Adaptationism.com

We tend to think we know what is adaptive, as if there was only one way of thinking about what adaptation means in each context. When talking about living things, we may think of adaptation in terms of traits that increase survival and reproduction. In non-biological contexts, such as design, we may consider phrases like “form follows function,” and consider an adaptive product to be one that is both functional, and has a form that does not increase consumer confusion, waste, or cost.

There is no particular problem with these first-approximation approaches to the word. But they don’t go deep enough. They don’t plumb the potential that is in this word to think deeply about our lives in a world that is always shaped by change, within us and outside us, and seeking equilibrium on terms that are continually new.

In Adaptationism as a mode of thought, decision-making, and analysis, which is an ‘-ism’ in the sense that it is considered an identity-shaping intellectual tool for our lives as a whole – an essential, and not just an accessory – we see Adaptation as having 4 fundamental levels of analysis, when determining whether something in human life – a behavior, mental state (pattern we recognize, emotion, desire, idea), or something we add, take away from, or change in the environment around us or within us (a tool, technology, built environment, human-caused change to an ecosystem, etc.) – is adaptive or maladaptive:

1. Does it help the individual survive, pair-bond, reproduce, and nurture their young well enough that their young are also likely to survive, reproduce, and do a good job of nurturing their young as well? (It is notable that Darwinian analysis rarely discusses pair-bonding and nurture as variables in addition to survival and reproduction, even though humans are the most nurture-needing of all creatures, with our prolonged period of physical helplessness and our even longer period of socioemotional maturation and general learning requiring the most dedicated caregivers possible – and devotion is most reliably achieved in a monogamous pair-bond in which the couple is securely attached. The more complex the society, the longer the developmental period of learning how to live within it tends to be, so the need of nurture is not decreasing, as society becomes more sophisticated, but increasing. In other words, abundance isn’t making life developmentally easier, but more developmentally complex. This makes securely attached parental couples who stay together with mutual respect and affection for the entire developmental arc of their children not less important, but more important, than it has ever been before. But you would not think that to be the case, if you read the many odious odes to non-monogamy you can find online and in books. Regardless of how our ancestors may have lived, when attachment structures were more plural and less focused on the mother primarily and father secondarily, the fact remains that we do not live in tribes, plural attachment structures do not develop naturally in modern communities, and this means that secure attachment depends on the parents by default, since it is not developing with a variety of third parties who are likely to remain constant in children’s lives. Plural attachment in tribes worked because everyone moved together; in modern societies, even if plural attachments developed, they would be cut short when people moved apart – which defeats the purpose of attachment in providing a sense of stable continuity over time.)
2. Does it help the group remain coherent and identifiable over time? This always requires both a) Resisting being conquered, destroyed, or collapsing, within any given generation; b) Continuing to perpetuate its identity over time to subsequent generations/members, which always requires a combination of achieving a strong influence over the socializing process in the formative years, or, being so intrinsically desirable to the alternatives that it is preferred over them even when the alternatives are known and have also influenced socialization. The Amish are a unique example of a group that has been prevented from a full monopoly over socializing influences by being required to attend formal schooling, yet remain sufficiently desirable to their members during Rumspringa that most choose to remain Amish despite the opportunity to pursue an alternative life outside the community.
3. Does it help manage the human population and the planet’s resources well enough that future generations – including the descendants of ourselves, or others in our families, or those of others in our communities – will have a similarly good shot at surviving, pair-bonding, reproducing, and nurturing their young? The tension, here, is that both of the first two senses of adaptation can conflict. For instance, if everyone maximizes their chances at reproduction, then the world will be even more overpopulated. If everyone maximizes their investments in nurturing their children with enriching experiences – say, trips around the world – then the world’s ecology will be even more harmed. So, adaptation is not so straightforward as we may like to think. What is adaptive in one sense may be maladaptive in another. And, frustratingly, there is no choice that is trade-off free. Something that decreased survival, pair-bonding, reproduction/fertility, or nurturing might be a “win” for Team Planet and loss for Team Thriving – it may improve ecological health by, in effect, hurting the health of human being. For another example, a group that increased its capacity to defend itself against external groups by vast accumulations of weapons of war might help the group be better adapted to continuing itself over time, free from risk of external conquest or destruction – but may undermine the ecological base on which it rests, and ultimately depends for its existence, in ways that make its collapse more likely.
4. If we are talking about some human-created thing being adaptative or not – an idea, a habit, an attitude, a perspective, a technology – we can ask whether it is narrowly adaptive (does it achieve the function we are trying to achieve with it?), but we can also ask the questions above: how does it help individuals adapt? How does it help groups adapt? How does it balance these goals of immediate function, individual adaptation, and group adaptation with the ecological element that also acts as a potential constrain on the thriving of individuals and groups?