You have ten times as many bacterial cells as human ones in your body, and that leaves out viruses and fungi. Are those non-human creatures in your body part of you?
It’s easy to think of them as ‘not you’, as little Others along for the ride on your body. They are parasites and symbiotes that feed off of us, help us digest food, might even protect us from infections – but they’re not part of me, right?
Enter Toxoplasma gondii, a protozoan parasite that infects all sorts of mammals but really loves getting into cats (the only place it can reproduce). In fact, its talent is finding its way from other mammals into cats. How does it do this?
By altering the behavior of intermediate non-cat hosts. If a mouse is infected, it starts hanging out in open areas. An infected rat actually seeks out cat urine, rather than running from it. Then, presumably, the mice and rats get eaten by hungry cats. In other words, T. gondii changes the behavior of its hosts in order to maximize the chance of finding its way inside a cat.
Of course, T. gondii doesn’t just find itself inside rats and mice on its way to cats. Often it gets into humans, through exposure to pet cats or from eating uncooked meat (a report in the UK discovered that up to 38% of stored meat was infected). Some infected people develop flu-like symptoms, but most people develop no symptoms and the infection remains latent and apparently inactive. For a long time, it was assumed that latent infection in humans had no real effect on the host.
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“Once the decision has been made, close your ear even to the best counter argument: sign of a strong character. Thus an occasional will to stupidity.”
–Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil
We live in a world of many choices: the foods we eat, the careers we choose, the relationships we foster, every consumer good we buy. We tend to have more than a binary yes/no choice, but rather many options, often with complicated trade-offs involving many dimensions. I like peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, but which peanut butter should I get: Crunchy or creamy? Reduced fat, normal fat or normal fat with extra omega-3’s? All-natural or not? Store brand or name brand? Which jelly: strawberry, grape, apricot-pineapple, or countless other fruit choices? Jam, jelly or preserves? Low sugar, low sugar with other additives, or normal? Relative balance of cheap, healthy and tasty?
Even simple decisions like this can present a crippling array of possibilities, over which we may feel some pressure to maximize and find the “right one”. But there’s a fine line between giving a little thought to decisions here and there, and agonizing over labels and minor cost differences at every choice.
Unfortunately, it’s not just minor matters that present us with myriad options. Buying a car: New or used? Lease or purchase? Cash or finance? Make, model, color, options, all of which we can easily find extensive information about. Presumably the more information we have — the better informed our decision is — the better our choice will be. This is what I might call the naive rationalist assumption.
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Compersion, n.
1. The opposite of jealousy.
2. The positive feelings one gets when a lover is enjoying another relationship.
The term compersion originally comes from the polyamory community, where people may have multiple intimate relationships at the same time, with the knowledge and consent of all partners. In these situations, jealousy may be a natural human reaction. Compersion and jealous feelings can certainly coexist, but jealousy can often be mitigated by self-examination, and compersion can be learned.
Another term — related to compersion but broader — is “Mudita”, a Buddhist term that roughly means sympathetic joy, rejoicing in others’ good fortune. Basically, if you have a sort of inner joy or inner comfort with yourself, you are secure enough to relish the joy of others. You take pleasure in their pleasure, for its own sake, not for any relation to your own state. Compersion, then, can be thought of as an analogue of Mudita specifically applied to your loved ones: feeling secure against jealousy in your relationship such that you derive happiness from your partner’s happiness, even when that comes from outside.
Hostile and Benevolent Sexism
Everyone is familiar with hostile sexism: the rude jokes, discrimination, harassment, and explicit opinions of gender inferiority. In general, this attitude is condemned in our society, and laws are in place to at least try to minimize employment discrimination and outright harassment.
However, sexism may come in more subtle forms, sometimes labeled benevolent sexism. Paternalist traditions such as opening doors, paying for meals and carrying things may be seen as sexist if they imply a lack of competence on the part of the woman to do these things herself. Patronizing comments may involve ambivalent content, such as praise combined with an implied devalued position (”It’s okay, honey, don’t worry your pretty head about it”). Women may be seen as warm but incompetent, or as needing men’s help. Examples of benevolent sexism are often less clear-cut than hostile sexism.
A 2007 study at the University of Liege looked at the effects of these two types of sexism on women performing job-related tasks. Specifically, women in a trade school or college doing job interview training were told about a potential job opening up at a place that had previously employed only men. The training consisted of (1) a description of the job, and then (2) taking what was described as a standard job interview test involving a simple task.
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Some people are great at self-monitoring in social situations. They attenuate their behavior based on the social dynamic they are in, engage in impression management, tend to be concerned with the appropriateness of their actions, and adapt well to different social circumstances.
High self-monitors are often likeable and successful people, and highly desired romantic partners. However, a 2007 study showed that people who score high on measures of self-monitoring may seem desireable partners, but often they are less happy in their relationships and less committed.
Michael Roloff, one author of the study, suggests that a tendency to adapt their personality to fit different situations keeps them from letting their true selves out during intimate interactions with romantic partners.
Low self-monitors, on the other hand, are less likely to hide their feelings, and appear to be happier with their relationships and more committed. However, as Roloff points out, these people might be less diplomatic, they may say hurtful things, and studies show they tend to be worse negotiators and get promoted less at work.
Obviously, most people fall in a middle ground between these extremes, and have some aspects of both traits. It seems valuable, then, for all of us to keep in mind the trade-offs of being diplomatic and fitting in versus wearing all your thoughts on your sleeve all the time. Certainly some combination of diplomacy and bluntness can mitigate the downsides of both. Indeed, Roloff’s study points out that intimate communication and tendencies that enhance communication quality tend to improve the quality of relationships even for high self-monitors.