The Folly of Fools

September 26, 2011
Are there biological advantages to the practice of deceiving oneself and each other? The two are related, says noted Rutgers biologist Trivers in a spirited, provocative exploration of the evolutionary logic of deceit and self-deception: “we deceive ourselves the better to deceive others.” The self-deception Trivers is concerned with is unconscious, not planned. Deception, whether in family relations, in religion, sex or historical accounts, occurs at every level of life: parasite and host, predator and prey, plant and animal, male and female, neighbor and neighbor, parent and offspring. Even though our senses show us the truth of the world around us, our conscious minds often distort it: we project onto others traits that in fact characterize us; we repress painful memories, rationalize immoral behavior, and act repeatedly to boost self-opinion. But the costs of self-deception include the misapprehension of reality, especially social reality, and the possibility of making ourselves immune to the needs of others and ourselves. For example, airline pilots sometimes commit deadly errors out of self-deception that arises from overconfidence in their skills and lack of awareness of the dangers posed by a certain situation. Stimulating but also challenging for lay readers, Trivers’s study provides an energetic exploration of a perplexing human trait.