Can Evolution Explain Human Emotions? - Dr Randy Nesse | Modern Wisdom Podcast 542

Randy Nesse is a physician, author and founder of the field of evolutionary medicine and evolutionary psychiatry.

Evolution created an odd creature in humans. We're able to fly to the moon and cure diseases. But we also get anxious in the supermarket or depressed if we have a bad week. Why would mother nature make us so fragile? If natural selection is powerful why are mental disorders so common?

Expect to learn why the capacity for low mood exists at all, how low mood and depression could be evolutionarily advantageous, what happens if someone has too little fear or anxiety, why bad feelings are useless but normal, how eating disorders could be an adaptive response to the local environment and much more...

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Check out Randy's Websites - nesse.us and goodreasons.info and evolutionarymedicine.org
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#emotions #evolutionarypsychiatry #depression

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00:00 Intro
00:24 Are Humans Designed for Happiness?
05:11 How Elite Performers Can Find Balance
11:53 Do We Pathologise Natural Responses?
16:58 Anxiety Attacks in an Evolutionary Context
23:15 Dr Nesse’s Smoke Detector Principle
31:57 The Anxiety of Constant Surveillance
38:39 Causes of Low Mood & Depression
42:49 Why We Experience Social Anxiety
50:26 Ancestral Causes of ADHD
1:01:39 The Danger of Low Anxiety
1:07:51 Did Evolution Cause Eating Disorders?
1:12:31 Genetic Existence of Schizophrenia & Bipolar
1:17:25 Is Modernisation to Blame for Mental Illness?

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