HOW WE BECAME HUMAN
HOW WE BECAME HUMAN, and why we need to change – Timothy Dean, Australian philosopher. Published in 2021 by Macmillan.
This book doesn’t have an index. It has section headings that help find topics. These are indented in the following pages with the “Page No” shown
Chapter 1 – Moral baggage (on the evolution of morality and the need for change) – Page 1
Mismatch – Page 2
Remaking morality – Page 6
Moral adaptation – Page 9
Right and wrong, better and worse – Page 12
Societal Progress – Page 14
In a discussion about evolutionary progress and primitive societies Dean suggests from Page 17
“This doesn’t mean that there isn’t societal progress, of a sort. Like organisms, societies can be judged according to how well they solve problems that their members face. Except this time there’s no objective answer as to what these problems are or what the best solutions might be. With evolution, one can always say that survival and reproduction matter, but that’s not always the case with societies; we couldn’t call a society that is geared entirely towards maximal population growth to be the best possible society, especially if that society left its members living in squalor. So it’s up to us to decide what’s important and how it’s to be judged.
I suggest that we judge societal progress according to how well the society helps its members to satisfy their interests, whatever they might be. And I’d argue that it so happens that most of those interests will be common across all societies, because most people who have ever lived have valued things like health, sustenance, security, community, finding a mate, being able to express themselves and find meaning in their lives. This still leaves room for variation and disagreement over which interests are most important, like whether freedom is more important than equality, or the best means to promote those interests. But suffice to say I think there’d be general agreement over the fundamental interests themselves that most people tend to have.
The thing is, no society is perfect when it comes to helping its members satisfy their interests (although, arguably, agricultural societies have fared worst of all). While modern societies have proven to be measurable, better at servicing their members’ physical needs, such as by feeding them, lifting life expectancy and improving general security, there is growing evidence that they’re failing when it comes to their members’ psychological needs, such as living free from anxiety or mental illness.”
Why philosophy? – Page 18
Time to adapt – Page 20
Page 20 “This too is a book about change and how it has unsettled the very roots of our being. It’s a book about change and how evolution – itself one of the greatest agents of change – has shaped our minds to flourish in a bygone world. It’s one that agrees with many of the precedents and wisdoms that we carry with us are moral baggage from another world. But it’s also a book of hope. It suggests that the same minds that have changed the world around us are capable of remaking morality to help to live together – to thrive together – in the new world that we’ve built, and are continuously building, for ourselves.”
Chapter 2 – I’m not racist, but … (on racism) – Page 22
Shadows of race – Page 26
The cognitive monster – Page 30
Am I racist? – Page 32
Who’s racist? – Page 35
Stranger danger in the savanna – Page 39
The myth of race – Page 44
Colours – Page 49
Resisting Race – Page 53
Chapter3 – How Dare (on outrage) – Page 60
Working as intended – Page 66
Outrage – Page 68
Oi – Page 71
Schadenfreude – Page 74
Ostracism – Page 78
The power of shame – Page 81
Social media outrage – Page 83 – The benefit and cost of (mass) outrage
Mask off – Page 88
Page 91/2 – “recent trend of moral purity crusades on social media” and differences between progressivesconservatives.
End Game – Page 94
Page 93/4 – “If the end game is to change people, and through them change the world, then we must find a way to engage, correct, and forgive.”
#metoo – Page 97
Solutions – Page 100
Chapter 4 – Devil’s Bargain (on religion) – Page 105
A force for good? – Page 107
One, and only one – Page 111
Zeal against you – Page 116
Gods in the wild – Page 120
Small Gods – Page 122
Chance and coincidence? – Page 124
Humanity’s greatest invention – Page 128
Don’t eat that – Page 130
My god is better than your god – Page 132
Mismatch – Page 135
Without God, anything goes – Page 139
Drop the baggage – Page 142
Page 142 – “Big God religions have similar baggage that we can stop carrying with us now that we have crossed over into the modern world. We can still appreciate what Big God religions have done for us in the past, enabling us to cross the treacherous waters separating small-scale hunter-gatherer societies from the large-scale societies of today. We can also appreciate that many aspects of Big God religions are no longer fit for the modern world, particularly moralising leading to intolerance, conformity leading to oppression and dogmatism leading to ignorance.”
Aunt Susan versus intolerance – Page 145
Bad faith – Page 148
Gods above – Page 150
Chapter 5 – Who’s on top? (on sex) – Page 152
The Nature of Sex – Page 156
Soft Clay – Page 160
What is and what ought to be – Page 163
The cost of sex – Page 165
Would you …? – Page 170
You ,sir, are a cad – Page 172
Love’s lies – Page 176
Sex in the fields – Page 180
Monogamy – Page 185
What to wear – Page 188
Not all men – Page 191
Modern mismatch – Page 194
Changing world – Page 198
Future of sex – Page 200
Page 205 – “But to the degree that we believe in the value of human flourishing in a modern post-industrial society, with the abundance of opportunity, where sex is largely decoupled from reproduction, we can allow ourselves to explore the much richer and more diverse sexual landscape of the twenty-first century and play a game where everybody wins.”
Chapter 6 – E pluribus unum (on politics, community, and society) – Page 206
Strength in diversity – Page 212
Somewheres and Anywheres – Page 215
Broad spectrum – Page 221
Revenge of the Somewheres – Page 226
Another world – Page 233 This includes a precis of the work of Jonathan Haidt
Kill the traitor – Page 239
Dear leader – Page 245
Worlds collide – Page 249
Pushmepullyou – Page 254
Slow revolution – Page 256
Starve the trolls – Page 262
Disagree well – 263
Page 268 – “If we value Society, and the wealth, abundance, and security it provides, then we must open ourselves to different views, learn how to negotiate between them and argue our view constructively. That will take effort on both sides, but can start with each of us.”
Tim Dean provides an excellent explanation for the Trump phenomenon with his “Somewheres and Anywheres” classification of human types who prefer “Community” and “Society” respectively. This new analysis which roughly maps onto “conservatives” and “progressives” is very revealing. It is a divide that needs to be recognised by the opposites if we are to continue human flourishing.
Chapter 7 – Remaking morality – Page 269
Licence to kill – Page 272
Wired for conviction – 275
From Page 277 – “Each of the problems mentioned in this bock – racism, online outrage, sexism, religious intolerance, political polarisation – are made harder to solve when people are unwavering in their views, unwilling to understand, tolerate, persuade, or negotiate with others, and motivated to see their particular moral whim realised, no matter the cost.
If we’re to remake morality for the modern world, if we’re to unshackle ourselves from the baggage of our past and adapt morality to help us live and flourish together today, then we need to reimagine morality as something malleable, adaptable and negotiable that often comes in shades of grey. We need to see it as something that can be tailored to the world we live in, and change as that world changes. And to do that, we need to break free of black-and-white thinking, unwavering moral conviction and the impression that there’s one True Mortality that works for all people, in all societies and at all times.
The problem is we’re wired for moral conviction. It’s our default state to see tight and wrong in black-and-white terms, to believe there is One True Morality, to be intolerant of moral disagreement and to want to punish what we perceive as moral deviance. some people take this inclination further than others, some actively resist it, but the seeds of it exist within us all thanks to the way we have evolved to think about morality. So the problem we face today is not too little moral conviction; it’s too much.”
What’s wrong with stealing? – Page 278
Moral tourism – Page 283
You do to – Page 291
Moral tension – Page 293
Moral colours – Page 296
Wag the dog – Page 300
Moral mystery – Page 303
Way of life – Page 305
Experiments of living – Page 310
Remaking morality – Page 314
Moral perception – Page 316
Acknowledgements – Page 321
References – Page 323
There is no index. Chapter and Section Headings are listed above and Indented
The End – Page 340