Prologue
Suppose Albert Einstein and Charles Darwin got together and decided to combine their theories, to turn the Theory of Evolution into a function of the efficient transfer of energy, and put biology onto the same playing field as astro-physics and atomic physics. It wouldn’t be hard. Biologists have already done this in real life for other animals.
The big challenge is figuring out how the efficient transfer of energy applies to human behavior. So Albert Einstein and Charles Darwin join William Shakespeare’s theatre company, to learn what he knew about human behavior, in order to write a theory for human behavior as a function of the efficient transfer of energy.
The big challenge in evolutionary psychology right now lies in breaking human behavior down into manageable components, without leaving anything out, in order to discover some sort of theory that encompasses the entire realm of human behavior. Various evolutionary psychologists have discovered pieces of this puzzle, but no one has yet discovered a singular, universally applicable, and thoroughly useful theory of human behavior.
Theatre artists began searching for a singular, universally applicable, and thoroughly useful theory of human behavior roughly 25 centuries ago, in ancient Greece. It has been discovered. Today, actors, directors, and writers use it to win Oscar Awards for their stunningly realistic replications of human behavior.
There are just a few catches. First, theatre artists have figured out how to do this largely intuitively. Second, they had no way of connecting human behavior to its evolutionary origins. Third, these are artists, not scientists, so they use different professional language. Fourth, artists also use a fundamentally different definition of the nature of reality. Fifth, artists have a fundamentally different definition of what constitutes observable evidence.
The hypothetical story of Albert Einstein and Charles Darwin going to work in Will Shakespeare’s theatre company is a metaphor for my life. A small fraction of a percent of people share my scientific abilities, but the same can be said of my artistic abilities, which is why I’ve worked in theatre for most of my adult life. When I learned about the field of evolutionary psychology, numerous connections between theatre and evolutionary psychology were immediately obvious to me.
Theatre artists win Oscar Awards because they’ve discovered the evolutionary psychology equivalent of dark matter. Now they use it effectively as the central component of their singular, universally applicable, and thoroughly useful theory of human behavior.
I call this book The Theory of Evolutionary Relativity because with a sufficient understanding of how sensory input interacts with humans’ (or other animals’) brains to produce output, a person can convert directly from one to the other, and can refer to sensory input in terms of its inevitable or potential energy output. Great artists make the conversion intuitively. At this point, enough is understood about evolutionary psychology that how artists do it, and why they produce accurate results, can be derived from first principles, and is supported by a body of evidence that is so large that, although it wasn’t collected in a closely controlled environment, consistent patterns of cause and effect can be identified.
This book is the most controversial approach ever to the most controversial field of study ever. I’ve had to develop my own professional language to use in talking about my work, which is a hybrid of scientific and artistic professional languages. Reading this book will require a considerable amount of creative thought, and a great deal of emotional fortitude. I think perhaps I should remind everyone that new fields of study are pioneered first, and then people develop professional languages for talking about them.
In this book I cite very few references for two specific reasons. First, this entire book is based on elementary principles of evolutionary psychology and elementary principles of theatre. These elementary principles can be found anywhere; so leaving it up to anyone who is curious to look for them on their own is my proof of how elementary they are.
Second, and more importantly, despite how elementary these principles of theatre are, their applications are very complex. My work is the product of my career in theatre. No evolutionary psychologist can replicate my work just by reading a few pages out of a book. An effective way to replicate my work would be to consult a theatrical director in person, with the goal of cross-referencing your two bodies of knowledge.