ISIR blog live # 9 - More evolutionary psychology on mate selection

Here is installment #8 of my blogging "live" from the Internaltional Society for Intelligence Research (ISIR) 2005 conference in Albuquerque, NM.

Yes...more evolutionary psychology stuff and intelligence. That is the theme of all papers today. More practical papers come the next two days. Stay tunned. Remember, I'm more-or-less just regurgitating what is presented...not endorsing it.....this (evolutionary psychology) is NOT my area of expertise.

Miller. Mutual mate choice for intelligence as a fitness indicator.

I had a hard time focusing after lunch, so my comments for this paper are more haphazard and ADHD-driven.

The three major models advanced to explain the evolution of human intelligence:

• Survivalists models - those who developed better tools dominated and survived. Bigger brains did better.
• Social intelligence models - More clever brains can manipulate less clever brains...and thus, the clever brains survive and evolve.
• Group competition models - larger, smarter, better organized groups do better and survive and evolve.

Miscenallenous tidbits:

• Mutual mate choice for good genes.
• The average human offspring has 2 to 4 harmful genetic mutations. Most mutations impair mutiple traits.
• Mutations constantly erode adaptive design of all species. Therefore, the goal of mate choice is to minimize the mutattions in offspring.
• Mate choice focuses on complex information traits called fitness indicators.

The presentor has devloped an algorithm (go figure) called the "fitness matching model." Not enough time/space here to describe. If you want more information, check out his book. Also check out some independent comments on his work.

Technorati tags: psychology. intelligence. cognition. intelligence theory. general intelligence. evolution. evolutionary psychology. genetics. mate selection.