Keith Henson Quotations

Anyone who has ever had the feeling of being higher than a kite after giving a public speech is well aware of the effects of attention.

Brigham Young had 47 children, and over 50 women as wives.

As for leadership, I am the kind who leads reluctantly and more by example than anything else. Someone had to be on the incorporation papers as president.

High status males had multiple wives or additional mating opportunities in the ancestral environment.

Successful cult memes induce intense social interaction behaviour between cult members. This trips the attention detectors.

Attention is the way social primates measure status. It is highly rewarding because it causes the release of brain chemicals such as dopamine and endorphins.

Most of the suicide hijackers came from Saudi Arabia, a place not lacking in wealth. But due to rapid population growth, the wealth per capita has fallen by about half in a generation.

People repeat behaviour that leads to flooding their brains with pleasurable chemicals. The short-term reward loop acts over hours to years, and the long-term reproductive success loop over generations.

Cults, or related social movements such as the Taliban in Afghanistan, result in massive military expenses.

Children do not have to learn that streets are dangerous places by potentially fatal trial and error.