MY, MY—SO NOW WE ARE IN THE BUSINESS OF TELLING THE WORLD HOW GOD WOULD HAVE HANDLED THE WHOLE MATTER. I BARELY UNDERSTAND MY LITTLE CORNER OF THE WORLD MUCH LESS THE MIND OF THE OMNISCIENT CREATOR. WHO SAYS SHE OR HE IS BIASED TOWARD HUMANS? PERHAPS SHE HAS AN AFFECTION FOR PLASMODIUM, AS IN HALDANE’S FAMOUS JOKETO WHEN ASKED BY A CLERIC WHAT A LIFETIME STUDY OF EVOLUTION HAD TAUGHT HALDANE ABOUT THE NATURE OF THE CREATOR—“AN INORDINATE FONDNESS FOR BEETLES”—AT THAT TIME, 1/3®” OF ALL ANIMAL SPECIES—300,000—WERE BEETLES. | enjoyed Brian Mannix’s comment, most especially “Pseven”. His argument for cooperation is the same as that of Adam Smith in the Wealth of Nations. Once a medium of exchange is introduced into a system of barter, itself a reciprocal relationship, it can be vastly extended, with specialization such that one individual no longer produces ten pencils/day, but ten people are specialized to produce a single pencil—and thus a thousand/day. | too share an aversion to cultural/group selection though perhaps for other reasons. But I side with Peter in feeling that male self-domestication is more important in damping male psychopathy than female choice—Richard Wrangham vs Sarah Hrdy among evolutionary anthropologists. Peter’s argument on reduction of inter-birth interval in humans again veers off into culture-land when one does not need it—paternal investment, grandmother investment and older sibling investment are all expected on genetic grounds. The authority on the subject is David Haig at Harvard. HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_029161