Reviews the book, Moral Origins: The Evolution of Virtue, Altruism, and Shame by Christopher Boehm (see record 2011-29744-000). On Boehm’s account, morality originated in the 350,000 years before humans became “culturally modern,” about 45,000 years ago. The crucial development was the consistent formation of counterdominant subordinate coalitions within 20- to 30-person foraging bands. These coalitions harshly punished within-group alpha males who attempted through sheer force to dominate food sources and mating choices. Boehm’s thesis is that “prehistorically [by 250,000 years ago] humans began to make use of social control so intensively that individuals who were better at inhibiting their own antisocial tendencies, either through fear of punishment or through absorbing and identifying with the group’s rules, gained superior fitness” (p. 17). Those who had better self-control through either of these means and maintained a good reputation in the gossiping networks in their band realized the fruits of group cooperation and mating preferences. And so they had more opportunities for cooperative benefit and more offspring, and their genes tended to be better represented in successive generations than those with less self-control. - http://psycnet.apa.org/psyccritiques/2012-28630-001