Viraj's Weblog

I'm reading a rather amazing book called Before the Dawn. It's pretty much the written version of a great documentary called The Journey of Man. Both of these tell the story of human migration and evolution out of Africa following the same Y chromosome all males share and the mitochondrial DNA all females share. These essentially came from our evolutionary Adam and Eve.

One of the interesting concepts is just how much warfare was likely in primitive societies. Think of the time when there were different human-like species. Do you think we got along well? Not so. One species survived, and for a reason. Daily there were extermination campaigns. Every day you were hunted or hunting. Follow chimp warfare and you get a glimpse of how the pre-humans must have been like. Hunting in groups, finding a lone 'outsider', and then jumping him to destroy him and his legacy. It must have been a vicious time to live in.

A small group of people started the population we now call humans. They left Africa and formed bubbles of societies as they traveled to new lands. Out of each of those bubbles left a few more humans, eventually finding a new land and again settling. Some stayed, some left. The cycle repeats, and eventually you have the different nations and races we have today.

We have come a long way. Animals gathering in groups larger than 50 require a lot of brain power to read others and work together.

One principle that biologists think may help explain larger societies, both human and otherwise, is that of reciprocal altruism, the practice of helping even a nonrelated member of society because they may return the favor in [the] future. A tit-for-tat behavioral strategy, where you cooperate with a new acquaintance, and thereafter follow his strategy toward you (retaliate if he retaliates, cooperate if he cooperates), turns out to be superior to all others in many circumstances. Such a behavior could therefore evolve, providing that a mechanism to detect and punish freeloaders evolves in parallel; otherwise freeloaders will be more successful and drive the conditional altruists to extinction.

Conditional tit-for-tat altruism cannot evolve in just any species. It requires members to recognize each other and have long memories, so as to be able to keep tally.

The book then goes and gives an example of the vampire bat, whose societies do just this.

Many common emotions can be understood as being built around the expectation of reciprocity and the negative reaction when it is made to fail. If we like a person, we are willing to exchange favors with them. We are angry at those who fail to return favors. We seek punishment for those who take advantage of us. We feel guilty if we fail to return a favor, and shame if publicly exposed. If we believe someone is genuinely sorry about a failure to reciprocate, we trust them. But if we detect they are simulating contrition, we mistrust them.

Think of how much information processing this requires and you can imagine how our brains might have evolved.

Reciprocity, and an ability to calculate the costs and benefits of cooperation, underpin our social life, writes the economist Paul Seabright, "making it reasonable for us to treat strangers as though they were honorary relatives or friends." It is remarkable that this behavior evolved at a time when primitive warfare was at its most intense and people had every reason to regard strangers with deep suspicion. Strangers can still be dangerous, yet in the right circumstances we habitually trust them....

making it possible "to step nonchalantly out of the front door of a suburban house and disappear into a city of ten million strangers." Without this innate willingness to trust strangers, human societies would still consist of family units a few score strong, and cities and great economies would have had no foundation for existence.

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Trust is an essential part of the social glue that binds people together in cooperative associations. But it increases the vulnerability to which all social groups are exposed, that of being taken advantage of by freeloaders. Freeloaders seize the benefits of social living without contributing to the costs. They are immensely threatening to a social group because they diminish the benefits of sociality for others and, if their behavior goes unpunished, they may bring about the society's dissolution.

I can't help but be reminded of the scheming financial practices that many fell victim to. Sure you can pay that $1 million mortgage, don't worry. Trust me. Sure you can have a credit card with your awful credit. Trust me.

Human societies long ago devised an antidote to the freeloader problem. This freeloader defense system, a major organizing principle of every society, has assumed so many other duties that its original role has been lost sight of. It is religion.

Can it be that the lack of this freeloader eviction system, be it religion or whatever, what has led us to the economic meltdown we are seeing? I think that religion is dying, and it is evident in almost every aspect of daily life. But what will replace the handling of freeloaders? I have to wonder if hundreds of years from now there will still be the concept of guilt and shame. Will our trust for others diminish?

Before you consider taking that tryst in Dubai, heed this warning:

... sales manager Michelle Palmer, 30, was stopped by a policeman for allegedly having sex on Jumeirah beach two weeks ago with Vince Acors, 34 – a man she met only that night.

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Sex before marriage in illegal in the UAE, as is being drunk in public, but for years authorities in Dubai have let westerners off with verbal warnings rather than prosecute.

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The maximum punishment that Ms. Palmer could face is six years in jail. She is said to have been advised to marry Mr. Acors, who was on holiday in Dubai at the time, in order to reduce her sentence to two years.

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“People have to understand that the act of kissing in Public considered normal by today's European standards is considered as a criminal offence according to UAE laws and customs. Of course the authorities in Dubai tend to be more tolerant than the other emirates in the interpretation and application of the laws but these laws are still in place and they can act upon them whenever the lines are crossed.”

I guess what happens in Dubai, stays in Dubai... for about 6 years .

Here's a new episode of Dawkins' show. And while you're at it, check out this Bill Maher standup.

Dawkins has a BBC documentary that's nicely done. Here is part one and part two. My favorite parts are the interviews with religious fanatics like Ted Haggard (pre-amphetamine gayness) who clearly show their hatred of Dawkins. If you liked the show, check out this debate. These types of intelligent forums are needed in American television.

• 30 days: an Atheist among Christians
• Louis Theroux visits the Westboro Cult (7 parts)

There's a really interesting interview with Francis Collins in the February 2007 issue of Discover. I wrote about his book earlier. Here's a quote:

Before we start trashing religion, we should recognize that religion down through history has been misused by lots of people in terrible ways. But it's also done some profoundly good things. What has atheism done to help people? The worst examples of human carnage in the 20th century came from the atheist regimes of Stalin and Mao. The principles of faith are generally altruistic, gentle, and loving. The problem is when someone takes those principles and twists them to suit their own purposes - that was the Inquisition, and that is suicide bombers.

So what would you say to the scientists who are fervently opposed to religious thought and practice?

Is there any dogma more unsupported by the facts than from the scientist who stands up and says, "I know there is no God"? Science is woefully unsuited to ask the question of God in the first place. So give the religious folks a break. They are seeking the kind of spiritual truths that have always interested humankind but that science cannot really address.