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The Evolutionary Psychology of Extraterrestrial Intelligence: Are There Universal Adaptations in Search, Aversion, and Signaling?

  • Thematic Issue Article: Astrobiology
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Abstract

To understand the possible forms of extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI), we need not only astrobiology theories about how life evolves given habitable planets, but also evolutionary psychology theories about how intelligence emerges given life. Wherever intelligent organisms evolve, they are likely to face similar behavioral challenges in their physical and social worlds. The cognitive mechanisms that arise to meet these challenges may then be copied, repurposed, and shaped by further evolutionary selection to deal with more abstract, higher-level cognitive tasks such as conceptual reasoning, symbolic communication, and technological innovation, while retaining traces of the earlier adaptations for solving physical and social problems. These traces of evolutionary pathways may be leveraged to gain insight into the likely cognitive processes of ETIs. We demonstrate such analysis in the domain of search strategies and show its application in the domains of emotional aversions and social/sexual signaling. Knowing the likely evolutionary pathways to intelligence will help us to better search for and process any alien signals from the search for ETIs (SETI) and to assess the likely benefits, costs, and risks of humans actively messaging ETIs (METI).

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Acknowledgements

We thank Anna Dornhaus, Tom Schoenemann, Linnda Caporael, and two reviewers for helpful comments and pointers on an earlier draft and Deborah Klosky for careful editing. Part of this work was supported by the John Templeton Foundation grant, “What drives human cognitive evolution,” to the first author.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cognitive Science Program and Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN, USA

    Peter M. Todd

  2. Department of Psychology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA

    Geoffrey F. Miller

Authors
  1. Peter M. Todd
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  2. Geoffrey F. Miller
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Correspondence to Peter M. Todd.

Additional information

Portions of this article are adapted from Todd and Miller (2017) “Cognitive exaptations for extraterrestrial intelligence”; to appear in D. Vakoch (ed.) Extraterrestrial Intelligence: Cognition and Communication in the Universe.

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Todd, P.M., Miller, G.F. The Evolutionary Psychology of Extraterrestrial Intelligence: Are There Universal Adaptations in Search, Aversion, and Signaling?. Biol Theory 13, 131–141 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13752-017-0290-6

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