
Want to keep your wallet? Carry a baby picture - kqr2
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article6681923.ece
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gjm11
Some doubt might be cast on the general validity of the results by the
following brief description of the experiment being reported here:

"In the study, 40 wallets were sent out in each photograph category as well as
40 containing a card suggesting that the owner had recently made a
contribution to charity. A control batch contained no additional item.

All of the wallets were stuffed with the same set of everyday items, including
raffle tickets, discount vouchers, and membership cards. _None of them
contained money, however._ "

(Added italics mine.)

~~~
tspiteri
I think that since there was nothing valuable inside, finders might have
thought it was not worth the trouble sending the wallets back, while a baby
picture is valuable to its owner, so it was worth sending back. If I had found
such a wallet, that's the way I would have acted.

~~~
agotterer
I was actually thinking the complete opposite. Since they found nothing of
value in the wallets, they were easy to part with and send back. If they found
$300 in cash, the finder may have felt more inclined to keep the wallet or at
least the money. A good follow up test would be to see how often the money
comes back with the wallet.

~~~
tspiteri
I was not trying to speculate what people would do if they found a wallet full
of money, I was just trying to interpret why they sent back a wallet with a
baby picture but did not send back a wallet with nothing of value inside.

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mhartl
_The answer, scientists have found, depends rather more on evolution than
morality._

This is a false distinction: the human moral sense is a product of evolution.

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arketyp
I don't like the way this article presents the viewpoint of evolutionary
psychology. A conception such as morality vs evolution is nothing short of
dangerous.

I think this is a probable scenario:

"Oh, look, a wallet. I wonder what's inside... Alright, no money anyway. Some
tickets and shit. Should I return it? Can I be bothered? Must be a real hassle
for the owner with all these cards of course. - Oh, a picture of a baby. I bet
this person is stressed out with the kid as it is. Hey, might as well be a
Good Samaritan today..."

~~~
Dove
Yeah. I love how they ask a professor to tack a completely spurious
evolutionary explanation on there. You know, a speculation coming from a
professor on the basis of a sound scientific theory is _still_ just a
speculation.

On the whole, I wish people didn't feel the need to jazz up empirical results
with that kind of pseudo-technical commentary. It muddies the reader's mind
about which part actually constitutes the science.

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absconditus
"Scientists argue that it would be difficult to genetically code for feeling
empathy exclusively towards your own child and much easier to code for feeling
empathy towards all children."

Aren't there several species that do in fact shun the offspring of other
parents?

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TheSOB88
I think it's bunk too - a much more logical explanation is that communal care
of children is good for the species/tribe.

~~~
barry-cotter
Those are very, very logically distinct, species and tribe, I mean. You can
conceivably have people doing things for the good of the tribe because in a
natural environment they're probably related to the other members of the tribe
so if the behaviour helps teh sponsoring gene spread, on average it will
propagate. "It's good for the species" is never a good explanation for
anything, ever. The other members of of a species (of one's own sex) are the
competition, the ones you want to fail in comparision to you. Group selection
works fine if there's a guiding intelligence behind it, but there are no
examples in nature, ttbomk.

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teamonkey
>"areas of high footfall, but well away from postboxes, litter bins, vomit,
and dog faeces."

Having lived in Edinburgh for many years, I can say that does limit the
options considerably.

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jgfoot
While there may be advantages to carrying a photo of someone else's kid in
your wallet, the difficult questions and embarrassing situations that are
going to come up from that are just not worth it.

~~~
ensignavenger
I have pictures of my nieces and nephews, and friends babies in my wallet- why
would there be any embarrassment or difficult questions as a result of this?

~~~
jgfoot
See, if you reach for your wallet to pay for dinner, and your date/business
colleague says, "oh, what a cute photo! Is that your kid?," you can just say,
"no, that's my nephew," and still beam with pride. I, however, would have to
say, "no, that's some kid whose photo I downloaded from Flickr; isn't he
adorable?" and the awkward conversation would not end there.

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oPerrin
I lost my wallet last night. Thanks for the thought HN but a little too late.

~~~
mahmud
Did you leave it in El Segundo?

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kpPkGZ6zhzA>

