Spent: Sex, Evolution, and the Secrets of ConsumerismBy Geoffrey Miller (Heinemann, £20)
Why write a book about the evolutionary psychology of consumerism? As the success of John Naish's Enough (subtitled "breaking free from the world of more") proved in 2008, the modern publishing environment is hospitable to this particular species. But why write one? To change the world? To make money? No. Geoffrey Miller's answer to this kind of question is simple: it's all about showing off. Our evolutionary history has bequeathed us strong tendencies to display signals that indicate our desirability. Being an author, for example, advertises intelligence—something that in turn is supposed to correlate with brain size, physical and mental health, semen quality in men and, ultimately, sexual attractiveness.
And why would anyone buy Miller's book? Showing off again. Consumerism, in his view, is not about buying things we need, but is almost always about display. We surround ourselves with symbolic indicators of health, wealth and virtue. Successful marketing plays along with this. According to Miller, this explains why some people buy Hummer H1 Alpha sports-utility vehicles for $139,771 even though they are both impractical and slow. The Hummer is the peacock's tail of the human world—an unwieldy signal of resources and thus of sexual desirability.
With the zeal of a convert, but also with great wit and style, Miller preaches to the uninitiated. We should learn just how much we consumers in late capitalism are in thrall to evolutionary forces, he proclaims, and how conspicuous consumption has its roots in Darwinian fitness indicators. Along the way, he berates business schools and academic journals for ignoring the "wonderfully robust and useful models" that psychological research allegedly provides.
Miller asserts that human differences can be reduced to a "big six" list of dimensions: openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, emotional stability and general intelligence. All six are reasonably stable across the life cycle and are largely inherited. If we had our scores for each category tattooed on our foreheads, he half-seriously suggests, we could eliminate the high costs of trait-display consumerism.
Immersed in Miller's superb writing, it is easy to overlook the reductionism. Yet I suspect that human psychology has more than six dimensions, and that some of these "wonderfully robust" models are more fragile than he claims—something that comes to the fore in the (only mildly ironic) section on universities, which are described as offering "a costly, slow, unreliable intelligence-indicating product that competes directly with cheap, fast more-reliable IQ tests." In Miller's world, a Harvard degree is simply an expensive IQ guarantee. "Is it a coincidence," he asks, in conspiracy theory mode, "that researchers at the most expensive, elite, IQ-screening universities tend to be most sceptical of IQ tests? I think not." This paranoia runs counter to the general tone of his writing. But the tendency to treat a single aspect of any phenomenon as the only relevant one is symptomatic.
Unlike most writers in the genre, however, Miller provides the cure as well as the diagnosis. The final three chapters of Spent constitute a self-help manual, encouraging the reader not to spend and governments to nudge us away from profligacy. Conspicuous consumption is an expensive form of communication, Miller argues, when a few minutes of social interaction reveal most of our relevant traits anyway. The risk of submitting to the urge to display is that we end up constructing elaborate facades that mask an inner emptiness. Miller dubs this the "centrifugal- soul effect"—everything moves to the outside, leaving a gap at the heart.
At least as controversial as this last piece of advice is Miller's claim that multiculturalism fuels conspicuous consumption. Where groups with different social norms live in close proximity, he explains, the only common currency is economic display. Put similar people together and you will allow them to compete in ways more congruent with their fundamental values; mix them up, and there is no other way of expressing status. So, Miller thinks, we need to create local communities of similar people with the power to sustain their own social norms, as long as basic human rights are respected. Otherwise, "conspicuous consumption will remain the only game in town."
On the national scale, Miller also proposes purchase taxes rather than income taxes. Point-of sale-taxation, with exemptions for those below the poverty line, discourages overspending and has the added benefit that purchases are harder to conceal than income, and so should bring many tax dodgers into the light. This might even work, though there must be more to be said against it than Miller allows.
I'm tempted to say you should buy this book: it's stimulating and full of wit. But, to be consistent with its message, I'll have to recommend instead that you borrow it, or even perhaps download an illegal "replica" (don't take me literally). Either way you'll save yourself £20, an unnecessary expense motivated by presumed status-enhancement. I wonder if Miller's publishers realise how subversive this book really is.
Why write a book about the evolutionary psychology of consumerism? As the success of John Naish's Enough (subtitled "breaking free from the world of more") proved in 2008, the modern publishing environment is hospitable to this particular species. But why write one? To change the world? To make money? No. Geoffrey Miller's answer to this kind of question is simple: it's all about showing off. Our evolutionary history has bequeathed us strong tendencies to display signals that indicate our desirability. Being an author, for example, advertises intelligence—something that in turn is supposed to correlate with brain size, physical and mental health, semen quality in men and, ultimately, sexual attractiveness.
And why would anyone buy Miller's book? Showing off again. Consumerism, in his view, is not about buying things we need, but is almost always about display. We surround ourselves with symbolic indicators of health, wealth and virtue. Successful marketing plays along with this. According to Miller, this explains why some people buy Hummer H1 Alpha sports-utility vehicles for $139,771 even though they are both impractical and slow. The Hummer is the peacock's tail of the human world—an unwieldy signal of resources and thus of sexual desirability.
With the zeal of a convert, but also with great wit and style, Miller preaches to the uninitiated. We should learn just how much we consumers in late capitalism are in thrall to evolutionary forces, he proclaims, and how conspicuous consumption has its roots in Darwinian fitness indicators. Along the way, he berates business schools and academic journals for ignoring the "wonderfully robust and useful models" that psychological research allegedly provides.
Miller asserts that human differences can be reduced to a "big six" list of dimensions: openness to experience, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, emotional stability and general intelligence. All six are reasonably stable across the life cycle and are largely inherited. If we had our scores for each category tattooed on our foreheads, he half-seriously suggests, we could eliminate the high costs of trait-display consumerism.
Immersed in Miller's superb writing, it is easy to overlook the reductionism. Yet I suspect that human psychology has more than six dimensions, and that some of these "wonderfully robust" models are more fragile than he claims—something that comes to the fore in the (only mildly ironic) section on universities, which are described as offering "a costly, slow, unreliable intelligence-indicating product that competes directly with cheap, fast more-reliable IQ tests." In Miller's world, a Harvard degree is simply an expensive IQ guarantee. "Is it a coincidence," he asks, in conspiracy theory mode, "that researchers at the most expensive, elite, IQ-screening universities tend to be most sceptical of IQ tests? I think not." This paranoia runs counter to the general tone of his writing. But the tendency to treat a single aspect of any phenomenon as the only relevant one is symptomatic.
Unlike most writers in the genre, however, Miller provides the cure as well as the diagnosis. The final three chapters of Spent constitute a self-help manual, encouraging the reader not to spend and governments to nudge us away from profligacy. Conspicuous consumption is an expensive form of communication, Miller argues, when a few minutes of social interaction reveal most of our relevant traits anyway. The risk of submitting to the urge to display is that we end up constructing elaborate facades that mask an inner emptiness. Miller dubs this the "centrifugal- soul effect"—everything moves to the outside, leaving a gap at the heart.
At least as controversial as this last piece of advice is Miller's claim that multiculturalism fuels conspicuous consumption. Where groups with different social norms live in close proximity, he explains, the only common currency is economic display. Put similar people together and you will allow them to compete in ways more congruent with their fundamental values; mix them up, and there is no other way of expressing status. So, Miller thinks, we need to create local communities of similar people with the power to sustain their own social norms, as long as basic human rights are respected. Otherwise, "conspicuous consumption will remain the only game in town."
On the national scale, Miller also proposes purchase taxes rather than income taxes. Point-of sale-taxation, with exemptions for those below the poverty line, discourages overspending and has the added benefit that purchases are harder to conceal than income, and so should bring many tax dodgers into the light. This might even work, though there must be more to be said against it than Miller allows.
I'm tempted to say you should buy this book: it's stimulating and full of wit. But, to be consistent with its message, I'll have to recommend instead that you borrow it, or even perhaps download an illegal "replica" (don't take me literally). Either way you'll save yourself £20, an unnecessary expense motivated by presumed status-enhancement. I wonder if Miller's publishers realise how subversive this book really is.
