“We have Paleolithic emotions, medieval institutions, and godlike technology.” ~Edward O. Wilson
This post is about the deep roots of our emotional lives, based on paleontological evidence and theory. Over the ~315,000-year history of Homo sapiens, hunting and gathering resulted in evolutionary changes in the human brain. But today I am not just referring to the pursuit of wildlife, though that’s definitely how it started.
Our ancient ancestors survived by facing enormous threats in nature and in each other. Armed with simple tools like knives, arrows, spears, and rocks they had to leave the meager safety of caves, huts, and brochs or stone houses to secure food. We wouldn’t be here if they didn’t. The odds were terrible…their skeletal remains are sometimes found with ghastly injuries caused by great horns, hooves, and teeth. It is believed they even jumped on the backs of frightful beasts many times their size in order to subdue them. Even hunting in groups did not eliminate the threats involved.
At some level they had to deny their fear and pain in order to pull this off. Brain structures evolved to better adapt to this reality. Internal “warning systems” improved such that intelligence became a critical tool. But the ability to “turn off” or short-circuit built-in fear mechanisms also improved. Perhaps this is a reason the pre-frontal cortex is mostly slower to develop in men. Those with psychopathic traits seem to have the ability to turn off fear completely and permanently. The hunting brain gone wrong.
I imagine that our earliest cold and hungry community members all very much wanted this to happen, and ostracism followed for those who refused to participate. We all adapted to this reality, in one way or another.
Fast forward to more modern times. The threats faced by the prehistoric ones still exist in some quarters but are absent in most; either way the acquired brain processes persist. Though the search for food is just as dire for far too many, we may now have other drives which capture us psychologically, such as the pursuit of companions, of careers, of talents, of missions and purposes. The good news is the brain is so responsive to experience and surroundings that we have the capacity to evolve again. And again and again. If we can perceive the need.
The bad news is that our deep, primitive brain structures can still overwhelm the need for growth. Thrill seeking, recklessness, passive-aggressive warfare, and addiction to and abuse of power can all be rooted in a primal relationship to pain and fear. (Anxiety and dysregulated mood are other vestiges of the primeval past, but these are wholly different subjects.) Instead of jumping on the backs of mammoths we do donuts in parking lots, play parkour, bang our heads up with substances, overwork, and systematically diminish those around us. All because the drives involved can consume us and limit the ability to feel pain and fear, in self and, crucially, in others. I could go on.
Fear is often mentioned as an impediment to relationships, and this can certainly be true. But denying fear and pain also interferes with relationships, as well as other pursuits, with at least equally disastrous results. Even more so, I think. To manage fear one must first acknowledge it when the old brain is conditioned not to. The bygone adaptations served their purposes in the past. It seems that today cooperation is much more critical to the survival of civilization, by which I mean each other, our community. In the caves the brutish means of our survival was immediate and self-evident. Those of us who see the need for a more sophisticated interaction with our world have adapted, brought our brains to bear, and see another way. Though it is still sometimes a struggle.
Others have not, and this is one of our modern predicaments. Perhaps the wild beasts are still with us and others, and we must face the pain and fear involved in a totally new way. Which may start by not denying it any longer. And working with an entire community rather than venturing out alone or in small “hunting” parties.
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