AbstractAnselme & Güntürkün generate exciting new insights by integrating two disparate fields to explain why uncertain rewards produce strong motivational effects. Their conclusions are developed in a framework that assumes a random distribution of resources, uncommon in the natural environment. We argue that, by considering a realistically clumped spatiotemporal distribution of resources, their conclusions will be stronger and more complete.
AbstractAs a general theory of extreme self-sacrifice, Whitehouse's article misses one relevant dimension: people's willingness to fight and die in support of entities not bound by biological markers or ancestral kinship (allyship). We discuss research on moral expansiveness, which highlights individuals’ capacity to self-sacrifice for targets that lie outside traditional in-group markers, including racial out-groups, animals, and the natural environment.
