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"The capacity to act as a 'psychopath' may very well be a necessary evolution of our culture, and in fact may become a desired genetic trait in future years."

"The capacity to act as a 'psychopath' may very well be a necessary evolution of our culture, and in fact may become a desired genetic trait in future years." How so? Recent genetic evidence suggests that, among the various traits that distinguish modern humans from the hominids we outcompeted (such as Neanderthals), one of them is improved empathic capability. We are better able to read and respond to social cues than our less-adapted cousins were. Our ability to work cooperatively was a major competitive advantage, and quite possibly the most critical competitive advantage. It may be true that psychopathic traits enable certain individuals to game the system, as it were, and succeed wildly in modern society. The stereotype of the Psychopath CEO is grounded in some reality, after all. But if everyone behaved psychopathically, then society would possibly cease to function as we know it -- probably for the worse.

ars 15y ago
Genetic evidence? Really? They managed to get Neanderthal DNS, sequence it, and understand it? Where was I during this earth shattering breakthough? (Actually understand DNA by looking at the sequence?) This is probably just someones conjecture based on living conditions and such, there is no way it's based on genetic evidence.
- jonnathanson 15y ago
  "Really? They managed to get Neanderthal DNS, sequence it, and understand it?" Not sure where you were during the sequencing, but yes, it's happening. http://www.eva.mpg.de/neandertal/ http://www.eva.mpg.de/neandertal/
  - ars 15y ago
    That is pretty impressive. But it was the "understand it" part that I'm surprised about.
  - thomasz 15y ago
    I guess the real question was: Does the sequencing of Neandertal DNA allow us to prove that they had insufficient empathy?
    - jonnathanson 15y ago
      A recent study showed that the modern human genome and the Neanderthal genome are something like 98% identical (I'm making that number up; it's in the paper I read; the exact figure is fairly close to that). The 2% of genes that differ include the genes in modern humans linked to empathy, facial recognition, social aptitude, etc. (We found out which traits these genes are linked to because they are present, but not expressed, in modern-day people with severe forms of autism). If I can ferret out the paper, I'll post a link.
      - RobertDole 15y ago
        Even better: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1Nrm-M-m14 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1Nrm-M-m14
jonmc12 15y ago
Its just speculation of course. But 2 angles: 1. Communication capacity is the reason empathic capability is important. Human-human communication relies on perspective-taking and evolves over time as our brains get more exposure to people. Emotional empathic capacity is just the bootstrap for perspective-taking. If human cultural norms evolve for communication capacity, then there is a case that empathic capacity will simply use too much cognitive capacity to fit within these cultural norms. 2. We communicate more and more with non-human devices than humans. I can't even imagine what this looks like 100 yrs from now or 1000, but there is a chance that natural selection will favor brains optimized for communicating with devices and machines where emotional empathy is not present.
- icebraining 15y ago
  Natural selection would only benefit those who are more able to communicate with devices if that trait led them to produce more offspring than the people without it; that's the selection part. Do you see people who have a more natural ability to work and understand computers as having more kids than the rest of the population? If anything, it's the opposite.
  - jonmc12 15y ago
    I meant selection criteria in the same sense that ability to succeed in college may be selection criteria today. It does not require birthing more kids, rather a consistent use of this selection criteria from generation to generation in a subset of the population. If machines are performing all the work, and being able to send 10M messages per day to these machines is a requisite for economic success, some parents will filter heavily for this criteria in he best interest of their children.
- wtracy 15y ago
  I would say that we communicate with other humans at least as much today as in the past. We just are spending more and more time using "high-tech" communication mediums that filter a lot of the nuance and nearly all of the non-verbal cues from conversation. Arguably, the need to pick up on emotions through text- or audio-only communication might make empathy more important.
chunky1994 15y ago
> It may be true that psychopathic traits enable certain individuals to game the system, as it were, and succeed wildly in modern society. That's precisely why natural selection will encourage it, isn't it? >probably for the worse. I'm not sure I agree with that, a society where everybody can read each other accurately and perceptively..that may be a tougher society to live in, but it'll have its share of benefits (like perfect understanding), so it's not necessarily worse.

ars 15y ago

Genetic evidence? Really? They managed to get Neanderthal DNS, sequence it, and understand it? Where was I during this earth shattering breakthough? (Actually understand DNA by looking at the sequence?) This is probably just someones conjecture based on living conditions and such, there is no way it's based on genetic evidence.

jonnathanson 15y ago
"Really? They managed to get Neanderthal DNS, sequence it, and understand it?" Not sure where you were during the sequencing, but yes, it's happening. http://www.eva.mpg.de/neandertal/ http://www.eva.mpg.de/neandertal/
- ars 15y ago
  That is pretty impressive. But it was the "understand it" part that I'm surprised about.
- thomasz 15y ago
  I guess the real question was: Does the sequencing of Neandertal DNA allow us to prove that they had insufficient empathy?
  - jonnathanson 15y ago
    A recent study showed that the modern human genome and the Neanderthal genome are something like 98% identical (I'm making that number up; it's in the paper I read; the exact figure is fairly close to that). The 2% of genes that differ include the genes in modern humans linked to empathy, facial recognition, social aptitude, etc. (We found out which traits these genes are linked to because they are present, but not expressed, in modern-day people with severe forms of autism). If I can ferret out the paper, I'll post a link.
    - RobertDole 15y ago
      Even better: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1Nrm-M-m14 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-1Nrm-M-m14

jonmc12 15y ago

Its just speculation of course. But 2 angles: 1. Communication capacity is the reason empathic capability is important. Human-human communication relies on perspective-taking and evolves over time as our brains get more exposure to people. Emotional empathic capacity is just the bootstrap for perspective-taking. If human cultural norms evolve for communication capacity, then there is a case that empathic capacity will simply use too much cognitive capacity to fit within these cultural norms. 2. We communicate more and more with non-human devices than humans. I can't even imagine what this looks like 100 yrs from now or 1000, but there is a chance that natural selection will favor brains optimized for communicating with devices and machines where emotional empathy is not present.

icebraining 15y ago
Natural selection would only benefit those who are more able to communicate with devices if that trait led them to produce more offspring than the people without it; that's the selection part. Do you see people who have a more natural ability to work and understand computers as having more kids than the rest of the population? If anything, it's the opposite.
- jonmc12 15y ago
  I meant selection criteria in the same sense that ability to succeed in college may be selection criteria today. It does not require birthing more kids, rather a consistent use of this selection criteria from generation to generation in a subset of the population. If machines are performing all the work, and being able to send 10M messages per day to these machines is a requisite for economic success, some parents will filter heavily for this criteria in he best interest of their children.
wtracy 15y ago
I would say that we communicate with other humans at least as much today as in the past. We just are spending more and more time using "high-tech" communication mediums that filter a lot of the nuance and nearly all of the non-verbal cues from conversation. Arguably, the need to pick up on emotions through text- or audio-only communication might make empathy more important.

chunky1994 15y ago

> It may be true that psychopathic traits enable certain individuals to game the system, as it were, and succeed wildly in modern society. That's precisely why natural selection will encourage it, isn't it? >probably for the worse. I'm not sure I agree with that, a society where everybody can read each other accurately and perceptively..that may be a tougher society to live in, but it'll have its share of benefits (like perfect understanding), so it's not necessarily worse.