CHAPTER 01

SAME SPECIES, BUT DIFFERENT WORLDS

Men and women are different. Not better or worse - different. Just about the only thing they have in common is that they belong to the same species. They live in different worlds, with different values and according to quite different sets of rules. Everyone knows this, but very few people, particularly men, are willing to admit it. The truth, however, is most definitely out there. Look at the evidence. Around 50% of marriages end in divorce in Western countries and most serious relationships stop short of becoming long-term. Men and women of every culture, creed and hue constantly argue over their partners' opinions, behaviour, attitudes and beliefs.


Different Job Specs

Men and women have evolved differently because they had to. Men hunted, women gathered. Men protected, women nurtured. As a result, their bodies and brains evolved in completely different ways. As their bodies physically changed to adapt to their specific functions, so did their minds. Men grew taller and stronger than most women, while their brains developed to suit their tasks. Women were mostly content for men to work away as they kept the cave fires burning, and their brains evolved to cope with their function in life. Over millions of years, the brain structures of men and women thus continued to change in different ways. Now, we know the sexes process infor- mation differently. They think differently. They believe different things. They have different perceptions, prior- ities and behaviours. To pretend otherwise, is a recipe for heartache, confusion and disillusionment all your life.

"The equality of men and women is a political or moral issue; the essential difference is a scientific one."


We're Still Just Another Animal:


Most people have difficulty thinking of themselves as just another animal. They refuse to face the fact that 96% of what can be found in their bodies can also be found inside a pig or a horse or that our DNA is 97. 5% identical to that of a gorilla and 98. 4% to that of a chimpanzee. The only thing that makes us different from other animals is our ability to think and make forward plans. Other animals can only respond to situ- ations based on the genetic wiring of their brain and by repetition of behaviour. They cannot think; they can only react. Most people accept and acknowledge that animals have instincts that largely determine their behaviour. This instinctive behaviour is easy to see - birds sing, frogs croak, male dogs cock their leg and cats stalk their prey. But these are not intellectual behaviours, so many people have difficulty making the connection between this behaviour and their own. They even ignore the fact that their own first behaviours were instinctive - crying and sucking. Whatever behaviours we inherit, positive or negative, from our parents are likely to be passed on to our children the same way it happens with all animals. When we as humans accept ourselves as an animal whose impulses are honed by millions of years of evolution, it makes it easier to understand our basic urges and impulses, and to be more accepting of ourselves and others. And therein lies the way to true happiness.