Note that I don’t think this dynamic needs to be very conscious on anyone’s part. I think that humans instinctively execute good game theory because evolution selected for it, even if the human executing just feels a wordless pull to that kind of behavior.
Yup, exactly. It makes me think back to The Moral Animal by Robert Wright. It’s been a while since I read it so take what follows with a grain of salt, because I could be butchering some stuff, but that book makes the argument that this sort of thing goes beyond friendship and into all types of emotions and moral feelings.
Like if you’re at the grocery store and someone just cuts you in line for no reason, one way of looking at it is that the cost to you is negligible—you just need to wait an additional 45 seconds for them to check out—and so the rational thing would be to just let it happen. You could confront them, but what exactly would you have to gain? Suppose you are traveling and will never see any of the people in the area ever again.
But we have evolved such that this situation would evoke some strong emotions regarding unfairness, and these emotions would often drive you to confront the person who cut you in line. I forget if this stuff is more at the individual level or the cultural level.
Yup, exactly. It makes me think back to The Moral Animal by Robert Wright. It’s been a while since I read it so take what follows with a grain of salt, because I could be butchering some stuff, but that book makes the argument that this sort of thing goes beyond friendship and into all types of emotions and moral feelings.
Like if you’re at the grocery store and someone just cuts you in line for no reason, one way of looking at it is that the cost to you is negligible—you just need to wait an additional 45 seconds for them to check out—and so the rational thing would be to just let it happen. You could confront them, but what exactly would you have to gain? Suppose you are traveling and will never see any of the people in the area ever again.
But we have evolved such that this situation would evoke some strong emotions regarding unfairness, and these emotions would often drive you to confront the person who cut you in line. I forget if this stuff is more at the individual level or the cultural level.