We need to remember that your DNA only cares about only one thing; the survival and multiplication of your genes in future generations. Everything else is secondary and is just a means to that end. It is our genetic past that directs much of our behavior in the present.
Natural selection has provided us with emotions and instincts that are encoded in our DNA and greatly influence our behavior and decisions. Natural selection isn’t foresightful. Evolution is guided by the environment in which it takes place, and environments change. It was designed to maximize fitness in the environment in which those minds evolved; and that is not the modern world.
These systems evolved in what scientists call our ancestral environment—a world very different from modern society. In that world, overthinking could get you killed. Instinct worked better than analysis.
And evolution is not forward-thinking. It doesn’t redesign itself for new conditions. It only preserves what worked in the past.
Human decisions are emotional at their core—even the ones we call logical.
When you choose, emotion moves first. Logic follows behind, explaining and defending the choice. That doesn’t mean logic is useless—but it’s not the driver.
So why would evolution design us this way?
Because emotion is fast, and in the environments where humans evolved, speed meant survival. Emotions are not feelings in the casual sense—they are biological decision systems. They carry information from your DNA, refined through natural selection.
Your DNA isn’t interested in truth, fairness, or long-term planning. It has one mission: get your genes into the future. Everything else is a tool to accomplish that.
Harvard Zoologist, Edward O. Wilson in his seminal work “On Human Nature” poses the question of just why is our brain architected the way it is and not in some other way? He answers the question by postulating that its design “promotes the survival and multiplication of the genes that direct its assembly.”
In simple terms that means that the human brain has a singular purpose; that is to increase the likelihood that such individual’s genes will survive and multiply in future generations. Why? Because we are all descendants of those who were possessed with such brains; and those who may have had brains designed with a different purpose had their lineages die out.
So, if that is true; what can that tell us about Human Nature in all of its complex adaptations? Quite a lot, really; that is, if we can handle the truth.
My reading list for anyone who truly wants to understand HUMAN NATURE. Begin with the Robert Ardrey books for a sound foundation, then On Human Nature by Wilson, then the others.
