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Haha...I'm surprised to find this on HN. Just to comment on a note made in this study: "While MIT provides a parsimonious explanation of differences in idiotic behavior and may underlie sex differences in other risk seeking behaviors, it is puzzling that males are willing to take such unnecessary risks—simply as a rite of passage, in pursuit of male social esteem, or solely in exchange for “bragging rights.” Northcutt invokes a group selectionist, “survival of the species” argument, with individuals selflessly removing themselves from the gene pool."

The reason this happens is due to risk-taking behavior. Males take way more risks than females do - and you can find other studies which confirm this (i.e. for example this one: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/147470490800600...). When I read the Northcutt explanation for this I laughed -- it makes absolutely 0 sense and I can't believe that someone expanded energy in proposing this. It's absolutely ridiculous that someone would even suggest this, but meh.

[SkyMarshal]

There was at least one hypothesis floating around a while ago that males take more risks because they’re expendable to society, but females are not. If a society is decimated by a famine, disease, war, etc, it can be repopulated with just a few males, but requires many females. Thus males evolved to be more risk-taking and females more risk-averse.

At an individual level, the incentive may be social esteem/bragging rights, or it may be based on a calculation of greater risk = greater reward = more resources = more mating options, etc. It’s not that males are “selflessly removing themselves from the gene pool”, but that there’s some incentive and/or lack of disincentive to be more risk-taking.

[Log_out_]

And it's more attractive cause with great risk comes great reward, thus men with breasts in leotards. (Forgive the marvel jib)

Male risk taking behavior is more attractive to other males.

[lupusreal]

Men who are respected by many other men are more attractive to women than low status men.

[Log_out_]

Not necessarily .. We worship fearless idiots who jump in wingsuits into rocks. Death cult lifestyle defiantly is not selected for via social hierarchy.

[SkyMarshal]

Do we actually worship them, or cheer them on in the secretly morbid hope of seeing accidents, self-maimings, and Darwin Award events?

[lupusreal]

> Not necessarily

Of course it isn't true literally every single time, but it's certainly true on average. There is a strong correlation between a man being respected by many other men, e.g. high status among his peers, and that man being a stable reliable provider.

If their is a famine, who gets cut off from the communal source of food first? The man all the other men like, or the man none of the other men respect? If the company is shedding dead weight who is more likely to get laid off? Who gets the best reviews from their colleagues and is most eligible for promotion? In all cases, the man most respected by other men has an advantage. Such men are desired by an larger than average portion of women. This in turn creates a reinforcing dynamic where women see a man being desired by women and in turn desire him for themselves more. This in turn causes even more men to respect him.

Tldr it's good to be respected. And because respect begets more respect, it doesn't even necessarily matter how the respect was initially seeded. Having others witness you being respected is at least as important as doing something actually worthy of respect.

[Log_out_]

In a famine.. the man who believes in a ordered hierarchical society with laws are worthless. Family clans and crooks is what survived. Example: Africa, or the collapse of the ussr

[lelanthran]

> There was at least one hypothesis floating around a while ago that males take more risks because they’re expendable to society, but females are not.

That's not the hypothesis the way I heard it - men are more expendable to society, but it's really a stretch to conclude that because men are more expendable, they make decisions with this knowledge in mind.

I mean, really - there's no logic linking the two.

[SkyMarshal]

The logic may work via negation or inversion. Eg there is individual disincentive for both women and men to engage in high-risk behavior. But societies still needed a class of people to go out and hunt game, defend society from lions or opposing armies, or other higher-risk ventures, despite the individual disincentive to do so.

Women are not expendable and thus society did not incentivize them to do these high-risk things. But men are, so societies created various social incentives to facilitate high-risk endeavors - honor, social esteem, medals, hierarchical rank, wealth, fame, etc. Many died doing so, but the ones that succeeded and survived reaped these various rewards and got to mate, producing heirs with similar risk-taking characteristics and capabilities from both nature and nurture.

[k__]

Evolution doesn't look into the future.

In the past, groups with women that were more risk averse would do better on average when the group was decimated and needed to repopulate.

Groups with women that took too many risks didn't survive.

So, now we have more risk aware women.

Risk taking for men didn't have that of an impact and might even have proven beneficial (e.g., Genghis Kahn, etc.)

Just my assumption...

[bluGill]

Don't forget a risk taking man may die but ensure the rest of the village (who he is closely related to) survives.

[bumby]

>they make decisions with this knowledge in mind

I read it as an artifact of natural selection and natural selection does not work "with this knowledge in mind".

[lelanthran]

> It's absolutely ridiculous that someone would even suggest this, but meh.

It is, but note that someone suggested the very same thing below.

Anyone who has ever been out their front door knows why men take more risks - it's because riskier behaviour gets them laid more often, with more different women.

Being the top-dog amongst your male peers gets you more women. To get to the top-dog spot you need to take a ton of risks (challenging existing leaders, creating your own subgroup, learning new skills, etc).