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human nature

"It's only human nature"

The idea that human beings are naturally selfish, greedy or lazy cannot survive a moment's critical thought

How often do we hear it said "It's only human nature?" And mostly about some gross piece of behaviour as if it couldn't be avoided? Curiously, it is not often said about the best things that people can do. On hearing that someone has risked their life to save another, for some reason we are not inclined to say "Yes, it's human nature." But then, none of these variations of good or bad behaviour are determined by our "nature." We behave differently in different social settings and this is evident from everyday experience. So, in explaining behaviour we must look at the social context in which it happens.

Human nature and human behaviour

Steven Pinker is a leading representative of the school known as “evolutionary psychology”. Their basic position is that humans today still have, not just the same physical brain as the first members of homo sapiens (which is uncontroversial), but also the same mental make-up, i.e. that we think and react as if we were still primitive hunter-scavenger-gatherers living in small bands on the open grasslands of East Africa (where, again, it is generally agreed our species first evolved). In fact, they go further and argue that Darwinian principles apply just as much to these psychological traits as to our physical anatomy and physiology and that they, too, evolved through natural selection – the survival of the most fitted – out of those of that particular line of ape-like creatures from which homo sapiens is descended. Hence their name of “evolutionary psychologists”.

Exploding the human nature myth

Picture this:

Scene: The High Courts of Justice, London. On trial is a 30 year-old man, charged with 3 armed robberies, 3 counts of attempted murder, and 5 charges of assaulting police officers and another of incapacitating a police dog. The QC for the prosecution has finished summing up. He sits down, satisfied he had done enough to see this psychopath imprisoned for 350 years, and now the defendant’s barrister approaches the jury, one hand in his pocket and fidgeting with his car keys.

Barrister: Members of the Jury! It’s an open and shut case as far as I can see. It’s human nature, innit? Humans are by nature greedy, selfish and aggressive. We’ve been like this for donkey’s years. Nothing you can do about it, eh? He can’t help it (points to defendant) - he’s naturally predisposed to be a violent robber. I, therefore, urge you to find my client not guilty on account of this ’ere human nature thing.

Cooking the Books 2: How to undermine socialism

In the “Dear Economist“ column of the Financial Times Magazine (4/5 August) a correspondent asked:

“I suffer ridicule from economist friends when visiting a local restaurant. The restaurant supplies complimentary tissues and toothpicks to customers. My friends freely use them and even take some for later use. I feel this is wasteful and not ‘playing the game’ but their arguments seem more logical - there's no extra cost to taking more, it is included in the costing for the meal, and I'm the mug subsidising everyone else. How can I overcome my hang-up and become a maximising consumer?”

In his somewhat tongue-in-cheek reply Economist wrote:

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