RE: What if we're not good people?
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I think there will always be parts of me whose knee-jerk reaction is, essentially, wrong.
Wrong by what measure? Who's the judge?
It makes sense, evolutionarily, that there would be different strategies. Monogamy and family values are reproductively successful. You can build wealth over generations and assure that your grandchildren benefit from the good decisions your grandparents made. But if we all did that, I'm not sure the world would hold together. You'd get resentment, feuding, war between tribes as resources concentrated among a few families.
So the other strategy would be to just remix our genes in as many ways as possible, and figure, well, someone's going to come out okay.
Personally, I reacted against my mother's promiscuity (three kids with three different guys). I guess I wanted some stability; that's why I got married 25 years ago! (That's not the only reason, of course...)
Then again, we're not having any kids, so... genetically the strategy didn't really work out!
Well, when you put it like that... you're right. You know, it's funny, we like to think we're so evolved that we can't judge these things in "caveman brain" terms anymore, when in truth, it's so much of our caveman subconscious that's still running the show, essentially.
I guess when you look at it from the angle you outlined, establishing what's "wrong" is a bit trickier. You know, there's a lot of discussion it seems, in podcasts and such, with one side arguing for traditional family values and "manning up" and all that, while the other side increasingly leans towards sexual promiscuity and dismantling all that - I guess that's just the latest installment of this age old social division of monogamy vs. "sowing your seeds"...
Wow, 25 years - congratulations to you both <3
It's fascinating how genes, which are selected on the individual level, can create differing phenotypes that fulfill roles to help a population succeed on the group level. Like: we need extroverts and introverts; things would collapse if we didn't have charismatic leaders, but the thoughtful introverted types drive a lot of advancements. We need highly sensitive people who have extreme reactions to stimuli, but we also need folks who can just power through a challenge without getting all jittery about it. We need morning people and night-owls, because someone has to stay up late and guard the cave. And yeah, I think we need promiscuity and monogamy too.
You'd think all traits would be one-sided. There's really not much use for a slow gazelle, or a peace-loving tiger. But the "high sensitivity" trait is really interesting. Apparently it's genetic, and we're either one or the other (about 1/6th are "sensitive") -- nobody falls in the middle. (Where the other "big five" personality traits are more of a spectrum.) And this division has been found in just about every mammalian species that's been tested.
I wonder what other bi-polar genetic splits are stuck in our genome, and how many we share with other animals.
This is the nicest explanation of the night owl that I've heard.
That's so strange. Though I wonder, wouldn't the "power through" types be more beneficial, from an evolutionary perspective? I liked the "Do you have a rich and complex inner life?" question on the self-test....made me wonder what kind of people would say no, I'm a bit boring, really.
Probably. But if everyone just powers through, and nobody takes the time to work out that they're powering towards a cliff, everyone dies. That why societies need a few highly sensitive people - so they can recalibrate.
Your work proves otherwise. However, I've found it helps to be a bit boring on the outside. Saves energy for what really matters!