Our Biological Mind in the Modern Verbal World

Abstract

A rich body of research shows that our minds have been molded by how our remote ancestors responded to challenges posed by the physical and biological environment and the consequences of their responses. Prominent among these mental legacies of past environments are an ability to comprehend and deal effectively with short-term changes in local conditions but great difficulty comprehending interactions among events at great distances and over long time spans. Our brains are designed to resolve complex events and sensory inputs into polar categories. This facilitates taking action, which usually requires quick, binary (either/or) decisions. Because the consequences of errors associated with responding to a potential hazard are asymmetrical—a false negative is more costly than a false positive—our minds have a strong negativity bias. We have especially powerful negative responses to snakes, the first important vertebrate predators of early primates. We respond strongly to shapes similar to the weapons of dangerous animals, pointed forms, spotted and tessellated patterns. Unfortunately, the autonomic nervous system circuits often respond more strongly to stimuli that were relevant in the past—snakes, and dangerous herbivorous and carnivorous mammals—than to stimuli that are much more important today—weapons, electrical wires, speeding cars. We respond to sounds with a variety of emotions, such as fear, curiosity, and pleasure, that continue to help us as we make decisions in today’s crowded cities. Among the legacies of the distant past is our love of classifying objects, a vital component of the psychological processes by which we seek order in the environment, a goal that is assisted by language and development of appropriate linguistic categories. The emergence during the past 10,000 years of modern society from our hunter/gatherer ancestors was driven by five key innovations—sophisticated weapons, cooking, tapping new sources of energy, increasingly complex social cooperation, and, finally, the evolution of language.