There is ample evidence that humans (and other primates) possess a knowledge instinct—a biologically driven impulse to make coherent sense of the world at the highest level possible. Yet behavioral decision-making data suggest a contrary biological drive to minimize cognitive effort by solving problems using simplifying heuristics. Individuals differ, and the same person varies over time, in the strength of the knowledge instinct. Neuroimaging studies suggest which brain regions might mediate the balance between knowledge expansion and heuristic simplification. One region (...) implicated in primary emotional experience is more activated in individuals who use primitive heuristics, whereas two areas of the cortex are more activated in individuals with a strong knowledge drive: one region implicated in detecting risk or conflict and another implicated in generating creative ideas. Knowledge maximization and effort minimization are both evolutionary adaptations, and both are valuable in different contexts. Effort minimization helps us make minor and routine decisions efficiently, whereas knowledge maximization connects us to the beautiful, to the sublime, and to our highest aspirations. We relate the opposition between the knowledge instinct and heuristics to the biblical story of the fall, and argue that the causal scientific worldview is mathematically equivalent to teleological arguments from final causes. Elements of a scientific program are formulated to address unresolved issues. (shrink)

This article develops a theory for how caringbehavior fits into the makeup of humans andother mammals. Biochemical evidence for threemajor patterns of response to stressful orotherwise complex situations is reviewed. There is the classic fight-or-flight response;the dissociative response, involving emotionalwithdrawal and disengagement; and the bondingresponse, a variant of which Taylor et al. (2000) called tend-and-befriend. All three ofthese responses can be explained as adaptationsthat have been selected for in evolution andare shared between humans and other mammals. Yet each of us (...) contains varying tendenciestoward all of these responses. How doesdevelopment interact with genes to influencethese tendencies? How do individuals,societies, and institutions make choicesbetween these types of responses?We review the evidence, based on behavioral,lesion, single-cell, and brain imaging studies,for cortical-subcortical interactions involvedin all three of these response types, andpropose partial neural network models for someof these interactions. We propose that theorbitomedial prefrontal cortex mediates thischoice process. This area of prefrontal cortexperforms this mediation through its connectionswith areas of sensory and association cortexthat represent social contexts or stimuli, andwith areas of the hypothalamus, limbic system,and autonomic nervous system that representemotional states or classes of response patterns.The article concludes with implications of ourtheory for social interactions andinstitutions. We argue that despite the wideprevalence of fight-or-flight responses, thebonding, caring responses remain available. Weshow with historical and contemporary exampleshow social settings – whether in education,work places, families, politics, and informalsocial customs – can be designed to supportand enhance the natural caring responses of thebrain. (shrink)

Protection of civilians has become enshrined as a core task for international peacekeeping missions. How to ensure that civilians are safe from violence and human rights abuses is central to developing military doctrine for peacekeeping; how safe civilians are from attack is central to how peacekeeping missions are assessed both by locals and international observers. However, protection of civilians is often seen as something that is done by active peacekeepers on behalf of passive civilians, potentially missing the ways in which (...) peacekeepers’ actions interact with strategies that civilians undertake on their own behalf. Integrating peacekeeper and civilian self-protection strategies is not trivial, either from a practical or a moral standpoint. Drawing on primary research among women in Liberia, as well as case studies of civilian protection elsewhere, this essay examines the ways in which working with civilians on protection—creating ‘hybrid’ systems of protection—inevitably entangles peacekeepers in civilians’ other social, political, and moral concerns, undermining at least a naïve impartiality. To retain their moral stance, peacekeepers ought to focus on using the safety they provide to allow different local actors to interact safely and, ideally, constructively. (shrink)

The authors regard opiates as the primary neural substrate for social attachment, and peptide hormones as subsidiary. One may instead conclude from their evidence that oxytocin, vasopressin, and opiates play complementary roles in attachment. Oxytocin and vasopressin relate to different aspects of emotional experience, and opiates to quiescence from long-term attachment. This is related to intimacy versus affiliation.

Responding to renewed interest in political rhetoric among contemporary International Relations –realists, this article advances three main claims. First, it suggests that tragedy—the dominant...

The authors wish that the psychology of human decision making should borrow methodological rigor from economics. However, unless economics also borrows from psychology this poses a danger of overly limiting the phenomena studied. In fact, an expanded economic theory should be sought that is based in psychology (and ultimately neuroscience) and encompasses both rational and irrational aspects of decision making.

Introduction: sustainable critique and the lost vocation of international relations -- "For we born after:" the challenge of sustainable critique -- Sustainable critique and critical IR theory: against emancipation -- The realist dilemma: politics and the limits of theory -- Communitarian IR theory -- Individualist IR theory: disharmonious cooperation -- Conclusion: toward sustainably critical international theory.

Respect for victims requires that we have social systems for punishing and condemning (reproving) serious crimes. But, the conditions of social marginalization and political subordination of the communities from which an overwhelming number of prisoners in the United States come place serious barriers in the face of effective reprobation. Mass incarceration makes this problem worse by disrupting and disrespecting entire communities. While humanities education in the prisons is far from a total solution, it is one way to make reprobation meaningful, (...) so long as the prison classroom is a place where the educators’ values are also put at risk. (shrink)