review session questions

Question 1

what is the rate and direction of change in happiness, and why is it more important than the absolute level of happiness? how does it relate to material acquisitions?

Answer 1

• when you get stuff, you think that it will make you happy, but that happiness goes away
• when you get stuff, it does make you more happy but then the happiness goes away

Question 2

why are emotions designed to be less permanent than they feel?

Answer 2

to motivate our behaviors
-emotions are designed to motivate and not reward
-once you achieve your goal, it is no longer of any use to you

Question 3

three lines of evidence supporting the ideas that emotions are tools used to manipulate us

Answer 3

1. people who get into terrible accidents and become paralyzed graph
   -bad change in circumstances and then it gradually comes back up
2. people who win the lottery graph
3. when people have sex, they have pleasure centers that tells them to do it again
   -maximizing their reproductive success
4. when people feel jealous of others, they will change their behavior get a better outcome

Question 4

two examples to explain why human culture reduces the usefulness of our instincts?

Answer 4

1. first define culture and instincts
2. eea and how we are not adapted to it, how culture is distinct from our instincts
3. firearms, daycare, teenagers when they have sex all of the time, birth control and contraceptives, distribution and industrialization of food, etc.

Question 5

what is the fundamental reproductive equation, and what does it reveal about culture and biology?

Answer 5

sex
pregnancy
babies
maternal child care
loss of female economic power
loss of female political power