Category Archives: Hypotheses
Reflections on the Costs of Evolved Self-Awareness: Comparing Trajectories of Davids—Foster Wallace & Insurgent
I’m going to be writing on the costly implications of self-awareness in a forthcoming book & was walking around listening to Reagan Youth on Spotify & David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest on Audible when some parallels occurred to me. I’ll … Continue reading
Is Cunnilingus an Adaptation to Increase Intercourse Length & Increase the Probability of Fertilization?
Several years ago a student of mine (Christy McGee) in my “Anthropology of Sex” class was studying highly promiscuous women with the hypothesis that they would be averse to cunnilingus. She suggested that cunnilingus was a male means of detecting infidelity. … Continue reading
Fireside Trance drives Selection for Enhanced Attention & Working Memory via Baldwin Effect
Fireside hypnotizability Following up on a previous post tracking down the original sources for the December Smithsonian piece about hearth fires & cognitive evolution, evolutionary psychologist Matt Rossano’s “Did Meditating Make Us Human?” spins out a model similar to & … Continue reading
Parasites & Religion in Costa Rica
I really don’t have anything to report about parasites in Costa Rica yet, or religion for that matter, but we did arrive yesterday to begin preliminary data collection for the Costa Rican Religious Ecology Study, as I’ve been calling it. … Continue reading
The Adaptiveness of Gossip re HIV in Africa
I was listening to an old This American Life podcast from 2011 the other day & heard a great piece about the work of sociologist Susan Watkins. Watkins runs the Malawi Journals Project, thru which she has been studying gossip … Continue reading
HBES 2012 Roundup 4: Father’s Day & the Parasite-Driven Wedge
So I blew Father’s Day. Totally didn’t realize I’d booked myself to go to HBES on Father’s Day. And much as I love my dad, it wasn’t because I wasn’t going to be with him. It was because my wife … Continue reading
HBES 2012 Roundup 1: Joint Day with the Animal Behavior Society
The Human Behavior & Evolution Society (HBES) 2012 Annual Meetings took place this past weekend in Albuquerque, NM, in conjunction with the Animal Behavior Society, hosted by Steve Gangestad & others. I’ve only been to HBES one other time & … Continue reading
Evolution Triggers the “Oh Shit!” Circuit
Jonah Lehrer discusses the new Gallup poll numbers on the (non)acceptance of evolutionary theory versus creationist beliefs in his New Yorker blog post “Why We Don’t Believe in Science.” He cites a study by Andrew Shtulman in Cognition that finds … Continue reading
Pop Culture & Mating Success Study
Please participate in an internet-based survey of cultural knowledge and mating success of adults 18 years and older. The survey takes about 15 minutes and asks some personal questions of a sexual nature. Follow this link to the survey if … Continue reading
Towards a Bottom-Up Approach to Self-Deception
As I read John Hartung’s 1988 chapter on “self-deceiving down,” I am further convinced of the nonsense of arguing about theoretical distinctions & that we are considering the issue at too high a conceptual level to understand the influence of … Continue reading
