My quest to see the 50 things a Kentuckian should see before 50 begins at the top of everyone's list: the Kentucky Derby. I will send a report hereafter.
Saturday, May 02, 2009
Derby Day
My quest to see the 50 things a Kentuckian should see before 50 begins at the top of everyone's list: the Kentucky Derby. I will send a report hereafter.
Friday, May 01, 2009
Mothers and Others Conclusion: Grandmothers as Allomothers
Sarah Blaffer Hrdy has done some of her most interesting work promoting the "grandmother hypothesis." There is a puzzle why women have menopause long before life ends. Even in prehistoric societies, there would have been lots of grandmothers. The ingenious hypothesis is that women stop bearing kids early so that they can help raise their grandchildren. Since human babies take so much longer to mature than other animals, alloparenting (nurture by other than mothers and fathers) by grandparents would be a huge help in the survival and lives of children. And of all grandparents, the mother's mother is, other things equal, most likely to invest deeply in helping her daughter with the grandchildren.
The puzzle that Hrdy addresses in Mothers and Others comes from the widely accepted finding by seminal anthropologist George Peter Murdock that most societies were patrilocal. Even if a child's mother's mother was alive and ready to help, if mother and father moved in with his family in another village, her willingness to help would be to no avail. However, Hrdy reports, when Helen Alvarez re-examined Murdock's data, she found that the situation was not so cut-and-dried. Even if a society was normally patrilocal, often the new parents would stay with her mother at first when the first grandchild was born, to learn the ropes. And in other societies, (including our own) it was common for an expectant mother to go back to her mother's house to have the baby, then come back to her husband's house some months later. Citing other studies, Hrdy also reported that in polygamous societies, if a man married sisters, their mother was likely to move near them.
It does take many helpers and many hands besides mother's and father's to raise a child. And the most useful other hands, the best alloparents, are grandmothers.
The puzzle that Hrdy addresses in Mothers and Others comes from the widely accepted finding by seminal anthropologist George Peter Murdock that most societies were patrilocal. Even if a child's mother's mother was alive and ready to help, if mother and father moved in with his family in another village, her willingness to help would be to no avail. However, Hrdy reports, when Helen Alvarez re-examined Murdock's data, she found that the situation was not so cut-and-dried. Even if a society was normally patrilocal, often the new parents would stay with her mother at first when the first grandchild was born, to learn the ropes. And in other societies, (including our own) it was common for an expectant mother to go back to her mother's house to have the baby, then come back to her husband's house some months later. Citing other studies, Hrdy also reported that in polygamous societies, if a man married sisters, their mother was likely to move near them.
It does take many helpers and many hands besides mother's and father's to raise a child. And the most useful other hands, the best alloparents, are grandmothers.
Mothers and Others Conclusion: Grandmothers as Allomothers
Sarah Blaffer Hrdy has done some of her most interesting work promoting the "grandmother hypothesis." There is a puzzle why women have menopause long before life ends. Even in prehistoric societies, there would have been lots of grandmothers. The ingenious hypothesis is that women stop bearing kids early so that they can help raise their grandchildren. Since human babies take so much longer to mature than other animals, alloparenting (nurture by other than mothers and fathers) by grandparents would be a huge help in the survival and lives of children. And of all grandparents, the mother's mother is, other things equal, most likely to invest deeply in helping her daughter with the grandchildren.
The puzzle that Hrdy addresses in Mothers and Others comes from the widely accepted finding by seminal anthropologist George Peter Murdock that most societies were patrilocal. Even if a child's mother's mother was alive and ready to help, if mother and father moved in with his family in another village, her willingness to help would be to no avail. However, Hrdy reports, when Helen Alvarez re-examined Murdock's data, she found that the situation was not so cut-and-dried. Even if a society was normally patrilocal, often the new parents would stay with her mother at first when the first grandchild was born, to learn the ropes. And in other societies, (including our own) it was common for an expectant mother to go back to her mother's house to have the baby, then come back to her husband's house some months later. Citing other studies, Hrdy also reported that in polygamous societies, if a man married sisters, their mother was likely to move near them.
It does take many helpers and many hands besides mother's and father's to raise a child. And the most useful other hands, the best alloparents, are grandmothers.
The puzzle that Hrdy addresses in Mothers and Others comes from the widely accepted finding by seminal anthropologist George Peter Murdock that most societies were patrilocal. Even if a child's mother's mother was alive and ready to help, if mother and father moved in with his family in another village, her willingness to help would be to no avail. However, Hrdy reports, when Helen Alvarez re-examined Murdock's data, she found that the situation was not so cut-and-dried. Even if a society was normally patrilocal, often the new parents would stay with her mother at first when the first grandchild was born, to learn the ropes. And in other societies, (including our own) it was common for an expectant mother to go back to her mother's house to have the baby, then come back to her husband's house some months later. Citing other studies, Hrdy also reported that in polygamous societies, if a man married sisters, their mother was likely to move near them.
It does take many helpers and many hands besides mother's and father's to raise a child. And the most useful other hands, the best alloparents, are grandmothers.
Thursday, April 30, 2009
Mothers and Others 4: Nuclear Families and Alloparenting
Sarah Blaffer Hrdy makes a strong case that humans needed to develop alloparenting – parenting by others besides mother and father. Therefore, she says, mothers can’t depend on any one family structure, but need to be flexible to get help wherever they need to. I agree with this conclusion. However, Hrdy goes on to say that the nuclear family is not an optimal structure because it can’t provide enough care and resources that demanding and slow-growing human babies need.
I think Hrdy’s criticism misses how nuclear families work. A married mother and father are the core of the unit that cares for children, but they are rarely all of it. Even in our highly mobile society, where couples in the middle class often live far from their extended families, nuclear families get lots of help from grandparents, aunts and uncles, and more distant kin.
A nuclear family is not a self-sufficient unit. Not in theory, and certainly not in practice. Instead, when a mother and father marry they bring together two lines of support for the benefit of their children. This is one of the great advantages that children in two-parent families have over single-parent kids: they have two sets of grandparents and two sets of aunts and uncles.
Mothers do need to be flexible. They do need to be ready to take help from many sources, especially if they are not married. But the nuclear family still remains the best structure for parenting, and for mobilizing the most reliable network of alloparenting. Mothers need to work hard to create some alternative network if they are unable to make a nuclear family.
I think Hrdy’s criticism misses how nuclear families work. A married mother and father are the core of the unit that cares for children, but they are rarely all of it. Even in our highly mobile society, where couples in the middle class often live far from their extended families, nuclear families get lots of help from grandparents, aunts and uncles, and more distant kin.
A nuclear family is not a self-sufficient unit. Not in theory, and certainly not in practice. Instead, when a mother and father marry they bring together two lines of support for the benefit of their children. This is one of the great advantages that children in two-parent families have over single-parent kids: they have two sets of grandparents and two sets of aunts and uncles.
Mothers do need to be flexible. They do need to be ready to take help from many sources, especially if they are not married. But the nuclear family still remains the best structure for parenting, and for mobilizing the most reliable network of alloparenting. Mothers need to work hard to create some alternative network if they are unable to make a nuclear family.
Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Mothers and Others 3: Alloparenting Means Faster Babies
Humans beings are very slow to mature. We are the slowest of all primates, and probably the slowest of all animals. In other slow-maturing species, that means a long gap between babies. But not us. We can have new babies long before the earlier ones are mature because mothers get so much help from others.
In other apes, mothers rarely let go of their babies, not even to let their sisters or mothers hold or help, and certainly not the fathers of the babies. Human beings stand out for how much "alloparenting" - care by others - we do and accept. In foraging bands, fathers normally share in child care very extensively. This makes human mothers, especially in societies in which alloparenting is normal, confident that they can trust their babies to have extensive contact with other people.
Sarah Hrdy's main concern is to explain how intersubjectivity developed among humans. Alloparenting, she things, is the key difference. Mothers in many mammals, especially other primates, have reason to learn how to read the faces, noises, movements, and even minds of their babies, and babies need to develop similar skills in reading their mothers. But in humans, who are often in the care of "other mothers," it would be hugely valuable for babies to learn how to read other people, too, people with whom they did not share the whole range of smells and sounds that mothers and their babies do.
Hrdy reports that kids attached to their moms are better fed, but kids also attached to others were more empathetic, dominant, independent, and achievement oriented. This is an immediate fruit of a society, and species, trusting enough for alloparenting.
In other apes, mothers rarely let go of their babies, not even to let their sisters or mothers hold or help, and certainly not the fathers of the babies. Human beings stand out for how much "alloparenting" - care by others - we do and accept. In foraging bands, fathers normally share in child care very extensively. This makes human mothers, especially in societies in which alloparenting is normal, confident that they can trust their babies to have extensive contact with other people.
Sarah Hrdy's main concern is to explain how intersubjectivity developed among humans. Alloparenting, she things, is the key difference. Mothers in many mammals, especially other primates, have reason to learn how to read the faces, noises, movements, and even minds of their babies, and babies need to develop similar skills in reading their mothers. But in humans, who are often in the care of "other mothers," it would be hugely valuable for babies to learn how to read other people, too, people with whom they did not share the whole range of smells and sounds that mothers and their babies do.
Hrdy reports that kids attached to their moms are better fed, but kids also attached to others were more empathetic, dominant, independent, and achievement oriented. This is an immediate fruit of a society, and species, trusting enough for alloparenting.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Mothers and Others 2: Gendered Mind Reading
Sarah Blaffer Hrdy, in Mothers and Others, needs to figure out how humans developed intersubjectivity or a "theory of mind" - that is, the ability to understand what other people are thinking and feeling. She says that there are two main theories. One, that mothers needed to develop a capacity to read the minds of their pre-verbal babies. Two, that people needed to develop a "Machiavellian mind" to understand and anticipte the plans of their rivals. To these she adds a third strong motivation: babies need to understand what their caregivers are thinking and feeling. As Hrdy puts it, a baby's first job is to get mom addicted to nurturing, and that requires that babies need to know how to read mom.
I was surprised that Hrdy did not emphasize how gendered these theories are. When she names the chief proponents of the mother's mind-reading theory and the Machiavellian mind theory it is easy to see that the former are women and the latter are men. Hrdy notes regularly that as a mother she is very attentive to how babies interact with mothers.
I think these gender differences in theories of mind reading strengthen the case that they are true. If men, women, and children all have strong and distinct reasons to do something, that makes me more convinced that it is really true. Moreover, the different kinds of mind reading complement one another. My focus is on mate selection and marriage. Women select men who can provide resources; men who can anticipate rivals and cooperate with allies should be better at getting resources. Men select women who will be good nurturers; women who can understand what their families need even when the need has not been said in words would be better at nurturing.
I would add one more reason that humans need intersubjectivity. Women need to read whether men are really committed before they take the great risk of having children with them. And men, to a lesser extent, need to be confident that the women they marry will stay faithful to them. Women rely on mind reading more than men do, and often expect men to do the same. This leads to many miscommunications in courtship and marriage.
Nonetheless, human beings - women, men, children - have a strong need to be able to understand what other people are thinking and feeling, even without words. Whether, as Hrdy thinks, this capacity evolved or if we acquired it some other way, it is still a skill useful enough to keep. Which is reason enough for human beings to do it more, and more effectively, than any other creatures.
I was surprised that Hrdy did not emphasize how gendered these theories are. When she names the chief proponents of the mother's mind-reading theory and the Machiavellian mind theory it is easy to see that the former are women and the latter are men. Hrdy notes regularly that as a mother she is very attentive to how babies interact with mothers.
I think these gender differences in theories of mind reading strengthen the case that they are true. If men, women, and children all have strong and distinct reasons to do something, that makes me more convinced that it is really true. Moreover, the different kinds of mind reading complement one another. My focus is on mate selection and marriage. Women select men who can provide resources; men who can anticipate rivals and cooperate with allies should be better at getting resources. Men select women who will be good nurturers; women who can understand what their families need even when the need has not been said in words would be better at nurturing.
I would add one more reason that humans need intersubjectivity. Women need to read whether men are really committed before they take the great risk of having children with them. And men, to a lesser extent, need to be confident that the women they marry will stay faithful to them. Women rely on mind reading more than men do, and often expect men to do the same. This leads to many miscommunications in courtship and marriage.
Nonetheless, human beings - women, men, children - have a strong need to be able to understand what other people are thinking and feeling, even without words. Whether, as Hrdy thinks, this capacity evolved or if we acquired it some other way, it is still a skill useful enough to keep. Which is reason enough for human beings to do it more, and more effectively, than any other creatures.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Mothers and Others 1
This week I will be blogging on Sarah Blaffer Hrdy's Mothers and Others: The Evolutionary Origins of Mutual Understanding. Her concern is figuring out how human beings evolved the capacity to share childrearing - what she calls alloparenting - with others who are not mother or father to the baby. The "it takes a village to raise a child" strategy is very helpful for humans, and very different from what is normal to the Great Apes.
Hrdy argues that empathy and giving are hard-wired in us. We can see from brain scans that people find helping others inherently rewarding. One of the most striking findings that she reports is that people are more cooperative than economists assume: in a one-shot Prisoner’s Dilemma game, 42% cooperate anyway. In multiple iterations of the game, when we can see who is generous and who is not, the cooperative people tend to get even more trusting and cooperative.
A crucial point that I take from these experiments is that we want to be cooperative. We are very sensitive to who else is cooperative, and whether the social environment makes cooperation normal. If the people we most depend on are reliable, and most people we deal with are, too, then we tend to be cooperative and trusting in new situations because that is the kind of person we want to be - even though we might get suckered.
On the other hand, children who are betrayed by adults have a much harder time trusting and cooperating.
Hrdy argues that empathy and giving are hard-wired in us. We can see from brain scans that people find helping others inherently rewarding. One of the most striking findings that she reports is that people are more cooperative than economists assume: in a one-shot Prisoner’s Dilemma game, 42% cooperate anyway. In multiple iterations of the game, when we can see who is generous and who is not, the cooperative people tend to get even more trusting and cooperative.
A crucial point that I take from these experiments is that we want to be cooperative. We are very sensitive to who else is cooperative, and whether the social environment makes cooperation normal. If the people we most depend on are reliable, and most people we deal with are, too, then we tend to be cooperative and trusting in new situations because that is the kind of person we want to be - even though we might get suckered.
On the other hand, children who are betrayed by adults have a much harder time trusting and cooperating.
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Presbyterian Gay Ordination Fails Again
The vote was closer this time, but outcome was the same as it has been the last three times. Will that settle the issue? Of course not. Look for a wave of overtures to the next General Assembly to try exactly the same thing again.
If we adopted the new Form of Government, we would not have to tear up the whole church every two years over this issue.
If we adopted the new Form of Government, we would not have to tear up the whole church every two years over this issue.
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