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Flattering to Deceive the Second Half

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Flattering to Deceive the Second Half BOOKS ET AL. EVOLUTIONARY BEHAVIOR ary interpretation of self- The Folly of Fools contentious topic could deception, the book takes a The Logic of Deceit and be seen as mere opinion, dramatic change of tack in Self-Deception in Human Life the behavioral ecologist Flattering to Deceive the second half. There the Trivers makes a surpris- by Robert Trivers author presents a number of ing comeback by suggest- Basic Books (Perseus), Johan J. Bolhuis sociopolitical applications of ing a signifi cant relation- New York, 2011. 413 pp. $28, his ideas. He discusses a baf- C$32.50. ISBN 9780465027552. ship between parasite load iko Tinbergen presaged it, E. O. Wil- fl ing scope of topics, ranging and the number of reli- son started it, but the two towering from the Challenger disaster gions “per unit area.” The Nfi gures in the behavioral ecology rev- to the confl ict in the Middle East. An engag- underlying idea is that the need for protec- olution of the 1970s were undoubtedly Robert ing writer, Trivers provides many interesting tion against parasites will promote within- Trivers and Bill Hamilton. Trivers, an evolu- ideas. But if they constitute science, it is of a group cohesion and hostility toward out- tionary biologist now at Rutgers University, rather unconventional, democratic nature. siders. Religion then provides “substitute begins The Folly of Fools reminiscing about Unlike many evolutionary psychologists, logics with similar effects”—or, as Trivers his seminal theoretical work from the early who seem to hold that their favored theories formulates it in characteristic fashion, “We days of behavioral ecology. While Hamil- are inevitable evolutionary truths, Trivers is scratch our asses with our right hands, they ton introduced the related concepts of inclu- disarmingly honest. He notes that “[s]ome with their left [note the parasite implica- sive fi tness and kin selection, Trivers’s theo- real fraction of what I write must inevitably tions], so let’s avoid the nasty left-scratchers rizing focused on almost the entirely.” Again, Trivers is quick to put his opposite, conflicts of interest suggestions into perspective when he says between males and females and that, for instance, the diversity within Prot- between parents and offspring, estant churches may have little or nothing to as well as on reciprocal altru- do with parasite load. Regarding religion, ism. Trivers suggests that the his essential point is that people believe theory of human self-deception in a deity not because she—using behav- that he develops in the book has ioral ecological arguments, Trivers prefers in fact evolved from those early to regard the deity as female—exists, but insights into evolutionary con- because we have gained evolutionary advan- flict, with parents deceiving tages by being (self-)deceived into believing their young, and even them- that she does. selves, for their own benefit. Trivers’s early remark about genes could Trivers’s essential thesis is that be applied to the human mind, as our memes “we deceive ourselves the bet- are expected to promote their own propaga- ter to deceive others.” tion. His argument about religion could then The author reveals his be extrapolated to evolutionary interpreta- behavioral ecology credentials tions of other human behaviors and to The when he suggests that “life’s Folly of Fools itself. That is, the increasing key aim” is reproduction. With Self-deceived don. Quixote battling the giants. abundance of evolutionary psychology the- his distinctly Dawkinsian state- ories (deceptively dressed up as science), ment that “our genes are expected to promote be wrong.” Although this perspective could attempts to explain nearly everything, means their own propagation,” he firmly sets the be seen as a weakness, it is actually one of they will infl uence the way people interpret stage for an evolutionary analysis of human the book’s strengths. Readers will fi nd a ver- their own behavior. Thus, we could come behavior—as he sees it, applying “evolution- sion of evolutionary psychology conducted to see our behavior as (self-)deception not ary logic” to human self-deception. by an eminent evolutionary biologist. These because that is an inevitable outcome of nat- Evolutionary theory was famously may be just-so stories, but they are told by ural selection, but because evolutionary psy- (AMERICAN BOOK, NEW YORK, 1910) applied to human behavior by Charles someone who knows a thing or two about chologists (and now also behavioral ecolo- Darwin in The Descent of Man ( 1) and equally evolution—a welcome relief. Of course, that gists) tell us that it is. Despite this caveat, famously (or rather, infamously) by Wilson in does not negate any of the reservations one Trivers’s book is a thoroughly good read. If the last chapter of Sociobiology ( 2). The fi eld may have about evolutionary interpretations his well-informed but modest approach starts has been clouded with controversy since its of the human mind ( 3, 4). Nonetheless, Triv- a new trend, then The Folly of Fools is a wel- beginnings—as in the sociobiology debates ers’s frank admission that he may be wrong come and rather unselfi sh meme. STORIES OF DON QUIXOTE of the late 1970s and 1980s and the still- makes his book more palatable than most in References continuing, sometimes vitriolic discussions its genre. 1. C. Darwin, The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation concerning evolutionary psychology ( 3, 4). After entertaining and thought-provok- to Sex (John Murray, London, 1871). So how does Trivers deal with such a ing chapters on self-deception in aviation 2. E. O. Wilson, Sociobiology: The New Synthesis (Harvard Univ. Press, Cambridge, MA, 1975). tricky subject? After offering a scientific and space disasters and on political self- 3. K. N. Laland, G. R. Brown, Sense and Nonsense: Evolu- elaboration of his provocative evolution- deception, Trivers really gets fi ring on all tionary Perspectives on Human Behavior (Oxford Univ. cylinders in his treatment of religion, which Press, Oxford, ed. 2, 2011). 4. J. J. Bolhuis, G. R. Brown, R. C. Richardson, K. N. Laland, he skillfully dissects until nothing is left The reviewer is in the Behavioral Biology Group, Utrecht PLoS Biol. 9, e1001109 (2011). University, Post Offi ce Box 80086, 3508 TB Utrecht, Neth- but a system of deception of self and oth- erlands. E-mail: [email protected] ers. Whereas some of what he writes on that 10.1126/science.1214851 G. A. HARKER/FROM JAMES BALWIN, CREDIT: 1498 16 DECEMBER 2011 VOL 334 SCIENCE www.sciencemag.org Published by AAAS.
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