Fiction & Storytelling as an Evolutionary Adaptation

Scientists usually seem to focus on environmental and biological pressures that drive evolution because these are the most relevant and important sources of selection pressure for most animals. When it comes to humans, however, the field has to be widened to include culture because human cultural behavior can create new pressures and new opportunities for natural selection to work. Indeed, human cultural behavior itself is a product of natural selection pressures and thus can give insights into how humans have evolved.

Kate Douglas writes in a review of Brian Boyd's On the Origin of Stories: Evolution in New Scientist (May 23, 2009):

Boyd argues that art, including fiction, is a unique human adaptation whose chief function is "for improving human cognition, cooperation and creativity". His excellent accounts of these three areas of human activity show both an impressive mastery of the science and an admirable inclination to question orthodoxy. The "mating mind theory" - art as a product of sexual selection - is subjected to forensic analysis, the notion of "personal narrative" is poohpoohed, and even Aristotle is not beyond cross-examination.

Art, Boyd says, is a form of play. It is an interesting idea. In recent years, biologists who study play have come to see it as an adaptation allowing intelligent animals to hone mental and physical skills in non-threatening environments. This fits perfectly with Boyd's assertion that fiction fosters cognition, cooperation and creativity. Where the idea falls short is in its failure to recognise that play is primarily interactive, whereas storytelling is more of a spectator sport. ...

"Art alters our minds because it engages and reengages our attention," Boyd writes. This may sound obvious, but for Boyd it has sweeping implications for the content of stories. For one, it means that surprise is crucial - fiction must appeal to our evolved preference to pay attention to the unexpected. So too are elements of the fantastical, the ability to take readers beyond the here and now, and the capacity to engage their emotions and appeal to their innate attraction to pattern.

Many researchers believe that the ability to control fire was a key development in human evolution because it allowed us to cook, thereby gaining more calories and nutrients from meat and plants with less work. I wonder if fire wasn't a key ingredient here as well because fire gives light and light gives us the ability to do things after the sun sets.

Before fire, our ancestors had to stop working in the dark; after fire, at least some work could continue -- but if there wasn't enough work to fill the time, what did they do? This set of circumstances might have allowed storytelling and music to develop much further and faster than it otherwise would have. Not as much in the way of these activities could have been done in the daylight, I think, because that time was too precious and had to be used to its fullest.

When do you suppose our ancestors first started telling fictional stories about magic, supernatural beings, and gods? Stories about mundane events that happened that day wouldn't have been enough to capture people's attention and hold it for long. Exciting stories would have been needed and this would have required a very good imagination. So who do you suppose first got the idea to make up supernatural deities for their stories -- and if you could, would you go back in time and smack them?