Keeping a mate: Till death us do part

Lock on Chains
The chains that bind: Are they evolutionary? Photograph: Corbis Corbis/Corbis

I'm trapped by morality

From Michael, 40s, by email


Ask Carole: Chimpanzee wearing spectacles

Carole replies:
You seem very confident of the number of healthy women available to you for fertilisation; it sounds like you have acquired a harem! Does your wife know? Younger women may be attracted to financial security but that's not all that attracts them. You are in your early 40s; your semen volume and your sperm motility (movement) will be falling as middle age spreads around the girth.

You have one son and I'm guessing he is of school age and thus he requires parenting. You are mistaken in viewing your status quo as a dilemma of moralities versus descendents. One child that is heavily invested in can do far better in evolutionary terms than five neglected children. Your best strategy is to support your wife enabling her to give her best to your son.

The sentiments of love and guilt are not Christian hangovers, they are evolved, higher cognitive emotions. These sentiments are adapted to best guide us through life. There is variation within species. These sentiments are not evenly distributed among all humans and neither are they fail-safe, but if you feel love when you think of your infertile wife and your only son then get happy quick! Why not spend some of your wealth on a family holiday?

Kidd, S, et al (2001). Effects of male age on semen quality and fertility: a review of the literature. Fertility and Sterility, Volume 75, Issue 2, Pages 237-248.

Van Vugt, M & Hart, CM (2004). Social identity as social glue: The origins of group loyalty (2004). Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 86, 585-598.

De Waal, FBM & Bonnie, KE (2004). Primate Social Reciprocity and the Origin of Gratitude, p213, in The Psychology of Gratitude, Oxford University Press.

A mid-life crisis

From anonymous male, 50, by email
This is a classic mid-life crisis thing: guy reaches 50, falls radically out of love with wife and into insanely devastating love with Younger Woman, who turns him down because she's (sort of) happily married with three children, or four, depending how you count these things.

He's a nice guy at heart and reckons he should leave his wife out of honesty, to give her a chance to rebuild her life with someone who might really love her. But out of pure cowardice he lets himself be talked into staying, which is materially an easyish option. He's inevitably going to fall in love with another Younger Woman, so this time round is he capable of self-sacrifice and staying? Would this be a good idea? If he leaves, is guilt going to kill him? What do I do?

Ask Carole: Chimpanzee wearing spectacles

Carole replies:
You say you fell "insanely" for a younger, married mum with four children – this woman doesn't sound available to me. You say you were talked into staying. Was it your wife who talked you into staying, because she knows you better than you know yourself? Or did the other women do the talking because she didn't want you full-time? Do you want the excitement of love, the serotonin high and endorphin rush without making the life-change you speak of? You ask if guilt would kill you – would your wife's survival be threatened without you? You mention self-sacrifice – is your wife hard to live with? Or are you comfortable and bored? Your wife might manage very well without you.


Humans have an innate appreciation of natural beauty. If you can take a break I recommend you leave behind both work and domestic pressures and go travelling. Make use of your evolved, higher primate ability to self-reflect, and test your instincts in an environment unknown to you. You need to be up against the elements and relying on your intuition to discover what it really is that you want from the rest of your life.

Through a Window: My Thirty Years With the Chimpanzees of Gombe. Jane Goodall. Mariner Books (paperback) April 2010.

My fear of snakes

From Johnny Viper, ageless, by email
I have a bit of a problem with snakes. The weird thing is, I was born in New Zealand and have lived here all my life. But there are no snakes here so my phobia is a bit of a mystery. When running the other day, I jumped five feet in the air when I saw an old belt on the floor and mistook it for a snake. All kinds of tubular entities terrify me (though only temporarily, when I remember there are no snakes here). I consulted my priest about it, but he just mumbled a load of rubbish about the Lord working in mysterious ways before scuttling off to make a cup of tea. Can evolutionary theory offer any well-grounded, empirically testable hypothesis for my phobia?

Ask Carole: Chimpanzee wearing spectacles

Carole replies:
Your personal observation of being terrified by snakes or objects of a similar shape (congratulations on jumping five feet in the air, you are obviously a healthy male) is a phenomenon shared by millions of other Homo sapiens and all other primate species. The instinctive fear of spiders and other potentially venomous creepy-crawlies is an adaptation handed down to us from our ancestors whose fear reflex prevented them from succumbing to a poisonous bite just long enough to breed. The interesting thing here is that young infants, (who are at the life stage less impacted on by subsequent selection since the human lineage split away from old world monkeys some 20m years ago – meaning infants exhibit ancient simians reflexes) do not show a fear of snakes or spiders. This atavistic fear of potentially venomous critters is acquired in humans once the infant begins to walk. Prior to walking the suckling baby primate is carried by its mother and it is her reflex that protects them both.

Rakison, D (2009). Does women's greater fear of snakes and spiders originate in infancy? Evolution and Human Behavior, Volume 30, Issue 6, p438-444.
