“Just as the capacity for experiencing fatigue has evolved to protect us from overexertion, the capacity for sadness may have evolved to prevent additional losses. Maladaptive extremes of anxiety, sadness, and other emotions make more sense when we understand their… — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“Depression may seem completely useless. Even apart from the risk of suicide, sitting all day morosely staring at the wall can't get you very far. A person with severe depression typically loses interest in everything -work, friends, food, even sex.… — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“[Mood allocates] investments of time, effort, resources, and risk taking to maximize Darwinian fitness in situations of varying propitiousness. High and low moods adjust… — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“The current danger for most of us is not the deprivation suffered by our ancestors but an excess of nutrition.” — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“The current danger for most of us is not the deprivation suffered bu our ancestors but an excess of nutrition.” — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
I can't prove it, but I'm pretty sure that people gain a selective advantage from believing in things they can't prove. — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“People are not controlled by some internal calculator that crudely motivates them to maximize their reproductive success. Instead, people form deep, lifelong emotional attachments… — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“Darwinism gives no moral guidelines about how we should live or how doctors should practice medicine. A Darwinian perspective on medicine can, however, help… — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“Therapists have long known that many depressions go away only after a person finally gives up some long-sought goal and turns his or her… — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“Paradoxically, it now is much easier to treat many mental disorders than it is to understand them.” — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“Long before there were effective treatments, physicians dispensed prognoses, hope, and, above all, meaning. When something terrible happens-and serious disease is always terrible-people want… — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“Thanks to subsequent years of conversations with evolutionists, especially Williams, and with medical school residents and faculty, he has found that an evolutionary perspective… — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“Emotional capacities are shaped by situations that occurred repeatedly in the course of evolution and that were important to fitness. Attacks by predators, threats… — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
“Every textbook description of a disease should have, in our opinion, a section devoted to its evolutionary aspects. This section should address the following… — Randolph M. Nesse Copy Share Image
![“[Mood allocates] investments of time, effort, resources, and risk taking to maximize Darwinian fitness in situations of varying propitiousness. High and low moods adjust cognition and behavior to cope with propitious and unpropitious situations.” quote by Randolph M. Nesse](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/6d0/randolph-m-nesse-24802_behavior_mood-allocates-investments-of-time-effor_87538.jpg)
