At an individual level, the evolutionary benefits of our selfish emotions are obvious. In addition to helping us stay alive when things are scarce, they energize us in the quest to find sexual partners, so enhancing our chances of survival and of successfully passing on our individual genes. We see this play out among other species all the time, and it is fair to assume that something akin to the emotions stimulated in us by envy and jealousy flood through the synapses of other animals when beating each other up to establish social hierarchies, or to gain preferential access to food or sexual
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