Even in a pointless universe, pointless happiness and pleasures are surely preferable to pointless suffering. - Steve Stewart-Williams

A Ku Klux Klan member would be mortified to learn that he was actually a Black man. Many people’s reaction to learning that they are actually animals, or actually apes, is the same.

As far as we know, no woman in the history of the species has ever given birth and thought: “Wait a minute! How do I know that this baby is mine and not some other woman’s?” In contrast, if a baby comes out of the body of a woman you slept with nine months ago, that’s not nearly as reliable a clue. As an old saying has it, maternity is a matter of fact, paternity a matter of opinion.

The reproductive benefits of polygyny were so great for genes located in male bodies that the male mind might still have evolved to take advantage of those opportunities, if and when they did arise. As a result, men may harbor strong polygamous desires — much stronger than women’s — even if these desires are frustrated for most men throughout most of their lives.