#The Moral Animal
First and foremost: an uncritical read of this book will leave you feeling cynical and a bit cheated. It ranks up there with E.O. Wilson’s Sociobiology and Richard Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene1. It would be very easy to find yourself getting defensive about the material presented in here; especially if you believe humans to be some special exception among animals.
Meanwhile, with a more critical approach, you will find that you cannot get Robert Wright’s The Moral Animal out of your head: it is insightful, intellectually rigorous, even-handed, and at times palpably funny. Plus, you will find that it informs a great many (all?) of the human discourse (verbal or otherwise) that you encounter daily — how certain traits and behaviors came to be and the functions they serve.
Don’t ask about their intentions though; we need to remember that evolution is goal-less, after all. Put most succinctly:
We are built to be effective animals, not happy ones.
- Though I will readily admit that I know these two texts primarily by reputation, having only read excerpts and not their entireties.[↩]
