“Fight or Flight” vs. “Tend and Befriend:” The Yin and Yang of Human Social Life

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Last week I wrote a post suggesting that goodness, compassion, and cooperation with others is a biological imperative. I argued that being good to others is part of our evolutionary history—a response that developed to solve the problems of our harsh physical environments. In essence, humans as a species have underwhelming physical capabilities, and so overcoming obstacles in the environment through brute physical force becomes difficult. Instead, infants rely on mothers, adults cooperate with neighbors, and farmers barter with hunters. In this way, humans cooperate to survive.

In the comments section of that post, one of our readers made a second observation about human nature—that we also have a tendency to think in terms of “Us” versus “Them.”  That is, humans also have an innate ability to identify and respond to potential dangers, threats, or competitors in their social environments. This is also a result of our evolutionary history in that being able to identify environmental threats is important for survival.

So who is right? Are we Born to Be Good or are we cursed with a Selfish Gene?

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