What’s in it for me?

Discover the universal

empathy of humanity.
Throughout history, authors, philosophers, as well as political and religious leaders
– have told us to be wary of the evil at the core of human nature. People are
egotistical, these thinkers claim, always searching to improve their position,
regardless of the negative impact their actions have on others. The atrocities of war
and genocide seem to bear out such assertions. But what if this is just a small part
of the story?

What if the things that have kept us alive and evolving are empathy and connection
to our fellow humans? What if, instead of a desire to kill other people, what really
drives soldiers to enlist is a desire to belong? Let’s explore these possibilities and
take a closer look at the empathy within us all.

In these blinks, you’ll learn

 the real reason the walls of Jericho were built;

 what herd instinct is and how it has affected our evolution; and
 how to tell that a couple has been together for a long time.

 There is a popular but misguided tendency

to view human nature as inherently selfish.
 The idea that human nature is fundamentally selfish is widespread. Even
pop culture propagates this idea: “Greed is good,” proclaims Michael
Douglas’s character in the 1987 movie,Wall Street. “Greed is right. Greed
works. Greed clarifies, cuts through and captures the essence of the
evolutionary spirit.”

 Ideas like this are popular in both cultural and political theory, and they’ve
kept alive the myth that humanity is inherently self-centered.

 This notion is also backed up by the theory of Social Darwinism. Introduced

by nineteenth-century British political philosopher Herbert Spencer, it offers
a “survival of the fittest” outlook on life between the “haves” and the “have-
nots.”
  Social Darwinism further suggests that it’s counterproductive for those who
succeed in life to feel obligated to help, as they can get dragged down by
those who are struggling.

 This kind of ideology has found its way into the business world as well.

 For example, in the early twentieth century, business tycoon John D.

Rockefeller, Jr., regarded the expansion of big business at the expense of
smaller businesses as “merely the working out of a law of nature.”

 These are all misunderstandings of human nature and are especially

dangerous when they fuel self-fulfilling prophecies.

 We saw this in the notorious case of ENRON, an energy company that

believed humanity was driven by two things: fear and greed. This created a
horrible corporate environment as well as a brutal system ENRON
called Rank and Yank, in which managers ranked employees on a five-point
scale and fired anyone who received a five. This system led to 20 percent of
the workforce being fired every year.

 ENRON’s cold-blooded practices extended beyond employee relations, too.

In order to raise the price of energy costs, the company caused artificial
blackouts and shortages, showing no concern for the harm that these tactics
could cause people in elevators or on respirators.

 But this cold-hearted business philosophy eventually backfired, and

ENRON collapsed in 2001.

History shows that war and violence haven’t

always been part of the human experience.
Winston Churchill, the famous British Prime Minister, once said, “The story of the
human race is War. Except for brief and precarious interludes, there has never been
peace in the world; and before history began, murderous strife was universal and
unending.” But how much truth is there in this point of view?

A closer look at science and history shows that warfare was once not as pervasive
as you might think.
Contrary to Churchill’s opinion, it’s probably more accurate to suggest that human
history is comprised of long stretches of peace and harmony with brief episodes of
violence.

For instance, the walls of Jericho, which you may have read about in the Old
Testament, have long been considered a defensive structure and among the earliest
evidence of human warfare.

However, modern research suggests that these ancient tales aren’t historically
accurate and that the walls were likely built as protection against mudflows.

There’s also the fact that our ancient ancestors were constantly at risk of extinction,
living in small, widely dispersed groups with a global population of only a couple
thousand. Under such conditions, it’s likely that warfare wasn’t a common concern
at all.

These ancestors were hunter-gatherers and their life was like the modern-day
Bushmen of Africa. So, while violent confrontations did occur, they were
infrequent interruptions during otherwise peaceful times.

Likewise, the warfare and organized combat of modern times is not a result of any
natural proclivity for violence and aggression. Rather, our military involvement is
fueled by our natural herd instinct.

When you consider Napoleon’s army marching across the freezing expanses of
Russia, or American soldiers flying to the Middle East, it’s not a desire for
bloodshed that is motivating them.

Following the orders of a general that everyone else is obeying or falling into a
lockstep march with the thousands of soldiers beside you are instinctual actions
that come naturally to all of us. But these actions are driven by the same herd
instinct that leads to other, pleasurable coordinated activities, like chanting,
singing, dancing or playing certain sports.

The herd instinct plays a vital role in bonding

experienced by both humans and animals.
Have you ever wondered why yawning is so contagious? The mere mention of it is
often enough to elicit it!
This is due to unconscious synchrony,which is another term for the herd instinct
that is found in many aspects of our life and the lives of other animals.

Synchrony and the herd instinct stem from the sense of interconnectedness that
exists in humans and elsewhere in the animal kingdom.

For example, it’s not only humans who find yawning contagious. Researchers at
Kyoto University showed videotaped footage of yawning chimpanzees to some
apes in their lab, and, sure enough, before long the apes were yawning like crazy.

This synchrony is also part of the survival mechanism that compels a flock of birds
to fly in formation and head in the same direction.

And it’s of vital importance. Imagine you’re a member of that flock and suddenly
all your bird pals fly off. There’s no time to stop and figure out what’s going on;
so, without unconscious synchrony, you could end up dead!

The same applies to migrating animals that need to stop for food and rest.

The instinctual coordination of these activities ensures that everyone sticks

together and survives, as there is often only one chance to eat and rest during the
long journeys.

Furthermore, being in sync with others allows for important bonds to form.

This manifests as subtle mimicry. When out on a date, you’ll respond better to a
date partner who subtly mimics your actions – who seems relaxed when you’re
relaxed, who takes a sip of water when you do and who shares your smiles or
frowns.

Synchrony can even change how you feel about the service you receive.

Experiments have shown that a waiter can double his tips simply by repeating a
client’s order instead of just saying “You got it!” or “Good choice!”

But, as we’ll see in the next blink, the bonding that we experience through
synchrony has more value than just a few good tips.

It is natural for humans to bond with one another

as it leads to longer and happier lives.
There’s a reason why solitary confinement is considered one of the worst
punishments short of death. It can be so difficult to endure that some confined
inmates will cause trouble just so they can interact with the guards.

So, it’s another misunderstanding of history to suggest that society is the creation
of autonomous beings.

In the eighteenth century, philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau referred to this

origin myth as a social contract – society is a compromise, requiring people to give
up part of their “freedom” in exchange for increased safety.

However, suggesting that our ancestors didn’t rely on other people for survival and
happiness is utter speculation.

Humans are highly dependent on one another, both emotionally and physically,
and without the company of others we can become hopelessly depressed. It would
be strange to assume it wasn’t always so.

Nor is companionship only good for happiness; research has shown that the most
reliable way to extend one’s life expectancy is to get married and stay married.

So strong are the bonds of marriage that they can literally change us physically.
Scientists did a study where they showed people two sets of photos, one of
individual men and women on their wedding day, the other of individual men and
women who’d been married for 25 years.

When the participants were then asked who was married to whom within each set,
they had no problem pairing the couples who’d been married for 25 years;
however, they flunked attempts to match the newlyweds. The study showed that
married couples tend to look like one another not because they pick partners who
resemble themselves but because, after years of bonding, the couple’s features end
up converging.

This physical similarity was strongest between couples who were reportedly the
happiest and spoke of sharing their emotions on a regular basis. It’s this kind of
bonding that allows one partner to “internalize” the other, and vice versa, to the
point that it becomes apparent to any observer that they are indeed a couple.

When we deny our natural instincts to be

nurturing, it can have tragic consequences.
How much control do you think you have over your own decisions, impulses and
desires? It might be tempting to believe that we can choose what is best for us, an
outlook encapsulated in a theory called behaviorism, which regards the human
mind as a blank slate that we have complete control over.

John Watson, the father of behaviorism, attempted to prove his philosophy by

experimenting on a little boy named Albert.

Watson was able to condition “Little Albert” to whimper every time he saw a
rabbit by banging loud steel objects together and producing a horrible noise
whenever the boy was handed a rabbit.

Watson regarded this as a triumph of behaviorism over human nature, and his
devotion to the power of conditioning led him to ignore our inherent biological
wiring.

For example, Watson was skeptical of maternal love, and believed society required
less nurturing and more structure.

However, attempts to put these ideas into practice were disastrous. Psychologists
studied orphaned children who were kept in cribs separated by white sheets and
who received no visual stimulation or bodily contact. These children ended up
resembling zombies, blank-faced with wide-open, unmoving eyes.

If behaviorism was right, they should have been thriving; but instead, they were
near death’s door.

Deprived of the nurturing that builds babies’ natural resistance to disease, many of
the children needlessly died.

All of this makes clear that, from the moment we’re born, we need nurturing,
human connection and empathy in order to survive. It’s simply a biological
imperative.

As mammals, it’s critical that we receive maternal care. This initial bond is so
important that it continues to reverberate through our lives as we get older.

For instance, when we show love to our partners we might feed them a piece of
food or employ the same kind of “baby talk” language a mother uses with her
child.

Empathy comes naturally to us since it plays an

important part in ensuring our survival.
Chances are you’ve lent someone a helping hand at some point in your life, and it’s
likely that you didn’t need to be conditioned in order to do so.

Indeed, as biology and history show, our sense of empathy and cooperation come
naturally to us.

After all, we wouldn’t be here if our natural disposition was to be competitive and
insensitive.

This is especially the case for motherhood and good parenting, where empathy is
key. Over the course of 200 million years of evolution, parents have developed a
natural sensitivity to the concerns of their offspring in order to keep them healthy
and safe.

This sense of empathy is crucial since the chances of a helpless baby surviving if
its parents are instinctively cold and uncaring aren’t very good. Therefore, empathy
is a big part of why we’re here today.

But it is also something we have little control over.

When Swedish psychologist Ulf Dimberg was researching involuntary empathy in

the 1990s, he conducted an experiment to see how participants reacted to pictures
of happy and sad faces.

As you might expect, people frowned when they were shown angry faces and
smiled at happy ones. But, surprisingly, people had the same reaction when the
pictures were flashed on the screen so briefly that there was no time to consciously
register them.

So, even though the participants were unaware of whether they were shown happy
or sad faces, they unconsciously responded in the appropriate manner.

Other than psychopaths, who by definition are incapable of feeling empathy, no

one is emotionally immune to the plight of another’s situation.

So, the next time someone tries to tell you that human nature is fundamentally evil,
hopefully you’ll have enough information to prove them wrong!

Final summary
The key message in this book:

Empathy and caring for our fellow human beings comes more naturally to us.
While society tends to emphasize our proclivity toward negative behavior,
biology and science show that living harmoniously and helping one another
are equally inherent traits. It’s what we choose to see and focus on in
ourselves that often becomes the reality.

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your thoughts!

Suggested further reading: Our Inner Ape by Frans de Waal

Human beings are just as closely related to the gentle bonobos as they are to the
aggressive chimpanzees. Frans de Waal compares the lifestyle of these two species
of apes, in whose groups opposing characteristics such as sympathy and violence,
fairness and greed, and dominance and community spirit clash with one another.
Their sexual behavior tells us that we need to rethink the origins of our morality.