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Strong Feelings
Why emotions are an extremely poor guide to action in our modern complex world
Evolution had to solve a difficult problem. As vertebrates became increasingly complex, a wider range of ecological niches could be exploited. But a wider range of niches often implied greater environmental diversity, and greater diversity requires more complex choices to be made.
Insects operate almost entirely on the basis of their neural hardwiring. Animals like flies and beetles and ants function according to the patterns of physical connection of their neurons. A very tiny number of insect species can learn basic patterns (for example, cockroaches can learn to navigate a maze) but most remain firmly within the realm of hardwired behaviors that cannot be modified. These behaviors are sufficient for the insect to function within its ecological niche and their vast numbers mean that any individual mismatch between hardwiring and environment is statistically meaningless and therefore exerts no selection pressure on the species.
More complex animals, however, are fewer in number which means any mismatch between environment and creature will exert quite a powerful selection pressure. Complex animals need to be able to adapt to a variety of different circumstances. While dragonflies merely need to possess a few dozen behaviors in their…
