Most of the evolutionary explanations offered on the subject are correct, in my opinion, but this article is intended to indicate another point of view - a point which I think is very important, especially since it refers directly to our feelings and not only to behaviors that can be explained in different ways without attributing an intention to them.
The subject of altruism - a behavior that seemingly serves the other and not the individual who engages in it - has attracted the attention of evolution researchers and its deniers since time immemorial.
Here on the site, many words have been written on the subject - both in articles and in comments.
Many of the same words were also written by me.
Most of the evolutionary explanations offered on the subject are correct, in my opinion - both those that explain certain altruistic behaviors using considerations from the field of game theory and those that see other altruistic behaviors as a byproduct of remnant selection.
I will not repeat the above explanations here because everyone who is interested in the subject has already read them or thought about them themselves.
The purpose of this article is to indicate another point of view on the subject - a point that I think is very important, especially since it refers directly to our feelings and not only to behaviors that can be explained in different ways without attributing an intention to them.
so lets start.
We - as humans - like all mammals - only more so - are equipped with a developed brain, one of whose main functions is to form a model of the world - a model according to which we can predict the results of our actions in a "calculation" way and save ourselves from actually performing actions that could harm us.
A large part of the information on which the model is based reaches us through the senses, but these senses only provide us with physical information and this information is not enough to predict the behavior of complex living beings.
In order to predict their behavior we must "understand what they are going through" - that is - identify in some way their inner feelings.
The problem with internal sensations (qualia) is that we feel them indirectly. Much has already been written about the impossibility of conveying these feelings effectively through normal communication, characterized by sentences such as "it is impossible to explain to a blind person the feeling of the color red".
This is an unmediated experience of the farm - one that is very difficult to transfer by any means to someone else - and one that certainly does not transfer to someone else when the farm does not try to transfer it at all.
So how do we understand what others are going through?
Because in our mind there is a "model" of them - a model designed to serve us in predicting their behavior.
This model should also provide us with approximate information about their feelings, but this, as mentioned, can only be done by this model making us actually feel what they probably feel!
It is this mechanism that makes people cry in movies (see note about movies at the end of the article) or feel genuine anger at an injustice done to another.
Now - what is more natural, when we experience an unpleasant experience, than to try to thwart the causes of that experience?
Therefore it is quite clear that when we endure the suffering of the other within the operation of the model that simulates it in our mind, we will try to alleviate his suffering in order to suffer less ourselves!
An abbreviated presentation of all of the above is this.
- We have a model in our mind that simulates the other.
- This model is necessary for us to predict the behavior of the other, so evolution encouraged the formation of such a model.
- Since the only way such a model can make it clear to us what the other feels is by making us feel his feelings, he makes us suffer when the other suffers.
- An altruistic action is an action we take to thwart this suffering.
And more in short: Empathy is a necessary by-product of our ability to predict the actions of the other.
This is actually the idea, and it seems so necessary to me that it really amazes me that I haven't heard it before and that I myself didn't think about it until recently.
I would like to point out two facts in this context: one that confirms the idea and the other that raises a question about it.
Supporting fact:
In the brains of the developed animals there are neurons called "mirror neurons".
These neurons are neurons that fire both when performing an action and when watching another animal perform it.
According to my interpretation - these are the neurons in which the direct feeling of the owner of the neurons regarding what is happening in the soul of the other is expressed. Failures in the development and operation of these neurons are often linked to certain types of autism and indeed many types of autism are expressed in the inability to "get inside the head" of the other.
The hard fact:
There are psychopaths in the world.
These are people who understand well the feelings of others and even know how to use these feelings for their personal needs in an exceptional way.
But these people, for some reason, do not suffer from the suffering of others. They are completely indifferent to him. How, then, does the "other" model function in their minds? Are they indifferent to their suffering as they are indifferent to the suffering of others or is the separation between understanding and identification sharper with them?
An article published here recently Support the first option.
A note about movies:
The films are actually an excellent laboratory for testing the hypothesis I presented.
In real life, because of their complexity, it is difficult to differentiate between the various sources of our feelings and impulses and all our actions result from the weighing of many feelings and impulses.
In the movies we encounter characters about whom we have no prejudices, we owe them nothing, we are not dependent on them and we are not threatened by them.
All our feelings towards them stem from our identification with them or from the injustice they caused the characters we identify with.
Indeed, in movies we experience in a distilled manner joy, sorrow, pain, love, fear and anger... of others.
89 תגובות
Michael:
I asked in the free will article about the "illusion" of the passage of time but you didn't answer maybe because you don't read the comments so I also posted in this article
There is a central philosophical current that claims that the passage of time is an illusion and there is no "objective now" I claim that someone here does not understand something even in today's physics, apparently something is missing in the understanding of time because it is clear to everyone that there is an objective now and the difference between the illusion of free will is that as soon as it is shown that such a will does not exist- So there is no problem in accepting the argument.
But in terms of the passage of time, this is not the case, and if so, what determines that the consciousness ran forward with time every frame? What do you think about the subject?
Michael:
I asked in the free will article about the "illusion" of the passage of time but you didn't answer maybe because you don't read the comments so I also posted in this article.
There is a central philosophical current that claims that the passage of time is an illusion and there is no "objective now" I claim that someone here does not understand something even in today's physics, apparently something is missing in the understanding of time because it is clear to everyone that there is an objective now and the difference between the illusion of free will is that as soon as it is shown that such a will does not exist- So there is no problem in accepting the argument.
But in terms of the passage of time, this is not the case, and if so, what determines that the consciousness ran forward with time every frame? What do you think about the subject?
Michael, is it time to disappear?
how is dad
Hi Makal, I think you are wrong in that the person (or the animal) will have to (or want to) thwart the suffering he feels as a result of understanding the other. Because this suffering is very short-lived and the person will also understand that the act of helping others is not necessary to prevent the suffering - because it was possible to simply stop thinking about it and the pain disappears.
To simplify my words and avoid misunderstandings I will write:
* I agree that the only way to identify with the other/understand him is only through yourself. (I think this has been written in countless articles, even very old ones)
* Agree that you will also feel pain when you see that the other feels pain (there is no other way to feel it)
** I don't agree that this is related to atreism at all, since it is much easier, simpler and more economical to stop the pain by thinking about something else, than a physical action that will of course cost more time (at least)
The article was written, as you can see, in November 2010.
A year later I started sending an English version of it to some scientists in the field.
Almost no one answered.
Now this book is out:
http://www.amazon.com/Altruistic-Brain-How-Naturally-Good/dp/0199377464/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1418424972&sr=8-1&keywords=The+Altruistic+Brain%2C&pebp=1418424980244
It is interesting to know if this is an incarnation of my article.
And the results of this research could be predicted from the article:
http://www.haaretz.co.il/news/science/1.1921472
Here's another one:
http://www.haaretz.co.il/news/holidays/1.1831945
The following link seems quite related to the topic of the article, so I decided to post it here as well:
http://www.ted.com/talks/frans_de_waal_do_animals_have_morals.html
Ofer:
I haven't visited the site in a long time.
Maybe it will help you:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mental_model
Because in our mind there is a "model" of them - a model designed to serve us in predicting their behavior.
This model should also provide us with approximate information about their feelings, but this, as mentioned, can only be done by this model making us actually feel what they probably feel!
Hello Michael
I would love to understand which model you are talking about, what is the simulated power?
Michael
Thanks for the likes, I didn't read all the comments, I'll go back to the Shinat article, maybe I'll make more details in light of your comment.
Moti:
I say again: the article discusses a certain topic and not others.
He came to present an idea that had not come up so far on a subject that had not been discussed in sufficient depth in the past.
He explains how evolution could have created the same thing - seemingly strange - that makes us want to be moral.
I repeat and emphasize: without that desire - the company would not have been created at all and probably - neither would its influence.
I also repeat and emphasize - the article discusses feelings and desires and not actions (actions - as opposed to desires - can be the result of coercion).
Biasing the discussion to other issues only obscures the innovation and does nothing good to clarify the issue.
Note that the article does talk about animals and the humans are used only for the purpose of demonstration (since most readers understand how humans feel).
In one of the comments here - I also showed examples from other animals:
https://www.hayadan.org.il/yet-another-word-on-altruism-1311103/#comment-281552
Bees are not relevant to the topic of discussion.
Their "altruistic" actions are automatic and involuntary and the explanation for them is given by mechanisms that have already been described in depth in other articles - including Wikipedia.
If you want to write an article about something else and if you think you can do it in an interesting way - you are welcome to do so. There is no reason to turn an article on one topic into an article on another topic just because the two topics have a word in common
"I am not convinced that there is anything special about the person in this matter" It is easiest to understand the angle in the person. empathy etc.
Michael
No, the discussion cannot take place, and it is taking place, but within the discussion, I thought we would simply miss the point if we did not mention this side as well.
"The article does not only discuss man but other animals as well" Ok, let's think about how the idea is expressed in the bee, the ant, the wolf, etc. it could be.
The wolf
I don't know why you wrote this comment.
First of all - the article does not discuss behavior at all - it discusses the altruistic feelings.
I also opened the article by noting the fact that there are explanations of other aspects of altruism that the article will not discuss.
On the other hand - I am not convinced that there is anything special about Adam in this regard.
Of course there is culture and of course human behavior is also influenced by culture (both for and against altruism) but as mentioned - the article does not discuss behavior at all - it discusses altruistic feelings and the origin of these, in my opinion, is not in culture.
Beyond that - the article does not only discuss man but also other animals.
Besides - it's not really smart to see a discussion that took place and say it can't happen.
Michael
See, I think that any discussion on the subject of altruism as it manifests itself in the person of our time cannot be done without taking into account how the various interests of each society have affected this through education, that is, the strengthening of this feature according to the various inertias of the person in control. In other words, not only the obvious laws of evolution are added to this, but also frustrations, and the intelligence of even the individual himself.
And maybe that's why there is the phenomenon of the psychopath who lacked love and then remained stuck somewhere in the process of his development as a responsible adult.
That is, the phenomenon is more complicated when discussing man in general and today's man in particular.
Moti:
It could be, but it's unlikely because if it was a result of evolution, I think there would be a higher percentage of psychopaths in the population.
It should be remembered that there are many times malfunctions that are not the result of evolution (that is, they are not the result of natural selection because mutations are certainly involved in their creation). Take Down syndrome for example. It is clear that this syndrome does not confer any advantage and witnesses that it occurs from time to time.
It is not clear if psychopathy gives a person any advantage. By being indifferent to the suffering of others, he also arouses the wrath of others towards him.
Nowadays, at least, most psychopaths end their lives behind bars.
There is not necessarily an equivalence between causing harm to others and increasing your chances of survival yourself.
Michael
It reminds me of some program in Chalbotek where such a crook with the psychopathic mechanism completely impoverishes an elderly woman who went on pension with millions of shekels. The owner of the normal mechanism could not stop this identification mechanism of hers and every time when he came with a new enthusiasm for a great deal and despite not keeping previous promises she continued to give and even sold her house and went into debt and for a moment he did not stop to think what he was doing to a man he had no regrets wasted everything
Michael
I think that the psychopathic mechanism is also an evolutionary result since within the normal mechanism it survives very successfully like the example of Dawkings in the selfish garden where a hawk in a bunch of pigeons until it balances out after a few generations so there is no contradiction in my opinion.
Some examples to illustrate my point:
A dog and an elephant understand each other:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlJ6MF9MQQU
Understanding Oranutang Bio and Dog:
http://video.aol.com/video-detail/the-orangutan-and-the-hound/1356710375
A dog sacrifices himself to save another dog from trouble:
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/10/dogs_can_be_good_without_god.php
I looked for relevant links on the subject and found that some of my conclusions were also drawn by others, while the main conclusion - the one for the expression of which I wrote the article - apparently escaped everyone.
Those who are interested are invited to read all the following links:
http://www.emory.edu/LIVING_LINKS/pdf_attachments/de%20Waal%20(2008). Pdf
http://scholar.google.co.il/scholar?hl=en&q=%22De+Waal%22+PAM+Preston&btnG=Search&as_sdt=2000&as_ylo=&as_vis=0
http://www.painjournalonline.com/article/S0304-3959(07)00411-3/abstract
http://cabn.psychonomic-journals.org/content/8/1/54.full.pdf+html
https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://www.tannerlectures.utah.edu/lectures/documents/volume25/deWaal_2005.pdf
http://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/imp/jcs/2005/00000012/F0030008/art00010
https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://www-personal.umich.edu/~prestos/Downloads/Preston2007_MI.pdf
https://docs.google.com/viewer?url=http://www.emory.edu/LIVING_LINKS/pdf_attachments/Preston_dewaal2002.pdf
Hello Michael
An article was just published here that perhaps supports your claim. Probably the site in the brain responsible for the process is found:
Psychopaths behave in a lack of empathy similar to people with a frontal head injury
https://www.hayadan.org.il/the-brain-of-psycopaths-2811103/
I explained my words as clearly and clearly as possible.
Have a good evening.
Yaron:
This is a long response but it doesn't change anything.
Ramachandran reported on the experiment he performed and you estimate to be carried away.
Since all he said was that people whose hands were anesthetized felt a touch on their bodies when they touched someone else's body, then the only way to understand the claim of drifting is as a claim that his report is not true - that is, that even though he said it - that is not how the people felt - that is - that he was lying.
By the way, in my opinion - and this is not the first time I've said this - even those who confidently declare a statement that they are not sure of - are lying, because a lie is a statement designed to make people think about reality differently from what you yourself think about it.
"To claim that he was carried away in the description of the experiment with mirror neurons is to claim that he is lying. In theories you can be wrong, but in reporting the results of an experiment that does not require any interpretation, you can only tell the truth or lie."
I disagree.
I want to clarify my words again to avoid misunderstandings or misinterpretations for which I cannot take responsibility.
At no point did I claim nor did I intend to imply that Ramachandran was lying, such a thought never crossed my mind. The only thing I said is that Ramachandran may have drifted a little or was not entirely accurate in his words about the realistic feeling of touch in the hand when it is anesthetized (in the lecture to which a link was given in one of the previous messages).
Every scientific claim must always be examined on the merits of the matter and not on the merits of the man who made the claim, this is A and B in science.
Even if the scientist is a senior professor with a reputation, it is forbidden to automatically accept every claim that comes from him as a proven scientific theory or absolute truth. His claims must be examined according to the accepted scientific methods - which include, among other things, peer review and control experiments conducted by other scientists to verify the claims.
Regarding Ramachandran's specific claims: I would very much like to see video footage of the experiments in question or similar experiments carried out by other scientists and judge for myself through my own eyes what exactly happened there. If this is not possible, at least I would like to hear a *professional and objective opinion* of other scientists who observed the experiment (or similar experiments) and conducted a peer review for the experiment.
I'm interested in reading or hearing *what exactly* the subjects said during and at the end of the experiment, that is, the *exact wording* of their descriptions without any interpretation by one or another third party. I would also like to know what exactly they were asked during the experiment and whether it is possible that the questions they were asked to answer were directed questions:
A - I didn't feel anything special.
B - I felt a touch sensation in my hand.
Here, for example, the subject will probably choose answer B, even if the sensation he felt was only partial. If the answer is B, I would expect you to ask a follow-up question such as: Give a score between 1 and 10 for the intensity of the touch sensation you felt relative to a real touch sensation in your hand.
It could be that the question was formulated (completely in good faith) in such a way that the subjects "understand" that they are expected to give a certain answer, and in order to meet "expectations" they will give the requested answer. This is known from other fields (such as for example the reconstruction of events through hypnosis) and it is known that it is very important to prepare the questions carefully in order to receive objective and non-biased answers. I'm not claiming that slanted questions were deliberately worded, but this is definitely a point that needs to be checked, the way the questions are worded.
How many subjects was the experiment performed on and what percentage of them reported a completely realistic touch sensation? What percentage of subjects reported only a dark or partial sensation, how many felt nothing?
In short, peer review and skepticism are very important points in the face of claims of this type, not as an attempt to check if the professor lied, but as an important means of scientific criticism.
Sometimes when I see a movie and someone is being beaten in the movie, it's very hard for me to see it, I can turn to the person sitting next to me and tell him that it's hard for me to see the scene because I really feel like I'm being beaten. Does that mean I really feel a real pain sensation, like I'm being hit right now? Is the feeling that intense? I appreciate that while parts of the body are anesthetized then this sensation is present and probably stronger as Ramachandran described, but does it really compare to a completely real sense of touch? at 100%? Here is my doubt.
In addition to the points I mentioned, I do not know when Ramachandran performed the experiment, it is possible that some time has passed since the experiment in question and Ramachandran did not intend to lie or misrepresent, he simply did not remember exactly what the subjects said and only remembered that they described a sense of touch, therefore this is what he also described in the lecture, After all, he is also a human being and like humans, his mind sometimes completes things and descriptions according to expectations, anyone who reads a little about the brain knows how good our brain is at completing details and rounding corners.
These are the shades of gray (which are not absolute black or absolute white) I was talking about. Here (in the examples I gave) the inaccuracy or drift that I talked about can be expressed, therefore it is important, as I mentioned, to examine the claims according to scientific methods.
Any other interpretation of my words is not my responsibility.
Thanks.
experience.
Year:
A few more words that might save you the need to look for what you won't find.
Check out this Wikipedia entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homo_heidelbergensis
You will see that this type of person already had a brain in the range of sizes of the modern human brain and he certainly lived in the period that Ramachandran is talking about.
Regarding the other things you said - it seems to me that you did not understand Ramachandran's intention.
He did not say that these things were first created or discovered 75000 years ago but that they then began to spread rapidly.
The truth is that I don't know exactly what he meant either, but all of this is not important because all of this is only meant to be a background (which is not in his area of expertise) for explaining the things in which he deals intensively and is more knowledgeable than most people, if not all.
I repeat:
To claim that he was carried away in the description of the mirror neuron experiment is to claim that he is lying.
In theories you can be wrong, but in reporting the results of an experiment that does not require any interpretation, you can only tell the truth or lie.
Year:
You only gave marks and also said that "not only did he get carried away but..."
Well:
1. He didn't get carried away - so why did you write it?
2. You are invited to bring evidence from some authoritative source to refute his historical claims. Although they are not essential, but when your claims are presented without substantiation, there is no reason at all to refer to them
And regarding the article - I suggest you read it.
I mentioned in it that there are many aspects of altruism that have already been explained in different ways that anyone interested in the field is already familiar with.
The article deals with one and only point that has still troubled the scientific community to this day, and that is psychological altruism.
If you are interested in the field - the above should be enough for you.
If not - (and if you still want to understand - something that is not clear from your words) I suggest that you read the Altruism entry on the English Wikipedia (I am deliberately referring you to the English version because there is almost nothing written in Hebrew) and then read the interview with Oren Herman on which I have already voted in the comments here.
Machel,
Today I returned to Iden, and found a response from you that touches me. In 53 you commented "It is good that there is someone who can give such marks to the most respected neurophysiologist in the world."
Well when a claim is made, it doesn't matter who says it but what is said.
And if the above-mentioned estimator says that the human brain reached its peak size 400 years ago, that is not true. And the use of fire, and the language, and the tools, didn't start before 100 thousand years ago. And even in his field of expertise he has a mistake, which I think you yourself pointed out, other animals also have mirror cells.
Not only that, but identification processes take place in different areas of the brain, see for example the link I provided in response 16.
And regarding your article, it lacks clarification as to why it should be called altruism, which is a general term. Is it true that parental care of the child is also included? In the absence of such clarification, there is a weakness in the general argument.
Try it at home:
Just to illustrate why the brain trusts the sense of sight and touch more than muscle reports.
Put both hands in front of the body.
Now try - in one movement and without corrections after the misstep - to bring the index fingers of both hands together behind the back.
I assume that most of you will fail on the first attempt, and if you put your hands back forward - you will also fail on the second attempt.
It may be possible to learn to do it well after a few tries. I did not check.
Yaron:
Regarding the experiment you mentioned - there is no contradiction between it and Ramachandran's words:
1. Our mind is a plastic and dynamic thing that many of the things it seems to do automatically are actually learned skills. If you look at a baby you will see that he does not control his hands properly. He learns this over time by comparing the sensation of sight with the sensation of the nerves in the hand and eventually he also knows how to bring two fingers together with his eyes closed but this requires learning. This study is not a permanent thing and when changes occur in the body the brain adjusts itself. That is why people learn to use their prostheses as well and those who specialize in a certain sport also control the accessories belonging to that sport as if they were limbs (it could be a fencing sword, a golf club or a racing car). Everything is ultimately based on the practice of the brain (in fact, this is true even for vision - it is also studied in many ways and you are welcome to look for information on experiments in which people were fitted with glasses that invert the image).
2. In the example you gave - simply train the brain to learn something new. He is given corresponding indications from the sense of touch and the sense of sight and he learns that the hand is where the eyes see. These two indications outweigh the feeling that the muscles report on the position of the hand because, as mentioned, this is knowledge that is learned and adjusted regularly - precisely by indications of the type produced in this experiment.
3. In short - there is no wonder here at all and there is nothing here that is special for mirror neurons. It is true that the mirror neurons are involved because they are involved in all our sensations, but they do not have a special role here.
4. This does not contradict anything Ramachandran said specifically testing mirror neurons. They do this, as mentioned, by blocking all other indications except those of the mirror neurons (that is, they reach a state of non-contradiction between the various reports that the brain receives by blocking the reports that could have contradicted those of the mirror neurons - contrary to the example you brought in which the contradiction is avoided by artificially creating agreement between the various reports reported by the senses).
Amiram:
I completely got to the bottom of your mind and even gave you a winning answer.
Two or three models (which I don't think exist but even if there were) would not change anything and all my words would remain valid.
In my opinion, in that case you would only feel altruistic feelings about the creatures you include in the same model in which you include yourself.
As for other creatures - you wouldn't know what they feel and therefore you wouldn't be able to feel altruistic feelings towards them (maybe they actually enjoy being killed or being electrocuted?).
But between us - it is clear that there is only one model for complex living creatures.
When you think that a mouse hurts, do you imagine something different from your pain?
Dahil Rabak! Be honest with yourself!
You don't sympathize with Eben and therefore you don't feel sorry for her.
"God is nothing but the personification of nature" - a great sentence
I will embrace him warmly.
From your responses, I feel that you still haven't got the bottom of my mind.
Yes, a model of the other must develop in the animal that tries to predict the actions of the other.
No, this model does not have to be based on your feelings model.
Think of an animal that has interacted closely with several animal species over millions of years.
It certainly makes sense (evolutionary logic) for such an animal to have two or three or even more separate models, each of which is designed to predict the behavior of another species. Moreover, it is possible that it has a model of sensations and emotions completely different from that of the other species, which works and reacts in a very different way to physical phenomena.
In this case, the word "identification" is not well defined, so I say that we will sin if we continue to speak in the same terms.
It's more a matter of semantics and terminology. After all, you can try to defend the claim "Even the stilt has feelings" but it will lead us to define feelings so broadly that its intuitive meaning (the one that comes from our understanding of feelings in humans) will disappear completely.
Another flash of insight for Amiram and others:
I assume that everyone knows the concept of "humanization" - to treat something - and it doesn't matter what it is - as a human being.
We have a natural tendency to do this and this tendency is nothing but another manifestation of the fact that it is difficult for us to imagine complex systems in any other way.
Even when we talk about evolution and know that it is not controlled by any will, we prefer to use human terms during the conversation and only bother to put them between the lines to remind ourselves and our readers that this is not a real will.
Now - I wrote all of the above - only to reach the following sentence:
"God is nothing but the personification of nature."
This is clearly one of the cases where our tendency to imbibe models of complex behavior on ourselves makes us change our mind (converts our mind to our religion).
Amiram:
I understand very well what you are talking about and I think your words are wrong.
There is no chance that you will develop a model of the "other" that is not based on your own model - that is, on your self-perception.
It is not a matter of sin or an act of charity. You just can't do otherwise!
Keep in mind that in order to "develop" a model of the other person that is not based on your personal feelings, you need to develop a model of his perception of color, a model of his feeling of pain, a model of virtually anything and everything from the components of his being.
Neither this nor that - you need to build a model that predicts how any combination of his feelings will affect his behavior.
Not this one - you have to do this for all animals.
Not this one either - you have to go back and adjust all the models during evolution which will mean that you will always be fighting yesterday's wars.
Such a thing has no chance of working in reality. no chance!
Michael Hi again.
Due to the many responses to your article (sent to my email), I thought it appropriate to give a short comment.
This time I will use your language in the article.
Let's repeat the structure of your argument:
1. We have a model in our minds that simulates the other.
2. This model is necessary for us to predict the behavior of the other and therefore evolution encouraged the formation of such a model.
3. Since the only way such a model can make it clear to us what the other feels is by making us feel his feelings, he makes us suffer when the other suffers.
4. An altruistic action is an action we take to thwart this suffering.
Comment to (3): The claim that this is the only way requires analysis.
You can look at the system of a "model simulating the other" as presented by control systems, in the form of a state-space model.
If the sub-state of the sensations and emotions is 'unobservable' (a term well defined in control theory), and we take an additional assumption that the state-space model of the other is 'close' (a price function must be defined) to our state-space model, then the best value ( Again we need to define a price function) for the feelings/sensations of the other is indeed the same model as ours.
The sentence "the sub-state of sensations and emotions is not observed" in the terms of the control can be understood as the sentence "it is not possible to reproduce internal sensations through the senses" in the language of the article.
It is very possible that other animals, for example, will have a completely different model for trying to predict the other's actions, so different that to talk about it in terms of identification as this action is done by us humans, would simply be a sin.
I hope one of the readers is a little familiar with control theory, so that he can understand a little what the hell I'm talking about.
Regarding link 39, and response 51
Ramachandran is carried away not only about the sensations of touch with the hand, almost everything he says about human history is also incorrect.
Hi Michal, I saw the lecture, but with all due respect to Ramachandran (and there are many) it is not clear to me how his descriptions regarding the sensations of being touched by the anesthetized hand line up with the results of the following experiment:
"The rubber hand illusion"
You will find a lot of interesting material on Google about this, including their similar fascinating experiment that even makes you feel out of body (OOBE). In any case, in the link that I will give in a moment, it is written that after a few minutes in which you will caress your real hand and your dummy hand at the same time if you suddenly hit the glove hard with a hammer, the guy in front of him Perform the experiment he will feel a real pain (sharp pain as written) as if his real hand was hit with a hammer, it sounds dramatic, but after watching several videos in which the experiment is demonstrated it does not seem so dramatic to me, although it is very interesting, and I definitely intend to try the This experiment:
(The writing is a little small, I hope you can read)
http://www.mindmodulations.com/mindmods/images/blogimages/hack_your_brain3.jpg
http://www.mindmodulations.com/mindmods/images/blogimages/hack_your_brain4.jpg
And a short video demonstrating the experiment:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCQbygjG0RU
A person:
I did not write that this is the entire explanation for altruism and I also pointed (without detail) to the additional mechanisms that lead to the result.
I am convinced of the correctness of the claim you said is one step too far and invite you to point out a way in which we can be allowed to understand what the other feels. I repeat and emphasize the similarity to the problem of explaining the sensation of "red" to a blind person. In my opinion there is simply no way to do this.
I highly recommend you watch the link provided in response 39. I think the evidence there is really overwhelming.
I'm sure you're not aware that you feel touch when you see someone else being touched but...in short - see what's explained there.
Michael,
I really liked the article.
I agree that I probably have a model of the other's feelings.
I agree that it can explain altruistic behavior.
But to say "the only way a model of this kind can make it clear to us what the other feels is by making us feel his feelings" is one step too far.
Your theory is beautiful and explains or at least strengthens certain cases.
Not all of them.
And you also understand it on your own, because there are people who have a model of the other, but they don't suffer when he suffers.
This reminds me of an article about some biologist who discovered a phenomenon called "inverted shading" that explains why many animals have a dark upper part and a light lower part.
He explained that it was a matter of camouflage.
In short, the same biologist was not satisfied with this discovery and tried to explain that all color patterns in the living world stem from camouflage considerations.
And just so the response doesn't sound negative,
The idea is very beautiful and seems correct and the explanation is also good.
Without referring to the percentages he indicates, in principle Beethoven (43) is right.
Man is first of all a social being. We are not created in a test tube and we are not thrown as individual individuals into a world of test tube creatures. We are born to parents, we grow up with brothers and sisters and in the company of children, youth and then adults, in a society that is a kind of rahilat zebat or a neighborhood or a city and a people. Our consciousness is created in this process, and it is the consciousness of social beings, in which the particular and the general are permeated with each other without the possibility of separating from each other, but with a deliberate effort (such as detachment and isolation on the part of the individual, or on the part of society - boycott, deportation or imprisonment). The individual-society relationship can be harmonious and collaborative, and/or antagonistic and hostile, but it is always a social relationship. The "egoistic" individual as someone who needs special fitness or develops to be "altruistic" is an abstract product of intellectual thought, and not a legitimate inhabitant of the real world. There is no need for the consciousness of the actual social individual to produce a "model" of the other, because the "model" exists from the beginning: the model is myself. My identification with the suffering of the other is my identification with my own suffering. My identification with the other's happiness is my identification with my own happiness. The identification with the other is intuitive and instinctive and stems from the very fact of our being social beings, and does not necessarily require any mediation of egoistic interest. Altruism needs no more special explanation than egoism. Both are legitimate sides of the same person who is a product of society and dependent on society. In the real world, an ordinary person during his normal daily life performs a huge number of actions and experiences a great many emotions and feelings that can be understood as "altruistic" because they do not serve, and on the face of it, even go against his immediate egoistic interest. The need to explain "altruism" as if it were some kind of strangeness, or abnormal behavior that needed an explanation is only a product of a rather abstract, Hobbesian + Mathewsian = Darwinian narrative based on a view of life as a constant war for limited resources between hostile individuals.
This simplicity is a bit simplistic.
There is an urge to alleviate the plight of the poor, but this urge is weighed against other urges (such as the urge to be rich) and the action taken in the end is the result of everything together.
Besides - the entire camera image is not better than mirror neurons (in fact, it is less good because mirror neurons are what there really is) and the matter of the recognition software doesn't really belong either (on the contrary - the whole idea is that the recognition is by identity and not by translation - that is - neuronal The mirrors that are activated when viewing another Are identical For those who act when we ourselves experience the experience and therefore there is no need for any identification programming)
There is an internal camera that takes pictures of the objects and turns the images into a memory in the brain, when we come across objects that have already been memorized in the past, a recognition software is immediately activated whose role is to protect the body, therefore in order for the body not to enter a state of distress, the brain immediately transmits signals that balance the situation.
If we see a poor person collecting alms, the brain recognizes this and immediately balances this situation and causes the person to do an altruistic action that will reduce the state of distress that the body is about to enter.
Hope I explained it simply…
mirror cells:
I didn't see the link before but I read all of it in the book "Mind Illusions" years ago.
It's certainly interesting, but it doesn't really belong to the topic we're discussing right now.
I also knew the main points he presented in the previous link (which is why I mentioned the mirror cells in the article), but I was happy about the link because:
1. He presented things beautifully
2. That he provided some examples of mirror cell activity that were new to me as well
3. That he proves (a bit childish but I am committed to the truth) that Ramachandran - despite all the data he was exposed to - was unable to make the synthesis I did in this article. That is, he did not overcome the evolutionary necessity of developing such a mechanism.
It is worth paying attention to the following fact: I drew my conclusions without basing them on any information related to the mirror cells. The mirror cells only served me as evidence of the correctness of my conclusions. I drew the conclusions logically from simple facts that were known even 100 years ago and if I had lived a hundred years earlier I would have reached the same conclusions before the mirror cells were discovered.
If this were the face of things, the finding of the mirror cells would be seen as a decisive confirmation of the theory and this is how I think they should be seen in the current reality as well.
There is another fact worth thinking about in the same context:
Since, as mentioned, the conclusion stems from the very need to represent a model of the other in the individual's mind, it must be assumed that if we ever meet aliens that are built completely differently from us - the conclusion will still remain valid for them.
This might give some encouragement to those who fear that the aliens will act like psychopaths (but only a little, because even most humans somehow manage to sweep the compassion they feel for animals under the rug)
Glad you liked the previous link I gave, here's an even more interesting talk by him if you haven't seen it yet:
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/heb/vilayanur_ramachandran_on_your_mind.html
99.9999 percent of the time people are concerned with how the other person thinks and what their intentions are.
The rest of the time they are concerned with what the other will do.
People like to stick their noses in and have an opinion about the other's actions and mistakes in the past and tend to create multiple imaginations and speculations around it.
Very few people do not deal with it. Usually autistic or those with Asperger's.
The egoistic sociopaths go a step further apart from the aforementioned preoccupation, they initiate emotional manipulation of others.
Guru Yaya:
It seems to me that even though I tried to write the article clearly and even though I went back and explained it in my various comments, you just didn't understand what I said.
I explained exactly why this mechanism was have to develop.
I explained that it is a necessary by-product of our ability to predict the actions of others - the ability togives a huge advantage.
I think that what you write here is a problematic description of the understanding of these processes.
For the purpose of the diagnosis I will make here, I will bury a different process: evolution created pain, to direct a move away from life-threatening behaviors. The sentence I wrote here, even if it is true (not 100 percent, because I describe evolution as a conscious process, but I assume the intention is clear to the readers). Does not explain the process that happens in the body, and which produces the pain (the action of the neurons, the chemistry of the body, the chemistry of the brain, etc.).
You, on the other hand, did something the opposite of me - you described how the mechanism works, but you did not describe how this mechanism was useful for survival, as it is. We know that in the name of altruism, people do things that are very harmful to their survival. Things that are so harmful to their survival that one has to wonder why a control mechanism was not created over the identification, which prevents the altruistic behavior. The answers obtained through the analysis of game theory models explain this part of the mechanism.
Regarding the question of "how morality works", after learning "why morality works", I am afraid that a philosophical essay is far from satisfactory. It's hard for me to think of an observation or experiment that would disprove the model you created.
mirror cells:
Nice link!
In fact, he provides many experimental confirmations of his statements - and this without fully understanding the meaning of the things (the meaning of which I have presented here).
He also gets confused on one point because mirror neurons also exist in other animals and not only in humans - which again - confirms my claim.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirror_neuron
Not exactly, but in the direction - brain research and "empathy neurons":
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/heb/vs_ramachandran_the_neurons_that_shaped_civilization.html
Amiram:
I don't know where you are rowing.
I said what I had to say clearly.
The question "For what else is identification a sufficient condition?" is not clear to me.
I mean - it's not clear to me why I should look for what else identification is a sufficient condition for. I have enough to do and preparing the list of things for which identification is a sufficient condition (if there are such things at all) is not my top priority.
The question "for what is a necessary condition" is in a similar situation for me, except for the part of it that I referred to in the article, which is that identification is a necessary condition for our ability to predict the actions of others.
The question "Is identification necessary for society, culture, morality and justice" is not well defined.
All the terms you described are names of man-made structures - structures built according to the characteristics and impulses of man and these include identification.
If there was no identification then even if someone invented such words he would mean something else.
In this sense - certainly identification is necessary for the existence of these concepts. After all, there is no external source that is not related to the person who defines what morality is, what society is, etc.
Identification by itself is not a sufficient condition for any of these things, but given other facts it can be sufficient.
For example - a society would not have been created among the most empathetic people in the world if everyone was paralyzed and mute.
Children identify from a very early stage in their lives. I don't know what study you are talking about, but there were many studies that demonstrated situations in which a child who sees a student "in trouble" comes to help or comfort him.
Beyond that - I don't know why the fact that someone didn't notice the importance of identification should bother me.
As I said - a mechanism like imagination is necessary for everything we do and therefore it is also necessary for identification.
Life is also necessary for identification and so is the existence of senses that bring to our mind information from the world outside of us but again - I do not understand where you are aiming and for me it has already become a waste of time.
Read the lemma in the first question as follows: identification may be a sufficient condition for altruism, but what is it another sufficient condition for? What is it another necessary condition for?
Is it necessary for society, for culture, for morality, for justice. Is she enough for them?
What is its role in the learning processes of a child or baby. (There was a study not long ago in Ha'aretz's supplement that talked about studies done on babies to understand if we are born with a moral sense or if it is acquired. Identification was not mentioned there at all as a possible reason for the results of the experiments)
Regarding the second question.
Is a mechanism like 'imagination' necessary for the existence of identification? Are there other necessary mechanisms?
Amiram:
But I don't understand your question.
In fact, it seems to me that there is a syntax problem in the sentence "Identification may be a sufficient condition for altruism, but why is it another sufficient condition?"
Regarding the second question - "What are the necessary conditions for an identification model?":
It's not clear either.
If the question is really about necessary conditions for an identification model, then among them we can name:
1. Let there be something called identification (so that the model has meaning)
2. To have a mind where this model exists.
3. And many more conditions.
If the question is not about conditions necessary for the model but conditions necessary for identification, one can name for example the following conditions:
1. To have someone to sympathize with
2. To have someone who can identify
3. That someone from section 2 will have reason to identify
I understand what you're saying.
Again, I try to go somewhere else.
Identification may be a sufficient condition for altruism, but why is it another sufficient condition?
What are the necessary conditions for an identification model?
Amiram:
The word "model" has a definite meaning.
You are welcome to read about it in this article
https://www.hayadan.org.il/why-are-models-so-popular-in-science-0306101/
and in the discussion that followed.
There you will see what I think about it.
This by definition also includes models in the brain and these are what my mother means here.
The model of the thrown stone is also in the brain.
The word "imagination" you use is so broad that it includes almost all the activity of the brain, so it is clear that it is not the cause of altruism.
Obviously you need a brain to have feelings and you need feelings for empathy and you need empathy for altruism but these are really trivial necessary conditions while my words dealt with the sufficient conditions (I hope you understand the difference!)!
After all, to explain why X hit Y with a hammer on the head, we will not use the explanation "to hit someone on the head with a hammer you need a hammer and here X has a hammer". This is a necessary but not sufficient condition and therefore does not explain anything!
What I have shown is in fact that traits that are necessary for our ability to predict are also sufficient for altruism to occur.
jubilee:
The truth is that, as far as I'm concerned, the above insight (together with everything we knew before and which I said I would not refer to in the article) really already closes the entire explanation regarding the evolutionary formation - of both altruism and morality.
Maybe I'll find time to sum it up neatly in a comment or article.
Michael:
We treat the word model differently and now I think I understand the lack of communication.
You talk about the other model like the trajectory model of a thrown stone.
Whereas I'm talking about models inside the brain. Mechanisms, probably physical, that describe the sensations, emotions and thoughts we think. In this case imagination, a retrieval mechanism from memory cells and combining them in one order or another, is a model. As well as the mechanism that causes us to feel identification with the other. Indeed, it is possible to imagine something without identifying with it, as I mentioned and you also gave the example of the stone, but is it possible to identify with someone without imagining it?
Right. Required and self-evident. And there is much more to add.
Now all that remains is to write the sequel: "The Altruist Garden"
Amiram:
Imagination is too general a word. It does not describe a specific model but the process of uploading models and "activating" them.
I can see a stone flying towards someone, use a model of the stone's trajectory and understand that it might hit him, see that he is looking towards the stone and run his model to estimate what is going on in his mind and predict the action he will take. It's all imagination.
I can also use visual imagination to understand what the XNUMXD shape is that all three projections (top projection, side projection, and face projection) appear as a circle with an X.
It is clear that imagination is needed because as mentioned - imagination is the way we use models in our minds - but that is not the point here. The existence of imagination does not require altruism.
I do not disagree with what was said in 29.
But do you mean by - "model of the other" which includes the model we know as 'imagination'?
Amiram:
"Identification with the other" is a special case of "model of the other" where in this case the model is me.
Therefore your wording demands too much because I have no need to identify with a stone in order to predict its behavior.
The model - and it doesn't matter which model - is enough.
What I showed is that when the other is a complex living being - even though the real need is for some kind of model and not for "putting myself in his place" there is no way to build any model other than the model of putting myself in his place.
That's why I demand less and prove more.
All in all, I accept note 26 (I did try to reach the height that was above me before I started writing and when I sent it was already a little above me 🙂 )
Indeed I completely accept the claim that we perceive the other's feelings through our own feelings.
In fact, it seems to me a bit self-evident from the very definition of identification and the knowledge of its existence.
But glad you put the proper emphasis on it.
Comment 27 makes me feel that you failed to empathize with me 🙂
I'm not trying to disagree with you, just take these ideas to a slightly different place, a place that has occupied me before.
I still believe in the minimalist wording, even if at first glance it seems cumbersome to you.
"Model of the other" is an unsuccessful choice of words, in my opinion of course.
The truth is that a correction is needed to correct because the correction was too forgiving.
The claim "our chances of survival will increase if we have a model that is able to simulate (imagination) a situation in which we could be in, without being in it" is much stronger (and therefore limiting) than the claim that we have a model.
The example of the stone from response 23 illustrates this: we have a model of the stone's behavior and we have no idea what it means to "be in its condition".
The need dictated to us by survival is a need for a model by which we can predict.
No identification required.
What I showed is that the only way to create a "model of the other" when the other is a complex living being necessarily goes through identification.
Fix:
Amiram (24) probably read the article and by the phrase "the comment above me" he probably meant other comments and not 23.
However, he didn't read it carefully because I explained exactly what I was referring to. As far as I'm concerned, the ants matter was resolved by the considerations I explained that I'm not going into because they are known to everyone.
The expression 'our chances of survival will increase if we have a model that is able to simulate (imagination) a situation in which we could be in, without being in it' is nothing but a clumsy way of saying that we have a model.
The entire reference to the issue of identification misses the point I raised according to which there is no way to feel "the other's situation" other than through "our own situation" just as there is no way to feel the other's experience of the color red other than through our own experience of the color red.
It seems to me that comments 23 and 24 are from people who did not read the article.
In the article itself, I explained well the difference between a stone and "another".
However, Guy, writing such a sarcastic response without reading the article definitely shows a tendency towards psychopathy.
Not a bad article. I admit that the field has been occupying me for a long time, but over the years I already have many ideas included in the basic model presented in the article. I will introduce some of them.
As implied by the comment above, there is no need to assume - 'we have a model of the other'. This is too great a demand from an evolutionary point of view, and even the second point - 'the model is necessary to predict the behavior of the other' seems exaggerated. As mathematicians do, let's try to stay with a more minimalist requirement as follows:
"Our chances of survival will increase if we have a model that is able to simulate (imagination) a situation in which we could be in, without being in it."
And before you get lost, imagination is a classic example. How many times has each of us imagined in his head a horrible accident that could happen to him, what he would do and how he would react in this or that extreme case of danger.
But what is the connection between imagination and altruism, you must ask. where we will try to connect. I claim that the feeling of identification, or in the language of the article, the model of identification, is closely related to the model of imagination. No one can identify with another if he is unable to imagine himself in the other's situation. Try it, check yourself when someone tells you a personal story or there is an article on TV that evokes empathy in you. The mind automatically puts you in the position of the person you identify with. Actually I can't see a way to separate identification from imagination. It is clear to me that they are closely related, but I have not yet reached a complete understanding of the nature of the connections between them. But while we are able to imagine in our minds images of inanimate things for example, they do not evoke in us the feeling of identification. That's why I completely agree on this subject with the author of the article that identification is an emotion, a model, which is mainly activated by people (sometimes you can identify with inanimate objects if you attribute human qualities to them). The identification, for some reason, is reserved for members of our species, or more precisely for everything to which we attribute characteristics of members of our species.
And now for altruism. Altruism is already an action, as stated in the article, that we take for the sake of the other and sometimes this comes from our identification with him.
There are a multitude of actions we take (either with a conscious choice or not) as a result of the stay. A few examples: crying, appeasement, doing justice (taking the side of the one with whom we identified, of course, this can of course even be a killing spree and there can also be demonstrations in front of the Prime Minister's house), and those who can't take it anymore even react with complete indifference or repression. Altruism falls into the category of actions you can do for others, and if I was clear enough, it is not the main point (not to me at least).
Let's summarize: the main thing is the feeling of identification and the nature of its connection with the imagination. What are their relationships?
Is identification the emotion that actually creates social relationships? Are social relationships possible without identification? Can there be any kind of society, without identification? (If you think of ants as a society, then the answer is maybe yes - although it's hard to know what ants feel, but what about mammals). These questions hint at the very significant part of this emotion with the development of society and culture, both of which are sometimes very difficult to explain where they came from in terms of evolution.
Well, enough for now. Hope I gave enough food for thought
I do not understand the claim "altruism is a necessary by-product of our ability to predict the actions of the other".
I personally am able to predict the trajectory of a stone that I throw without having to put myself in its place.
Am I a psychopath?
Amadeus:
I disagree with you on everything but it is already written in the article.
sympathetic:
You probably don't understand me correctly.
I say that altruism is a necessary outcome of identification and identification is (and this is the important part of the whole thing) a necessary condition for our ability (which is absolutely essential) to predict the actions of others.
This is definitely the main thing because the claim is that it is not at all possible for a creature capable of predicting the actions of the other who does not have the same psychological altruism that is the only puzzle left after all the considerations of selection of remnants and game theory.
Michael, you are wrong. It is highly unlikely that our moral motivation always or even sometimes stems from an interest in stopping the negative emotion that the person towards whom we exhibit altruistic behavior arouses in us. This is a very counterintuitive description, which is probably psychologically incorrect.
Think, for example, what happens when I give a few shekels to a homeless person on the street (let's say even if it's a hundred shekels). It is quite clear to me that the money I give him will not improve his situation much, maybe only temporarily, and he will probably still live on the street even if he receives a hundred shekels, and when he spends the money, he will still continue to collect alms. So if my action cannot improve his condition, then it cannot improve my feeling (caused by his condition). I'm still really sorry for the situation he's in, and feel the same compassion for him that I felt before I donated money to him. According to your theory, we should only exhibit altruistic behavior when our actions have the power to change the plight of the person in distress (and thus indirectly improve our own plight). But this is certainly not the case in most cases. People still do good deeds even if they know they can't help much, and even harm themselves (for example, I won't have money to buy myself lunch if I give the hundred shekels to a homeless person).
Besides, all evolutionary-biological explanations are guilty of a naturalistic fallacy, and are therefore not relevant to the field of morality, but that's another matter...
Michael
If I understand you correctly, you are not discussing the big question. When the big question is the evolutionary benefit of altruism. Why does an individual lose resources and risk his existence for the benefit of others? The question you are discussing is what is the mechanism that produces altruism.
Your basic claim is that there is a model in our brains that simulates the other, therefore we identify with his suffering in a certain sense, we attribute the feelings he apparently feels to our similar feelings and therefore we work to alleviate his suffering.
I am not an authority at all in the field of evolutionary psychology, but I have several questions regarding the claim you make.
First: In my opinion, evolution does not require a model of the world and the ability to predict in order for it to be effective. For example
We shy away from certain foods or certain smells, for example rotten meat, without having the need to understand that eating this meat will harm us.
Therefore, it is possible that evolution has imprinted in us a rejection of, for example, a baby's cry, this sound is not pleasant to us and therefore we will act to cancel it. The way we act to cancel it is acquired, it is related to our model of the other, but the motivation to act to stop his suffering is not related to this model. In the same way that evolution tells us not to eat rotten meat, but it didn't make us invent the refrigerator to keep meat from rotting. The invention of the refrigerator requires a complex model of the world and the ability to predict.
Secondly, not only psychopaths do not act altruistically, but also ordinary people are happy when their enemies fall, whether it is a war or a sport, so that pleasure or suffering can be derived from the suffering of others, depending on who it is. The pleasure or the suffering does not involve a model of the world with predictive ability but a basic emotion.
It is not clear to me what Ami Bacher Melin is about, the writing in the article is clear.
Another direction to the same subject is given by the teacher from the East Osho
In his book The Psychology of the Esoteric
The Psychology of the Esoteric
He says that the evolution of consciousness was indeed pushed by nature, but only as far as man. It is no longer a built-in from the person, but a choice and self-work, that is, altruism is the result of a higher consciousness.
In the book he describes the possible stages of development, fascinating to read.
There was just an article in Science about a study that concluded that people who practice mindfulness
More calm, productive and happy = evolutionary work (ie not automatic development)
An interesting interview between an Italian scientific journal and Osho
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a2u1g1dnKT8
A psychopath is an evolutionary aberration whose survivability is appropriate for the current era. Once alienation and condescension took hold the empathic altruist was pushed into a corner. It is better for the altruist to continue being empathic without giving up the concept of power. How about fantasizing about an empathetic and altruistic leader? In the blogs they would call him a geek, and his advisers would be sad. Hitler is a prototype of a psychopath. In the last century, humanity was warned of its importance. Today people like him are respected and preferred because of considerations foreign to values. Greed involves racism, see totalitarian regimes benefiting from the favor of democratic regimes. The terrible fear of overflowing portions of values feeds the soulless human androids, which society encourages and welcomes over the altruists, who are commonly called "eccentrics".
Nice article mostly, I wouldn't give all the credit for identification and morality (response 12) to evolution.
Regarding mirror neurons, various studies show that extensive identification occurs, according to brain regions, in the brains of observers of the actions of others.
For example identification between listener and speaker in this article:
http://www.pnas.org/content/107/32/14425.full
This is not my way of giving grades and others, but those who praise the article are right. The idea that empathy leads to altruism is very beautiful.
It is possible that the reaction of psychopaths stems from over-sensitivity to the suffering of others, which, given a certain character, develops from a young age to the opposite extreme as a defense mechanism. It seems that there are additional defense mechanisms that develop into other phenomena in people with a different character.
The police prefer to believe a lying psychopath who pretends to be a "lawyer". He is a heinous criminal who enjoys super status only because of his psychopathic skills. As we know, psychopaths are liars who are able to pretend to be an angel. They jealously guard their status and remove from their path those who expose their faces. The police refuse to accept the seriousness of the crime and do not consider it a law enforcement body or a mechanism for maintaining the security of the citizen. Psychopaths take advantage of the police's weakness.
Very nice article
I would summarize your conclusions in one sentence
Altruism = a self-defense mechanism that minimizes internal suffering by identifying with the sufferer.
If there was no suffering in the world then we would not have developed an altruistic mechanism by evolution.
Ofer:
The article is intended to present an idea and not to be an encyclopedia.
I wrote a lot about morality - also on this site - but mainly in the comments.
As a rule - morality too - like any human trait - is a product of evolution.
You can find part of what I have to say about morality in the discussion that developed here:
https://www.hayadan.org.il/survival-in-the-philipines-0609099
You can find another part in a quote from my words in this article:
https://www.hayadan.org.il/science-is-not-everything-2909086/
(search for the word Michael)
interesting post,
The study of the mechanism based on mirror neurons is called theory of mind
And this is a defective mechanism even among autistics (at different levels, up to the level of dysfunction at all)
What is also interesting is that the mechanism works even without visual stimulation,
As for example when reading a fictional book, where the reader "gets into the head" of the character in the book and identifies
You are at an extreme emotional level (joy, sadness, stress, depression, etc.)
An example of neuronal activity shows that Michael mentioned in the article, which is directly related to altruism: When I fed my children, I found myself making involuntary chewing movements.
Thanks Michael for the article, indeed food for thought.
I would say instead "their model", an objective model: that is, an average model for most people. In this average model that exists in our mind (and not in a damaged brain like in psychopaths or autistics, etc.) we put ourselves in the place of the person we feel. Thus when his suffering or another emotion of his that is absorbed by our senses, is also felt by us.
This model is evolutionarily good for maintaining the group and communication within it.
And without a word about morality?
Another comment regarding Gali's response:
Read what Oren Herman, who appears in the video, says when he is interviewed here:
http://www.ynet.co.il/home/0,7340,L-6878,00.html
Look for his answer to the question "What specific question, for example, interests you in the context of the evolution of altruism?" And you will see that he is fully aware of the need for this kind of explanation that I have given here.
Full Disclosure:
Amir is my son 🙂
jelly:
This kind of thing you mentioned was what I meant when I wrote this paragraph:
"Most of the evolutionary explanations offered on the subject are correct, in my opinion - both those that explain certain altruistic behaviors using considerations from the field of game theory and those that see other altruistic behaviors as a byproduct of remnant selection."
However - as I mentioned, I tried to touch on a completely different matter here. I was not talking about the value of altruism for survival but about the fact that it is an inevitable consequence of other abilities whose contribution to our survival is not in doubt.
I also tried to point out the origin and the internal expression of the human urge for altruistic behavior - an urge that is always present in all of us but is not always expressed because we also have other urges.
I also learned and had fun. An interesting and beautiful diagnosis.
Thanks.
Read the "Price of Altruism" By Oren Harman
Here is a short description:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pU-s_5zkGL0
He is an expert on altruism and evolution.
Sorry I could not write in Hebrew from this computer - a bug in this computer
Gali
A Beautiful Mind!
Time and time again, M'Kal reveals to us pearls of genius insight that none of the thousands of scientists who have studied their subjects for hundreds of years have matched.
In a language equal to every soul reminiscent of Kipling's just so stories, he presents original insights that are equal to those of the great geniuses.
He did it again.
Thanks!
Also music. You forgot to write music, Machal.
To your credit, the title of the article is actually very good in relation to its content. It is not a title that pretends to bring scientific or true news. Indeed, the article brings interesting musings and heart murmurs. The main one is that the origin of altruism is in soliciting one's abilities to predict future phenomena with the help of identification.
The mechanism is not presented in a comprehensible and simple way and I will also comment that in a methodical way the use of double quotation marks should be avoided because it is very confusing. I would recommend working on the development of the original idea or at the very least on the development of its clarification to the public while providing less jumpy and more basic examples that will build understanding.
When things are said too quickly and many concepts are thrown into the air it is confusing and raises suspicion.