Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-qsmjn Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T12:19:53.377Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Just My Imagination: Beauty premium and the evolved mental model

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 March 2017

Ryo Oda*
Affiliation:
Graduate School of Engineering, Nagoya Institute of Technology, Gokiso-cho, Showa-ku, Nagoya 466-8555, Japan. oda.ryo@nitech.ac.jphttps://sites.google.com/site/ethologyodakeneng/

Abstract

Imagination, an important feature of the human mind, may be at the root of the beauty premium. The evolved human capacity for simulating the real world, developed as an adaptation to a complex social environment, may offer the key to understanding this and many other aspects of human behavior.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Aiello, L. C. & Wheeler, P. (1995) The expensive-tissue hypothesis: The brain and the digestive system in human and primate evolution. Current Anthropology 36:199221.Google Scholar
Bering, J. (2010) The God instinct. Nicholas Brealey.Google Scholar
Dennett, D. (1995) Darwin's dangerous idea. Simon & Schuster.Google Scholar
Geary, D. C. (2005) The origin of mind. American Psychological Association.Google Scholar
Nowak, M. A. & Sigmund, K. (1998) Evolution of indirect reciprocity by image scoring. Nature 393:573–77.Google Scholar
Oda, R., Niwa, Y., Honma, A. & Hiraishi, K. (2011) An eye-like painting enhances the expectation of a good reputation. Evolution and Human Behavior 32:166–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pinker, S. (1997) How the mind works. Norton.Google Scholar
Premack, D. & Woodruff, G. (1978) Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind? Behavioral and Brain Sciences 1:515–26.Google Scholar
Shermer, M. (2011) The believing brain. Times Books.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tinbergen, N. (1963) On aims and methods of ethology. Zeitschrift für Tierpsychologie 20:410–33.CrossRefGoogle Scholar