This is Part One of a three part series: Part Two here, Part Three here
Evolutionary Perspectives
Daily life is full of emotions, from the pleasures of happiness and love to the pains of worry, frustration, sorrow, and anger.
While we may take them for granted, our feelings are actually an extraordinary evolutionary achievement, as remarkable in their own way as language and logic.
Animals have emotions, too, as Darwin observed in his book, The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals, in 1872. But consider the apparent emotions in a spectrum of animals, from – say – snakes and lizards, to squirrels, dogs, and monkeys, and then to human beings. There is a direct correlation between the complexity of social life of a species and the range and depth of the emotions of its members. Because our relationships are so layered, nuanced, enduring, and plain messy, humans have the greatest emotional range of any animal.
In our species, emotions serve many functions. They arouse our interest and tell us what to pay attention to. They motivate approach strategies through pleasant feelings and motivate avoidance or attack strategies through unpleasant ones. They enable us to share states of mind with other members of our family, tribe, or nation – and to signal or detect important states of mind such as fear, disgust, anger, or erotic interest. They bond children and parents, lovers and friends.
