Kluge - Gary Marcus

Main points of Kluge

1. Insight into Evolutionary History
2. Improve ourselves by knowing ourselves ( our strength and weaknesses )

Chapters

• People
1. William Shakespeare
2. Richard Lederer
3. Ed Smylie
4. Jackson Granholm
5. Aristotle, John Stuart Mill and Adam Smith (Rational Man)
6. John Tooby & Leda Cosmides (Evolutionary psychology)
7. Martin Daly & Margo Wilson (Infanticide)
8. Martie Haselton & David Buss (Over interpret sexual intention)
9. Richard Dawkins
10. Herb Simon (Satisficing)
11. Francois Jacob
12. John Allman (Neuroscientist: Progressive overlay of Technologies)
13. Jerome Groopman: How doctors think
14. Barbara Touchman: The march of Folly
15. Leslie Orgel: Mother Nature is smarter than you are.
16. Dan Dennett: Philosopher
17. Stephen Jay Gould: Imperfections( the useless, the odd, the peculiar & the incongruous )
18. Peter Gollwitzer: Contingency Plans (If then Else )
19. Timothy Wilson
• Remnants of History
• Memory
• Belief
• Choice
• Language
• Pleasure
• Things Fall Apart
• True Wisdom

1. Whenever possible, consider alternative hypotheses.
2. Refrane the question.
3. always remember that correlation does not entail causation.
4. Never forget the size of your sample.
5. Anticipate your own impulsivity and pre-commit.
6. Don’t just set goals. Make contingency plans.
7. Whenever possible, don’t make important decisions when you are tired or have other things on your mind.
8. Always benefits against costs.
9. Imagine that your decisions may be spot-checked.
10. Distance yourself.
11. Beware the vivid, the personal and the anecdotal.
12. Pick your spots.
13. Try to be rational.

Main Point

• Emotional outburst
• Mediocre Memory
• Vulnerable to prejudice
• Nature: If something works, it spreads. Adequacy is the name of the game.
• Evolutionary Inertia
• Human Brain
• HindBrain (1/2 billion yrs old ): Respiration, Balance, Alertness
• Mid Brain : Auditory & visual reflexes
• Forebrain : Language and Decision making
• Relative Recent Evolution
• Bacteria : 3 Billion Years
• Mammals : 300 million years
• Human Beings : Couple of hundred thousand years
• Language, Complex Culture and Capacity for deliberate thought : 50,000 years
• Creatures who didn’t have language, didn’t have culture and didn’t reason deliberately. Originally adapted for very different purpose.
• Genome

Counter Point

• Optimization is inevitable outcome of Evolution.