively judgmental, or to blame people for what could be seen as failures of will.  If we do engage in judgment or blame, it should be guided by rationality, as to whether this would be helpful to improve the situation for all.  Often such blame or judgment is not actually helpful.  Arguably some forms of blame could be a normal motivational influence in humans, but probably we use this too often and too heavy-handedly.