"It's hard to say whether it's nature or nurture ..." The (extremely fascinating) field of evolutionary psychology gives some pretty convincing arguments that

"It's hard to say whether it's nature or nurture ..." The (extremely fascinating) field of evolutionary psychology gives some pretty convincing arguments that our brains are hard-wired for reciprocal altruism. Hard-wiring of reciprocal altruism in the form of emotions like guilt and gratitude is one of the main reasons humans can form these large and mostly stable social structures. EvPsych basically makes one important observation and asks the natural question leading from it: Just like our eyes and hands, our minds have also been developed in response to evolutionary pressures. What were these pressures and how do they account for the features we see in ourselves, like language, love, laughter, crying, etc?