Blueprint - Nicholas Christakis on the evolutionary origins of a good society

This opinion piece by Frank Bruni in the NYTimes motivated me to download and read Nicholas Christakis' Magnum Opus “Blueprint” (very much in the 'everything you need to know about humans' spirit of Sapolsky's "Behave" and Harari's "Sapiens," and "Homo Deus," and "21 Lessons," all books that I have made the subject of previous posts.). It echoes Pinker's emphasis on the more positive aspects of human nature and progress. It is a very engaging read, and not amenable to a simple summary, but here is a bit from his introduction:

How can people be so different from—even go to war with—one another and yet also be so similar? The fundamental reason is that we each carry within us an evolutionary blueprint for making a good society.

Genes do amazing things inside our bodies, but even more amazing to me is what they do outside of them. Genes affect not only the structure and function of our bodies; not only the structure and function of our minds and, hence, our behaviors; but also the structure and function of our societies. This is what we recognize when we look at people around the world. This is the source of our common humanity.

Natural selection has shaped our lives as social animals, guiding the evolution of what I call a “social suite” of features priming our capacity for love, friendship, cooperation, learning, and even our ability to recognize the uniqueness of other individuals. Despite all the trappings and artifacts of modern invention—our tools, agriculture, cities, nations—we carry within us innate proclivities that reflect our natural social state, a state that is, as it turns out, primarily good, practically and even morally. Humans can no more make a society that is inconsistent with these positive urges than ants can suddenly make beehives.

I believe that we come to this sort of goodness just as naturally as we come to our bloodier inclinations. We cannot help it. We feel great when we help others. Our good deeds are not just the products of Enlightenment values. They have a deeper and prehistoric origin. The ancient tendencies that form the social suite work together to bind communities, specify their boundaries, identify their members, and allow people to achieve individual and collective objectives while at the same time minimizing hatred and violence. For too long, in my opinion, the scientific community has been overly focused on the dark side of our biological heritage: our capacity for tribalism, violence, selfishness, and cruelty. The bright side has been denied the attention it deserves.

(The above is a repost of MindBlog's 6/3/19 post)