An interesting set of talks on the subject. I find it interesting that a lot of psychology programs do not require a base in Evolutionary Biology. Why is that? If we are studying the human brain and how it affects behavior, how can we do that without first knowing the basis of how the brain got developed to this point, and the reasons for the development?
Psychology fascinates me simply because it is the only way to truly understand human behavior. If you have an Evolutionary Psychologist who says that the reason for behavior A is Development B in the anatomical and chemical structuring of the brain, versus a normal Psychologist saying that Behavior A is because of past experience A, Who is right and why? How do experiences change the playing field when compared with anatomical development?
Beauty, whether objective, subjective or relative, is all about Selection! What we like, whom we wanna mate with, what we wanna eat, where we wanna live, how we wanna project ourselves, etc. are all abstractly defined by this perception.
In a way beauty is an interesting amalgam of symmetry, consistency, variety and a slew of other contextual features that help us choose the best almost instinctively.
Symmetry symbolizes genetic health / structural strength. We hardly cherish asymmetric faces and objects. Consistency can also be seen to work in the same context. Inconsistent color for objects, skin tone, etc. infer a poor genetic / systemic health and viability.
On the other hand variety is an interesting facet of beauty and encourages diversity! We are drawn to faces that are slightly different from those of our herd/group and this behavior can be seen as an impetus to prevent inbreeding and encourage genetic diversity.
Finally, there are special features we associate with beauty in specific contexts. Women with large breasts (nursing capability), slender waist (unlikely to be pregnant), etc. and men with a muscular body (ability to defend and provide), sharp chin (testosterone levels and fertility), etc. are desirable for the above mentioned reasons and these affinities could have been acquired through natural selection.
Altruism, the much revered behavior we all idealize but often brush off as impractical seems to have originated from our distant nomadic history than from our recent civilized past! The fact that we emotionally crave for it emphasizes its evolutionary significance.
I believe this behavioral trait had a significant survival impact for our nomadic hunter-gatherer ancestors. We, humans, lived as hunter-gatherers for a good part of our existence (200,000 BP to 50,000 BP) and were predominantly egalitarian and altruistic. Why did our ancestors depart so abruptly from their reptilian past and adopt an altruistic stand?
The answer probably lies in the proto-economy of exchanging favors that flourished in that era and the fact that such economy required an individual to be altruistic / just to participate. Our ancestors could store little for their future needs and any excess (meat, hides or tools) was a burden to carry through their nomadic existence. The only viable option was to give them away as favors and redeem those favors when required. This abstract culture of exchanging favors should have conferred a significant survival advantage to those who adopted an altruistic stand and could have preemptively excluded opportunistic participants to sustain and flourish!
Finally, evolution of agriculture and trade could have eroded the value of Altruism as civilization moved forward!
Why do we behave the way we behave? This question has set many minds racing for millennia and now in this age of scientific reasoning we are searching for answers to this age old question from a whole new perspective.
"If we are the product of evolution, so should be our behavior!" - is the basic premise behind this school of thought and in spite of wide criticism in its early days, its proponents have managed to credibly explain hitherto puzzling behavioral tendencies. They propose that most behavioral traits we share exist only because they gave us or our evolutionary ancestors an advantage over their peers to survive and breed successfully.
To start with, it is important to understand that this theory revolves around broad species level traits and should not be applied to explain individual level behavioral variations. Individual level behavior is not just a consequence of our genes but also depends on what we are exposed to as an individual during our lifetime. On the other hand some behavioral traits might not have any evolutionary significance. They could just be making a pass on us waiting for Natural Selection to prune them out.
Its interesting to note that even abstract concepts such as our perception of beauty can be explained with this theory.
LOVE! LOVE! LOVE! Why do we fall in love? What's the purpose behind this emotion? Lets try and look at it from an evolutionary perspective. For this we might need to look at the mechanics and consequences of this emotion and how it fosters a survival / breeding advantage to those species who possess this emotion.
Love at the very basic level, extends the mating ritual beyond a one off engagement between the male and female and encourages them to stick around for prolonged periods if not for a lifetime. Now this behavior suddenly confers a higher survival advantage to the offsprings as they now have two adults protecting them and providing for their needs.
Before the evolution of this emotion and as seen in reptiles, males almost always leave after the mating exercise and females take care of the eggs and offsprings. In amphibians and lower animals even females leave after the mating exercise. The basic parenting instinct evolved in reptiles and love can be seen as an adjuvant emotion further extending and strengthening this activity of parenting albeit indirectly.
Further to that, females are highly vulnerable to predators and starvation while tending to their eggs / offsprings and the emotion of love encourages the male to protect the female as well as the offsprings there by increasing their chances of survival.