On Humans

“We are survival machines – robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve the selfish molecules known as genes.” - Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene

In 1976, Richard Dawkins published one of the most iconic science books of all time. It has inspired a generation of science enthusiasts. But unsurprisingly, many readers disliked the idea of being but a “robot vehicle” or a “survival machine” for some tiny molecules — especially if these molecules are best served by repeated pregnancies or donations to a sperm bank.

Yet Dawkins was right on one thing: “however much we may deplore something, it does not stop being true.”

So what is true?

I have previously written about one claim in the Selfish Gene which is certainly not true. This is the claim that, if we accept the book's biological theories, then we humans must be “born selfish”. Even Dawkins has accepted that this was a "rogue" claim that readers should "mentally delete". You can hear more by heading to episode 20 of On Humans.

But what about the underlying science? Are selfish genes still the right way to think about the facts of evolution?

Not so, according to Eva Jablonka.

You might remember Jablonka from episode 36 on the evolution of consciousness. But before her work on consciousness, Jablonka was famous for her research on epigenetic inheritance -- literally, "inheritance beyond the gene". So what is epigenetic inheritance? What do we know about it scientifically? And does it matter philosophically?

I hope you enjoy this conversation.

LINKS

Get more links and references from my accompanying essay at OnHumans.Substack.com.

Support my work at Patreon.com/OnHumans

Each year, the World Happiness Report ranks countries based on their citizen's life satisfaction. My home country, Finland, tends to come at the top. Sure. But lessons can we draw from all this? Beyond patting Finns on the back, can we distil some more insights from the report?

I got to discuss this with Lara Aknin, co-editor of the World Happiness Report. In this previously unpublished clip, Aknin explains the major findings from the World Happiness Report and reveals the “single best predictor of happiness” across countries. 

If you want to hear more about Aknin’s work, see episode 47.

Support the show

⁠Patreon.com/OnHumans⁠

Keywords

Happiness | Life satisfaction | Economics | Social Science | World Happiness Report | Finland | Latin America | Nordic countries | Scandinavia | Welfare state | Well-being | Freedom | Equality | Generosity | Altruism

Many traditional societies accept polygyny (one man, many wives). Monogamy, too, is practised across the globe. But what about polyandry — one woman, many husbands? Is this a "dubious idea" as sometimes suggested by evolutionary theorists?

In this bonus clip, anthropologist Katie Starkweather offers interesting examples of formal and informal polyandry from around the world. She also brings nuance to theories about jealousy in men and women.

(This is a previously unpublished clip from my conversation with anthropologist Katie Starkweather, as published in episode 43.)

LINKS

Scholars mentioned

Donald Symons (author of Evolution of Human Sexuality), Sarah Blaffer Hrdy (author of Father Time, see episode 40), Brooke Scelza, Sean Prall

Articles mentioned

See the list and links here. This and other resources are available for free at OnHumans.Substack.com

Support the show

Patreon.com/OnHumans

Keywords

Monogamy | Polygamy | Polyandry | Mating | Pairbonding | Anthropology | Ethnography | Jealousy

Happy New Year 2025! To celebrate, here is an encore of what proved to be the most popular episode of 2024.

This rerun combines episodes 30 and 31 into one epic journey towards the frontiers of human understanding. My guest is Donald Hoffman. Our topics are consciousness, cosmos, and the meaning of life.

Enjoy!

Original show notes

Laws of physics govern the world. They explain the movements of planets, oceans, and cells in our bodies. But can they ever explain the feelings and meanings of our mental lives?

This problem, called the hard problem of consciousness, runs very deep. No satisfactory explanation exists. But many think that there must, in principle, be an explanation.

A minority of thinkers disagree. According to these thinkers, we will never be able to explain mind in terms of matter. We will, instead, explain matter in terms of mind. I explored this position in some detail in episode 17.

But hold on, you might say. Is this not contradicted by the success of natural sciences? How could a mind-first philosophy ever explain the success of particle physics? Or more generally, wouldn't any scientist laugh at the idea that mind is more fundamental than matter?

No — not all of them laugh. Some take it very seriously.

Donald Hoffman is one such scientist. Originally working with computer vision at MIT's famous Artificial Intelligence Lab, Hoffman started asking a simple question: What does it mean to "see" the world? His answer begins from a simple idea: perception simplifies the world – a lot. But what is the real world like? What is “there” before our perception simplifies the world? Nothing familiar, Hoffman claims. No matter. No objects. Not even a three-dimensional space. And no time. There is just consciousness.

This is a wild idea. But it is a surprisingly precise idea. It is so precise, in fact, that Hoffman’s team can derive basic findings in particle physics from their theory. 

A fascinating conversation was guaranteed. I hope you enjoy it. If you do, consider becoming a supporter of On Humans on ⁠⁠Patreon.com/OnHumans⁠⁠. 

MENTIONS

Names: David Gross, Nima Arkani-Hamed, Edward Whitten, Nathan Seiberg, Andrew Strominger, Edwin Abbott, Nick Bostrom, Giulio Tononi, Keith Frankish, Daniel Dennett, Steven Pinker, Roger Penrose, Sean Carroll,  Swapan Chattopadhyay

Terms (Physics and Maths): quantum fields, string theory, gluon, scattering amplitude, amplituhedron, decorated permutations, bosons, leptons, quarks, Planck scale, twistor theory, M-theory, multiverse, recurrent communicating classes, Cantor’s hierarchy (relating to different sizes of infinity... If this sounds weird, stay tuned for full episode on infinity. It will come out in a month or two.)

Terms (Philosophy and Psychology): Kant’s phenomena and noumena, integrated information theory, global workspace theory, orchestrated objective reduction theory, attention schema theory

Books: Case Against Reality by Hoffman, Enlightenment Now by Steven Pinker

Articles etc.: For links to articles, courses, and more, see ⁠https://onhumans.substack.com/p/links-for-episode-30⁠

This was fun!

Last Wednesday saw the first-ever live recording of On Humans. The event was held at the London Business School, courtesy of the LBS's China Club. My guest was MIT Professor Yasheng Huang, familiar to regular listeners from the China trilogy published earlier this fall.

In this new episode, we keep tackling the origins of modern China. This time, we draw insights from Huang's two upcoming books: Revisiting the Needham Question and Statism With Chinese Characteristics. The conversation is structured around five themes: 1) the "Needham Question"; 2) Keju exams; 3) Scale; 4) Scope; and 5) The Eighties. Expect juicy insights to questions such as:

• Why did the rise of Buddhism concide with rise of ancient inventions in ancient China?
• How does footbinding relate to China's technological decline?
• Has China's GDP growth stopped serving Chinese workers?

Towards the end of the conversation, Huang also shared his memories of working in China during the 1989 crackdown at Tiananmen Square.

Enjoy!

MORE LINKS

Get the On Humans newsletter at ⁠⁠OnHumans.Substack.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. You can also find On Humans on ⁠⁠YouTube⁠⁠ and ⁠⁠BlueSky⁠!

Feeling generous? Join the wonderful group of my patrons at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon.com/OnHumans⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠or get in touch for other ways to support!

Email: ⁠⁠makela dot ilari at outlook dot com⁠⁠⁠

Persians. Romans. Chinese. Guptas. Abbasids. Mongols. British.

The list of the world’s largest empires is a list of different peoples of Eurasia. With the sole exception of ancient Egypt, the Eurasian landmass has been the breeding ground for the largest empire of each moment in history.

Why has Eurasia been so prone to large empires? Similarly, why did so many technological breakthroughs — from writing to gunpowder — occur in Eurasia? And how did these broader patterns of Eurasian history enable the dark chapters of European colonialism?

These questions constitute some of the “broadest patterns of history”, to quote Jared Diamond’s Guns, Germs, and Steel. Indeed, these are not only the broad contours of the last few millennia: searching for answers, we need to dig deep into the origins of agriculture and beyond.

My guest today, ⁠Ideen Ali Riahi⁠, has been digging very deep indeed.

Building on Diamond’s original project, Riahi has traced the deepest roots behind Eurasia’s outsized power in human history. And if he is correct, these roots extend to periods way before the dawn of agriculture.

In this episode, we discuss topics such as:

The “Why Eurasia?” questions: What does it mean? What answers do we have? And is this a meaningful question to start with?

Environmental determinism vs environmental realism

Did the activities of our Ice Age ancestors prepare Eurasian lands for farms, cows, and cavalries?

Riahi’s case against genetic explanations of Eurasian dominance and Europe’s rise

As always, we finish with my guest’s reflections on humanity.

You can find links ⁠to academic articles discussed in this episode here.⁠

MORE LINKS

Get the On Humans newsletter at ⁠OnHumans.Substack.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. You can also find On Humans on ⁠YouTube⁠ and ⁠BlueSky!

Feeling generous? Join the wonderful group of my patrons at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon.com/OnHumans⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠or get in touch for other ways to support!

Email: ⁠⁠makela dot ilari at outlook dot com⁠⁠⁠

MENTIONS

Scholars

Jared Diamond (author of Guns, Germs, and Steel)

Daron Acemoglu ( co-author of Why Nations Fail, guest in episode #26)

Alfred Crosby (author of Ecological Imperialism)

Vernon L Smith

Melinda Zeder & Bruce Smith

Richard Dawkins (author of Selfish Gene)

Oded Galor (author of Journey of Humanity, guest in episodes #12 and #13)

Technical terms

Traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) | Niche construction | herd management | commensal pathway | Modern evolutionary synthesis | extended evolutionary synthesis | niche construction

Keywords

History | social science | comparative economics | comparative history | imperialism | colonialism | technology | ancient civilisations | agricultural revolution | neolithic revolution | human migration | wealth of nations | global inequality | indigenous cultures | epidemics

Why do wars begin? How can we avoid them? Do countries wage wars whenever it suits their own goals? Or are wars a product of failed understanding and military madmen? 

These are questions at the centre of the study of war and peace. But for too long, the field of international relations has answered them by scavenging data from European history alone.   To better understand the human capacity for peace, we need to understand military history more broadly. 

Or so argues David C. Kang, a professor of global politics at the University of Southern California.

A Korean American scholar, Kang argues that the histories of China, Japan, Korea, and Vietnam give us lessons that no reading of European countries could: lessons about neighbouring countries living in peace for centuries. Yes, there was violence. At times, there was war. But peace between these countries prevailed for stunningly long periods. And contrary to standard theories of war and peace, this wasn’t achieved by a “balance of powers” nor by the threat of a common enemy.

But is this too peaceful a picture of East Asian history? Didn’t China keep up bullying Vietnam? What about the epic wars started by Japan? What about the Mongols, the Great Wall, and China’s expansion on its Western frontier? And what, if anything, can this tell about war and peace in the 21st Century? Doesn’t the “Thucydides trap” make a war between the US and China inevitable?

We discuss these and many other questions in this fascinating episode.

I am particularly glad to bring you this episode as it brings together two of the major themes on the show this fall: the study of war and peace and the study of Asian history.

Co-hosting again is Jordan Schneider from⁠ ChinaTalk.⁠

Check out also our “What About China” trilogy from September (episodes #44-46)!

LINKS

Kang's new book, co-authored with Xinru Ma, is ⁠Beyond Power Transitions⁠.

You can read my essays and get the On Humans newsletter at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠OnHumans.Substack.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

Feeling generous? Join the wonderful group of my patrons at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon.com/OnHumans⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠or get in touch for other ways to support!

Email: ⁠⁠makela dot ilari at outlook dot com⁠⁠⁠

MENTIONS

Books

Beyond Bronze Pillars by Liam Kelley

Technical terms

Thucydides trap | Westphalian system | Balance of powers | IR (=international relations) | keju civil service |

Keywords

War | Peace | International relations | China | Japan | Korea | Social science of war | History | Military history | Humanities | Vietnam | East Asia | Thucidides trap |

Our ancestors did not wage war. Warfare emerged only when humans started settling down and storing food. Indeed, some modern hunter-gatherers still enjoy the peaceful existence that once was the natural state of our species.

Or so argued Douglas P. Fry, my guest in episode 8. I found many of his arguments convincing. For example, ancient cave art is surprisingly void of depictions of warfare. You can hear many more of his arguments in that episode, titled "Is War Natural For Humans?"

But not all scholars agree. Far from it. And I owe a voice to the other side of the debate. So here is an episode with one of the most thoughtful voices arguing for a deeper origins of war.

Luke Glowacki is a professor of anthropology at Boston University, where teaches courses on the evolution of war. And he believes that war has very ancient origins, indeed.

We had a very stimulating conversation, discussing topics such as:

(03:00) The debate: What can we all agree on? And what are the disagreements?

(12:10) Hunter-gatherers: Are they peaceful? And are they any good as models of the past?

(25:55) Archaeology: Cave paintings and broken bones

(34:55) Primatology: Chimpanzees and bonobos

(46:40) Implications: What can we learn from all this?

As always, we finish with my guest's reflections on humanity.

LINKS

Head here for links to relevant academic articles -- and the video of the chimpanzee raid!

You can read my essays and get the On Humans newsletter at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠OnHumans.Substack.com⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠.

Feeling generous? Join the wonderful group of my patrons at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon.com/OnHumans⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠or get in touch for other ways to support!

Email: ⁠⁠makela dot ilari at outlook dot com⁠⁠⁠

MENTIONS

Scholars

Douglas P. Fry (ep. #8) | R. Brian Ferguson #25 | Richard Wrangham #21 | Cecilia Padilla-Iglesias #39 | Jane Goodall | Manvir Singh | David Kang #49 (upcoming)

Keywords

Evolution | Archaeology | Anthropology | Primatology | Peace | Warfare | Social science of war | International relations | Biological anthropology | Cultural anthropology | Hunter-gatherers | Cave painting | Prehistory | Prehistoric violence | Prehistoric war

Daron Acemoglu has been awarded the 2024 Nobel-prize for Economic Science. This is a great testament to his impressive career. But the award was given for his early work on global inequality, together with Johnson and Robinson. The Swedish Riksbank did not pay attention to his new work on inequality within rich countries. Should we? And is his new theory even consistent with the old?

I got to ask this from Acemoglu during our 2023 interview. I thought this would be a good time to re-post his answer. In this highlight, we also discuss:

• The hidden tragedy behind growing wages
• Is automation the problem?
• Why we need a more "pro-human" direction of technology
• Lessons from (an imperfect) Germany
• Why fixing the economy starts from celebrating humanity

If you want to enjoy the full show, head to episode 26 of this feed.

You can also read my essay breakdown of Acemoglu's theory here. Get these and other resources at ⁠OnHumans.Substack.com⁠.

Thank you to all the patrons who make On Humans possible! You can join the club at Patreon.com/OnHumans⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠. You can get in touch for other ways to support at ⁠[email protected]⁠⁠⁠.

KEYWORDS

Economics | economic history | wage-stagnation | wage growth | inequality | economic inequality | automation | AI | robotics | US economy | German economy | Nobel-prize | labour unions | worker power | Elon Musk | Tesla | car manufacturing | co-determination | humanity

You are given 20 dollars in cash. You can use it as you wish, but with one condition: you have to use it to treat yourself.

Now imagine getting another 20 dollars next week. This time, the rules have changed: you must use the money to treat someone else. 

Which do you think will make you feel better?

Contrary to many people's predictions, we tend to feel much better after spending the money on others. Whether we act it out or not, it seems that the human psyche is fine-tuned for generosity.

Why? And why am I so confident about this anyway? Is the effect really a universal part of humanity? Does it take place across cultures and ages? What about those who give too much and experience a burnout? And if giving feels good, why don’t we do it more? 

Lara Aknin is one of the world’s leading scientists working on generosity. Her master’s thesis led to a publication in Science — something I used to think was undoable — and she has studied generosity ever since.

In this episode, Prof Aknin and I discuss:

The original evidence / Cross-cultural research / Alternative explanations / Do toddlers like giving? / Why does generosity feel good? / Why don’t we give more then? / What about giving too much (or caring for someone with dementia)? / Selfish generosity?

As always, we finish with my guest's reflections on humanity.

LINKS

You can read my essays and get the On Humans newsletter at ⁠⁠⁠⁠OnHumans.Substack.com⁠⁠⁠⁠.

Feeling generous on the 2nd annviersary of On Humans? Join the wonderful group of my patrons at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Patreon.com/OnHumans⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, or get in touch for other ways to support!

Get in touch: ⁠⁠[email protected]⁠⁠.

MENTIONS

Scholars

Elizabeth Dunn | Tania Broesch | Josh V. Kane | Benjamin J. Newman | Richard Dawkins

Articles

Links to articles is available here. Get these and other resources at OnHumans.Substack.com.

Episodes

16 | Does Poverty Make Us Selfish ~ Jacqueline Mattis

20 | Distorting Darwinism – Or Why Evolution Does Not Prove That We Are Selfish ~ Solo

22 | Do Young Children Care About Others? ~ Amrisha Vaish

Keywords

Psychology | Anthropology | Behavioral Economics | Prosociality | Generosity | Happiness | Warm glow | Altruism | Charity | Prosocial spending | Cross-cultural research | Reciprocity | Cultural similarities | Spending choices | Happiness experiments | Emotional well-being | Social connection | Financial generosity | Helping behavior