This tendency to 'confabulate' or 'rationalize' extends to healthy, whole-brain patients as well, and makes it difficult for us to know the truth about our own motives. Experiments involving split-brain patients demonstrate that the human brain can fabricate bogus explanations out of whole cloth and deliver them as if they were the known truth. The Counterfeit Reasons chapter looks at one particular form of self-deception: strategic ignorance about our motives. Perhaps the most subtle form of self-deception is self-discretion, wherein sensitive information is whispered rather than shouted by the different modules of the brain. Our brains are capable of these epistemic contortions because they are modular: composed of different pieces which aren't always consistent with each other. In other words, we hide uncomfortable truths from ourselves (and occasionally substitute pretty fictions in their place) to more effectively mislead others about our own knowledge and intentions. The New School of self-deception, a more evolutionary approach pioneered by Robert Trivers and Robert Kurzban, argues instead that we deceive ourselves in order to manipulate other people. The Old School of self-deception, pioneered by Sigmund and Anna Freud, argued that we deceive ourselves as a defense mechanism.

The Self-Deception chapter gets to the heart of the elephant, discussing why and how our brains conspire to distort reality and hide information. As others are lazy and would rather not bother to enforce our norm violations, minor sins make it not seem worth the bother, discreet communication makes it harder to show what we said, and ready-made excuses make it harder for others to show our motives. When weak norms require common knowledge to prosecute violations, we can often get away with violating them by wearing the thinnest of fig leaves. The most interesting transgressions, however, aren't the blatant ones that have to be carefully covered up, but rather those that take place in broad daylight. The Cheating chapter describes how, in the face of norms, humans typically have incentives to cheat, at least when they think they can get away with it. The chapter also discusses a handful of subtle but important norms, including those against bragging, currying favor, sub-group politics, and (broadly) selfish motives. The threat of gossip and the responsibility of maintaining one's reputation also helped with norm enforcement.

The egalitarian nature of this lifestyle was enabled in large part by weapons, which enabled a coalition of weaker group members to enforce norms on even the strongest members. The chapter begins by surveying the lifestyle of our hunter-gatherer ancestors, who lived in nomadic, egalitarian groups of 20-50 members. Norms are important because they help suppress individual selfishness and promote collective welfare, enabling our species to partially escape the trap of the competitive games discussed in the previous chapter. The Norms chapter introduces a suite of behaviors unique to the human species: the ability to make rules and to collectively enforce them within a group. All three games involve sending and receiving signals of our qualities as a potential partner. In the sexual game, we compete for mates in the status game, we compete for friends and in the political game, we compete for power by forming coalitions and acting in concert with our allies.

We examine three important competitive games: sex, social status, and politics. The Competition chapter argues that major facets of human physiology and behavior were sculpted by intra-group competition among our ancestors, in addition to their physical and ecological environment. These behaviors serve as analogues for the human behaviors we explore later in the book. Similarly, individual babblers appear to act 'for the good of the group,' when in reality they're selfishly jockeying for prestige. At first blush, social grooming appears to serve a hygienic function, but on more careful inspection it turns out to be a political behavior. The Animal Behavior chapter surveys two examples of 'hidden motive'-type behaviors in non-human animal species: social grooming among primates and competitive altruism in the Arabian babbler bird. Finally, readers are reminded that one can think ill of common human motives while still adoring humans overall. Key types of evidence are outlined, as is the trajectory of the book. The Introduction begins with personal stories from each author, and then explains the key book thesis, that humans are prone to self-deception about their motives. Hidden Motives in Everyday Life Introduction

Elephant outline