A recently published paper in the Elsevier journal Quaternary Environments and Humans poses the question, “Modern human origins: Do we know what we’re looking for?” It contains some remarkable comments about behaviors of humans that seem far more complex than is necessary for our ancestors to simply survive in the ancient environments where we supposedly evolved. The author, John Speth, is an emeritus professor of anthropology at the University of Michigan, and he exhibits some scientistic bias against people of faith who engage in what he calls “non-rational behavior.” However, what he somewhat pejoratively calls “non-rational behavior” is really just a proxy for extremely common human behaviors which, even he argues, apparently go beyond what is necessary to survive and reproduce.
Of course, everyone has to pay the bills. Professor Speth first recognizes that all humans need to do certain things to survive:
I don’t question for a moment that humans have to be capable of making economically rational decisions in order to survive, so it should come as no surprise that they often behave in ways that one would predict using conventional models drawn from neoclassical economics, behavioral ecology, and elsewhere. But so too do other animals; we all need to have a piece of real estate in which to live, adequate food to eat, and the capacity to reproduce and maintain viable populations.
That’s All Fine and Good
But then why do we humans do so many other things that aren’t related to paying bills? Speth immediately lists many examples where humans do far more than what we need to do to merely survive. We engage in numerous “non-rational behaviors” — many of which might fall into categories like religion or art or literature or play or fun. It’s very difficult for anthropologists to explain those in terms of evolutionary requirements simply to survive and reproduce. Here’s what Speth says, which is worth reading carefully and in full:
But for humans these necessities of life are just baseline requirements. They tell us little about the incredible array of non-rational behaviors that comprise much of human life, whether Indigenous or Western. Only humans hold grueling week-long initiation and puberty ceremonies in which adolescent boys and girls are inculcated with a society’s secret and sacred oral traditions; dance, feast, pray, sing, make lengthy orations, and offer tobacco smoke to entice or appease Creator Beings or other spirits and deities before embarking on a hunt or going to war, welcome in the New Year, or attempt to draw clouds and rain closer to their settlement; set out on arduous vision quests involving long periods of fasting and self-mutilation, or costly and risky religious pilgrimages to far away holy places; eat only foods that are Kosher or Halal and reject those that are not; salute, even die for, a flag; commit oneself to a lifetime of celibacy and prayer in a monastery; bet one’s personal resources on the lottery, super bowl, or horse races, or travel to Las Vegas (Nevada) for the sole purpose of gambling; go skydiving, bungee jumping, or rock climbing; learn to walk on stilts or ride a unicycle; spend endless hours playing fantasy games like Dungeons and Dragons; attend hours-long concerts, plays, or poetry readings; visit art museums; read lengthy tales about witches and wizards, or worship holy texts like the Bible, Torah, or Koran; spend time and money to see a movie about a Barbie doll or adventures that transpired “a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away….,” Many of these activities and events could last for days or weeks, result in important lost opportunities, and entail substantial personal costs and risks. One would have to spin veritable “just-so” stories (Kipling, 1902) in order to explain such behaviors as wholly rational, optimal, cost-effective ways of enhancing one’s personal or inclusive fitness.
In short, models that assume humans are wholly rational players in the game of life, whether present-day Western or traditional Indigenous, are unquestionably of value for establishing baseline economic parameters, but they are hardly sufficient to capture the mind-boggling sweep of costly, time- and energy-consuming, and at times risky non-rational behaviors that comprise a great deal of human life, and clearly make us something far more complex than just a “souped-up” ape.
Clearly, humans do many things that are hard to predict or explain if our psychology was merely crafted by natural selection, preserving behaviors that help us pass on our genes. In Speth’s words, we do a lot of things that aren’t easy to explain as “wholly rational, optimal, cost-effective ways of enhancing one’s personal or inclusive fitness” and this “mind-boggling sweep of costly, time- and energy-consuming, and at times risky non-rational behaviors that comprise a great deal of human life … clearly make us something far more complex than just a ‘souped-up’ ape.”
What a Great Comment!
Speth later lists more “non-rational” spiritual behaviors, and notes that these are “just a handful picked out of literally hundreds of similar ethnographic observations, underscor[ing] just how central non-rational spiritualism actually is (or was)” in human cultures.
Note also that the above examples span not only what Speth calls “Indigenous” behaviors but also those found in what he calls “Abrahamic religions — Judaism, Christianity, and Islam,” and even common behaviors in post-religious “secular” Western society. These sorts of behaviors are everywhere and they aren’t going away.
Can Bayes Settle This Debate?
How do we explain all the “mind-boggling sweep” of time-consuming behavior that isn’t directly necessary for survival? Perhaps we can settle the debate in Bayesian fashion. On which model does this astounding prevalence of “non-rational behaviors” make more sense:
- A model where humanity was originally designed to be in a relationship with some supernatural creator, and we are constantly reaching out, trying to find ways to restore that relationship with the sacred and supernatural.
- A model where humanity evolved by strictly blind and unguided natural mechanisms simply to survive and reproduce, and despite the great risks to survival, eventually humans made up all this costly time-and-energy-consuming non-rational hocus-pocus (over and over again, apparently, in independent cultures all around the globe) because it unwittingly aided survival by fostering group selection. Or something like that.
A Bayesian analysis tells us the answer: If blind and unguided evolution rules the day, this “mind-boggling” prevalence of “non-rational” behaviors is very hard to explain, much less predict. If we were designed, then all this spiritual and sacred-oriented behavior would be anticipated. The first model is far superior.
If we look at all this evidence with clear eyes, maybe what it is really telling us is that humans were designed for higher purposes that go far beyond mere survival and reproduction. We are not, as evolutionary theory would have us believe, merely a “souped-up ape.”