Uh, whenever getting food is expected to yield less of some necessary nutrient than is consumed by getting the food is a time when doing very little is the best option—at least if the nutrient situation will probably get better in a few months. Also, if you are male, whenever you are seen as effective sexual competition by a male or coalition of males who are in a position to kill you or permanently damage you with little risk of bodily or reputational harm to themselves is a time when doing nothing impressive is the best option—and in the EEA simply doing well at hunting, farming or making tools was probably seen as impressive by the women. Heck, I’ve gotten significant signs of interest from women just for sitting in a cafe in San Francisco and looking like I was productively engaged in writing things down on pieces of paper when the woman had no way to know what I am writing. Many writers say that industriousness is attractive to women. And, heck, in junior high school, I remember being attacked and my study supplies kicked around on the street by another male for appearing industrious.
In summary, it seems to me that one of the most profound differences between the EEA and modern life (at least modern life in the relatively well-run jurisdictions) is that in modern life, there is no reason not to spend a significant part of every day in effortful activity either physical or mental—and note that effortful mental activity consumes many times more calories than “subsistence” mental activity does (I think: I should actually research that; personal experience is my main reason for believing it) and that mental activity accounts for 25% of the calories consumed by a human being (and I’m fairly certain of that last point)
And if getting thrown out of the band were not a large source of loss of reproductive fitness in the EEA, then please explain the natural human fascination with the theme as evidenced by the mass appeal of shows like Survivor (plot: every week, contestants vote to see which contestant gets thrown off the island) or Big Brother (plot virtually identical). Emotional reactions and tastes as strong and salient as that which are widespread in the human population should be assumed to be the result of selection pressures unless and until there is a good reason to believe otherwise IMHO. Well, I think I need to say a little bit more on this point. Yes, I am aware that many people, and a large fraction of the more thoughtful people, have an aversion to shows like Survivor and Big Brother. At least in the case of Big Brother I think much of the aversion comes from the natural human tendency to hold privacy violations (even when the violated have voluntarily ceded their privacy) as moral transgressions. And I think some of it comes from the fact that thoughtful people have noticed that this fascination with who is in and who is out and who is in danger of getting thrown off the island tends to have negative effects in modern environments such as your typical white-collar workplace. But mostly I think I have over the years gotten pretty good at telling which reactions are learned and which are innate, and the revulsion of many people toward shows like Survivor strikes me as a learned antibody to an innate interest in the theme.
Possibly doing nothing is a good idea for hunter gatherers in case of starvation, but that seems worth checking in the anthropology research. If starvation were a frequent risk, lethargy would surely been prompted by insufficient food intake, which is rare for humans today. We wouldn’t just be lazy for that reason all the time; during times of abundance you ought to gather and store as much food as possible.
Apparently hunter gatherer bands were egalitarian, so it’s unlikely people would have been beaten up by (non-existent) leaders just for hunting and gathering well, especially given food was shared. Again the conditions under which people would be picked on in bands are something we can find out by looking at existing anthropology research. Nonetheless it’s hard to imagine that hunter gatherer bands which would push out members merely for contributing to the food intake of the group would be the most successful. We don’t favour do-nothings over well-meaning incompetents today as far as I can tell.
Uh, whenever getting food is expected to yield less of some necessary nutrient than is consumed by getting the food is a time when doing very little is the best option—at least if the nutrient situation will probably get better in a few months. Also, if you are male, whenever you are seen as effective sexual competition by a male or coalition of males who are in a position to kill you or permanently damage you with little risk of bodily or reputational harm to themselves is a time when doing nothing impressive is the best option—and in the EEA simply doing well at hunting, farming or making tools was probably seen as impressive by the women. Heck, I’ve gotten significant signs of interest from women just for sitting in a cafe in San Francisco and looking like I was productively engaged in writing things down on pieces of paper when the woman had no way to know what I am writing. Many writers say that industriousness is attractive to women. And, heck, in junior high school, I remember being attacked and my study supplies kicked around on the street by another male for appearing industrious.
In summary, it seems to me that one of the most profound differences between the EEA and modern life (at least modern life in the relatively well-run jurisdictions) is that in modern life, there is no reason not to spend a significant part of every day in effortful activity either physical or mental—and note that effortful mental activity consumes many times more calories than “subsistence” mental activity does (I think: I should actually research that; personal experience is my main reason for believing it) and that mental activity accounts for 25% of the calories consumed by a human being (and I’m fairly certain of that last point)
And if getting thrown out of the band were not a large source of loss of reproductive fitness in the EEA, then please explain the natural human fascination with the theme as evidenced by the mass appeal of shows like Survivor (plot: every week, contestants vote to see which contestant gets thrown off the island) or Big Brother (plot virtually identical). Emotional reactions and tastes as strong and salient as that which are widespread in the human population should be assumed to be the result of selection pressures unless and until there is a good reason to believe otherwise IMHO. Well, I think I need to say a little bit more on this point. Yes, I am aware that many people, and a large fraction of the more thoughtful people, have an aversion to shows like Survivor and Big Brother. At least in the case of Big Brother I think much of the aversion comes from the natural human tendency to hold privacy violations (even when the violated have voluntarily ceded their privacy) as moral transgressions. And I think some of it comes from the fact that thoughtful people have noticed that this fascination with who is in and who is out and who is in danger of getting thrown off the island tends to have negative effects in modern environments such as your typical white-collar workplace. But mostly I think I have over the years gotten pretty good at telling which reactions are learned and which are innate, and the revulsion of many people toward shows like Survivor strikes me as a learned antibody to an innate interest in the theme.
Possibly doing nothing is a good idea for hunter gatherers in case of starvation, but that seems worth checking in the anthropology research. If starvation were a frequent risk, lethargy would surely been prompted by insufficient food intake, which is rare for humans today. We wouldn’t just be lazy for that reason all the time; during times of abundance you ought to gather and store as much food as possible.
Apparently hunter gatherer bands were egalitarian, so it’s unlikely people would have been beaten up by (non-existent) leaders just for hunting and gathering well, especially given food was shared. Again the conditions under which people would be picked on in bands are something we can find out by looking at existing anthropology research. Nonetheless it’s hard to imagine that hunter gatherer bands which would push out members merely for contributing to the food intake of the group would be the most successful. We don’t favour do-nothings over well-meaning incompetents today as far as I can tell.