Today, I am going to do something I never ever ever do. I’m going to talk out of my ass. Not literally, of course. I’ll be typing rather than talking, and typing out of my ass would cause a rather unpleasant effect on my keyboard. No, the talking out of my ass I intend to engage in is me pontificating on something I know nothing about, which probably makes up the lion’s share of my articles. So you’re used to it.

Last night I had a fabulous conversation with a friend of mine about a comment she had been fed in an anger management class. The instructor told her that anger is a secondary emotion. This is the teacher’s way of saying that anger comes from some outside stimulus. First we feel some other feeling, such as frustration or confusion, and it leads to anger. The argument presented was that we need to learn how to deal with the primary feelings such that we do not allow the secondary emotion to surface and create difficulty for us. We both agreed that while there might be some small amount of logic to this statement, it was ostensibly bullshit.

That wasn’t enough for me to feel the need to comment on this blog. It took an interesting article by Jerry Coyne over at Why Evolution Is True discussing the Adaptive Rumination Hypothesis (ARH) which states that depression is an adaptation that has been naturally selected. Jerry posits, and I agree, that this is incorrect. But the idea of psychological Darwinism intrigued me as it pertains to the conversation of the night before.

So now, the out-of-ass-talking begins. I’m not a psychologist, nor am I in any way uniquely gifted with knowledge and insight into the brain and it’s development, at least no more than anyone who took a first year psych course in college would be. There is no experimentation or peer review behind my statements, this is all merely my opinion and me running ahead with a thought. Hopefully that suitably underscores my lack of credentials and prevents anyone from actually mistaking me for a legitimate expert.

A quick search on the chemistry of anger brought up a stack of really interesting articles, none of which I have read. However, after I hit “Publish” I plan on reviewing at least a few of the articles here and seeing how they jive with what I am talking about. What I was looking for (and didn’t find in my ten-second conference with Dr. Google) was an explanation of the known biochemical reactions that take place during a bout of anger. So I’ll ignore that aspect of it and instead talk about the brain chemistry.

Anger is regulated by hormones made in the hypothalamus. This is the part of the brain that regulates our primal needs, such as hunger, thirst, and sexuality. In Paul MacLean’s triune brain model, this is a part of the Reptilian Complex, the early part of the brain we inherited from our reptilian ancestors. It’s an easy to trace bit of our evolutionary history, and it’s simple to see how a little fight-or-flight response aided our ability to live long enough to have a big family. Clearly, anger is an adaptation that makes a bunch of sense.

Now that we’re all responsible, self-aware mammals with a complex society and good jobs, the fight-or-flight instinct is less imperative. Imagine if your boss came in to tell you he was concerned about your latest TPS report and you belted him across the nose and ran to Cuba. While deeply, deeply satisfying, this behavior would certainly be anything but advantageous. However, it’s folly to assume that we don’t need a well-tuned reptilian brain to continue to survive.

In my mind, anger (and the rest of the reptillian complex) is the part of the brain we’re most embarassed about. It’s the part that we look down on as being beneath our oh-so-evolved human brilliance. But it’s an integral and necessary part of who we are. Yes, there are times when we need to learn greater ways to control our anger, but our physiology demands that we accept it. As Sigmund Freud said, depression is anger turned inward. If we don’t get rid of our anger, it will chip away at us in other ways.

Remember, folks. We’re animals. We like to pretend we’re not, that our complex society has somehow elevated us above the ridiculous poop-flinging lives of our nearest genetic relatives, but that’s just not the case. Not by a long shot. Bonobos are perhaps a good model for stress management (and if you’re curious about more, go buy Bonobo Handshake by Vanessa Woods… I plan to…) but I don’t think our current society would work as well. Imagine your boss comes in to tell you he has concerns about your latest TPS report and you begin penis-fencing with him, or you attempt to rub genitals with the guy who just cut you off in traffic. It’s something to move towards, but until that time let’s take a hint from the other closest relative, the chimpanzee, and make use of that all-important anger adaptation. Don’t allow it to control you, and don’t allow it to damage your life, but likewise, don’t try to kill it outright. It’s both natural and normal to get angry, so let it run it’s course.

Oh, and for the record, that embracing your chimpanzee side? Doesn’t extend to beating women up or eating people. Sorry.

Jim