"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy." Hamlet

Is the Theory of Options true?

It appears taking advantage of the reader to raise such an issue in the near last chapter, but there are clear concerns. One difficulty with knowledge today is that there are so many competing theories, especially in topics such as human evolution and behavior. Such widely differing theories cannot all be correct, but nobody has time to study them all. So, why should we spend effort studying the Theory of Options rather than some other theory?

This author can only emphasize that the Theory of Options offers unique solutions to problems that no other theory has resolved. There has never been a satisfactory explanation of why the human brain evolved to be so large, or how complex human emotions like inhibition evolved to be individually fit. While explaining how having morals confers an advantage has neither been solved in evolutionary theory, nor has it been satisfactorily explained in thousands of years of secular debate. If anything, we are at an impasse over this. People now claim either that;

1. Modern human behavioral attributes were selected by evolution as a fact, so it is only anti-Darwin or anti-evolution attitudes in society preventing the acceptance of these explanations.

Or,

2. There are too many other variables to human behavior to be explained by genes or selection alone, so these variables must override the usual Darwinian selective factors.

No one theory today can accommodate both views, plus explain irreducible complexities of the human condition such as why humans display psychologically unfit behaviors such as suicide, which would be selected out in nature. On the other hand claiming that we cannot explain these; that they are an ethical or cultural quality not selected by evolution is hardly an answer either. People propose new theories every day, but mostly with a point of view already in mind, and no recourse but to blame the intransigence of the other side for not seeing why one particular view is correct.

In this book we have tried to resolve the problem two ways. Firstly, we have tried to explain the real problem, though it is very difficult. Next, though primarily, we have proposed a simple, practical theory as a set of principles, called the Theory of Options, as a way to countervail the difficulty. The real difficulty though, which everyone vaguely appreciates, is that the math to explain a property as complex as human choice or emotion is way beyond our present understanding. More of an issue is why some evolutionary biologists insist that the existing math is adequate, merely because its equations explain some behaviors, though mainly in lower orders such as birds and insects. Again, the surface problem seems intransigence, but the real difficulty is much deeper, also to do with evolution. As a way of increasing behavioral options humans evolved a brain that could abstract. Only to further increase advanced, social options humans leaned to formalize abstraction in a rigorous set of rules called mathematics. These rules, refined over millennia of testing, now work so well and with such precision that we think that they do not merely represent, but "are" physical laws of the universe, including laws of how life evolved. This issue is always contentious, but one upshot of it is that we choose which equations are appropriate to solve which type of problem. Today, even the term "equation" has become much intermixed with the term "algorithm", and this further complicates the debate. An equation is a logical tautology but an algorithm is a procedure. There can exist a range of equations to solve a range of problems. But there exists no universal algorithm, one that could tell us which equation we must apply to solve which type of problem.

We see an example of this in human evolution. One set of equations might explain how selective factors operate with equal force on amoebae as they do on highly evolved mammals. Now, it is true that selection does act all the time. Still, it took two billion years and total redesign of the genome DNA to evolve eukaryotic from prokaryotic life. Yet it took only five million years and a mere 1-2% change to expressed DNA to evolve humans from chimp-like ancestors. Even this small change of DNA did not produce a proportionate effect to any that occurred in previous evolution. Humans and chimps share roughly the same genes for expressing the brain, yet from this similar base set of genes the human brain is vastly expanded. Humans, chimps, or all higher animals compliment the reflexive neurology of the lower brain with a learning neurology of the higher brain. In chimps, this learning neurology is multiplied approximately 2.5 times in bulk of the reflex neurology. In humans the multiplication is eight times. So even a 1-2% alteration of genome DNA did not produce a 1-2% change of morphology, but a 300% increase in the ratio of the learning part of the brain. Such a large, relatively sudden increase in learning power has results disproportionate with any mere percentage or ratio of change. So, we need an equation that explains not only how selection acts, but how it acts with different effects of scale and complexity at different times in the history of life. Such an equation does not exist within current knowledge.

Another problem we have highlighted is that 'normal' mathematics works on the principle that any point in empty space is as good as any other. This is a powerful principle because mostly empty space is like that. Yet it is still only a formal rule of abstraction, but not a law of the universe that all events say, are equally probable in any direction. This is another bitter dispute in evolution. The forces of evolution are selection and mutation, and the standard equations allow that these forces are as likely to act in any direction, such as the chance of selecting one letter in four is 1 in 4, or one in twenty is 1 in 20. Only in life and the universe, because of both history and the physics and chemistry of how things exist, some properties are easier to alter in one direction than another. There are some 80,000 genes in the human genome, and we might think from our equations that each gene is exposed to selection at each reproductive event, and that each reproductive event will influence the survivability of each gene. This is mostly true for allele combinations, non-coded DNA or the genome fingerprint. But hard, short, RNA and DNA sequences were selected previously in the history of life, so today they are not exposed to selection in ways affecting the human gene mix. There are ways to express mathematically that only very few genes are exposed to selection at modern reproductive events, but these more complex equations are not used or are not even formulated. On the other hand, simplified equations of single sets of genes and alleles passing or failing at single reproductive events cannot explain many other facets of evolution, not just human behavior. They cannot explain why sex or eukaryote life evolved, or why if selection and mutation act all the time, there are long periods of species stasis when species do not alter "punctuated" by sudden increases in species complexity.

Again, the real difficulty is not the math, but the paradigm that equations are not a symbolic representation of possibilities, but that they "are" reality. This actually restricts our understanding, because we are not letting the symbolic rules force our modes of thinking. For example, we know how genes influence single reproductive events, but we have no understanding of how genes physically ensconced in one living body could influence by 'action-at-a-distance' genes in a separate body. Yet, genes retain remarkable synchronism, or orthologous evolution across individuals, species or whole classes and even phyla. In this thesis we have suggested that this is an historic effect, that certain early evolved genes occupy prime positions within a 'spectrum' of gene propagation strategies. If there is a gene combination that allows 100% orthologous distribution throughout all life, one combination, most likely of RNA for prokaryotic and eukaryotic life, has occupied that prime spot early in life. Subsequent gene combinations can only occupy a place of slightly reduced orthologous distribution and so on. These early sequences, already occupying prime spots in the gene spectrum, will not be exposed to selection in modern life, in terms that any of them would suffer genetic death from failure of any one line to reproduce. There would certainly be equations to express this property, but they might be very strange looking. Effectively they would have to show that random events were not equally likely in all directions in a plane of probabilities, which can also be shown, but not by the sets of equations currently used.

Another problem is that not only genes, but species themselves will occupy a spectrum of possible modes of competition. In the new theory, which might appear strange, we propose that fitness actually falls as species become more complex. This means that some of the earliest species, such as bacterial forms, occupied the prime fitness spots in a spectrum of possibilities. Only because species are always altering or going extinct, we introduce a new logical category, we call a phylogeny to explain the process. In this theory species evolved in time, but phylogenies evolve in "complexity space". Again, there would be nothing strange in this if we could accept that we are only discussing a symbolic representation of reality. If we could already explain how human evolution worked, or sex evolved, or why the steady pressures of mutation and selection produced the "punctuated" pattern of the fossil record with the current set of symbols there would be no need to introduce the extra complexity. But the existing explanations are not adequate, so we need new ones. Only the guardians of the current orthodoxy have insisted, perhaps correctly, that seeing how facets of evolution can already be explained by equations anything new should also be explained by equations. We can accept this too, only with the caveat that the equations might be very complex. This is because in one view, an increasingly broad one, the events of modern evolution are not determined solely and exclusively by changes in a few allele frequencies in modern genomes. We could explain why humans evolved and behave the way they do, and why they have morals and inhibitions directly from the equations of gene flow. Only these will not be the equations of just a few alleles in single modern events. They must be equations showing the integrated effects of the whole history of life, eventually forcing one species into an only available path of evolution where adaptation would eventually move outside of biology. For reasons explained in this and the earlier chapters, such equations would be very complex, if they could be formulated at all.

Yet, in another sense, we should not have to await the formulation of impossibly complex equations to understand how humans evolved, or why we have morals, or how we are motivated. We can come up instead with an alternative "verbal model" which captures the essential thesis, but which everybody can understand. This is the Theory of Options. It is not a complex formulation of mathematics, biology, or any science, but simple statements in everyday language that consistently followed can resolve some of the deepest conundrums of our era.

So, what is it that the Theory of Options actually says?

As explained, because of the anticipated complexity of the problem, the Theory of Options is not mathematical, but only a 'verbal model' of how humans evolved and the motivation of their behavior. The entire theory can be resolved into two simple, easily grasped statements;

• Theory of Human Evolution: Human evolution can be best understood if we consider that humans evolved along a fitness pathway that maximized the options of behavior.
• Theory of Behavior: Human behavior can be best understood if we consider as a generality, that each individual strives to maximize his or her options in life.

But are these statements true?

The most controversial statement is the first one. It goes back to the problem that in 'ordinary' mathematics every point in space in any direction is as good as any other. In such a mathematics the path along which humans evolve should be no different to that of an amoebae, an oak tree, or a lizard. We could just play on words, and say that all creatures, by trying to maximize reproduction of their DNA are also trying to maximize the options of behavior, but that is not the contention. The issue, in the new theory it applies to all life, is that the mathematical space in which evolution occurs is "directional" due to a number of factors. Firstly, many properties of both life and the universe are easier to change in one direction than another. Next, precisely if the space in which each creature would maximize reproductive fitness as DNA was perfectly empty, this would still result in a "directionality" to life as spaces become filled with earlier evolving successful species. If humans could have evolved along a pathway maximizing reproduction of DNA via the simplest of behaviors they would have. Only those spaces as fitness pathways were already occupied. Again, because of other complications explaining evolution, strictly, we should refer to a logical entity called a phylogeny as occupying "spaces" rather than species. But we can also show by the same logic that humans do behave like a phylogeny, in that they radiate into many different niches and environments, but they do not biologically speciate to do so. This would also be a unique property, which would also show that human evolution occupied a unique phylogenic "space" in the history of life. Plus human evolution also occurred when advanced species could already adapt to their environment at the maximum rate of change that large animal phylogenies could sustain. So, the next stage of evolution would be to move adaptation outside of biology into cultural forms, which is another unique direction in phylogenic space.

Only while these contentions seem complex and unproven, we can argue from common observation that human evolution would be easier to explain if we merely assumed it was along this pathway. This does not mean that the brain is directly motivated by genetic evolution to maximize options, in the sense that a human child raised by wolves would motivationally emulate anything but the behavior of wolves. It means that the human morphology, posture, hand, foot, face, locomotion, diet, sexuality and body covering, plus the brain are easier to explain how they evolved if it were to maximize the options of behavior. In evolution any organisms only has to be fitter than its rival, and any change comes at a cost. So, selection tends to drive organisms into specialization, because this is the easiest way to gain slight fitness over rivals for the least cost of change. But once pre-humans started using tools, artifacts, and organizing labor socially, it became fitter to specialize outside of biology, especially in competition between groups. Only once it was easier to specialize adaptation outside of biology, within biology itself it became fitter to generalize, to make the body and mind as versatile as possible. In this sense the human brain is not motivated to maximize options, be moral, or anything else that is programmed. It is driven by fitness to be large and versatile. Versatile brains are strongly motivated psychologically simply because in terms of fitness costs, psychology is easier to modify than biology. Plus we not only have to explain human behavior, but the hand, posture, body covering, emotions, voice, and facial expressions all from a perspective of individual fitness, and fitness among individuals cooperating within a group. Critics are very welcome to explain this another way without the Theory of Options or the fitness pathway, if they think they can produce better explanations. In this way the Theory of Options is only a hypothesis up for testing. But from the examples given the hypothesis would seem to pass a test of explanation very well, better than any rival hypothesis currently available.

The next statement of the Theory of Options, concerning behavior, is also possibly very contentious within psychology. Only compared to evolution, within science psychology does not seem to be such a contentious subject, perhaps because scientists outside of the discipline do not care to get involved in the topic. Or ironically, the only scientists who care to get involved in psychology are evolutionary biologists! Here the Theory of Options offers what is contested as the correct interpretation of how evolution acts on the human psychology. It teaches that psychologically humans feel motivated to maximize the options of behavior. Unlike animals, humans do not feel directly motivated to act out every biological imperative, but they like to think that they are in control in terms of opportunities. It is as though the human self feels assured when it has choices and options in life, but struggles against situations which restrict its options. Via biology humans are motivated by imperatives that strike other animals. Yet at the higher, overriding psychological level the worst human feeling is loss of control. Again, in the preceding chapters many examples are given of how this would work in practice. If there had not been a debate over evolution, there would never have been formulated, at least by this author, a theory of psychology about maximizing the options of behavior. But now it has been formulated, the theory shows promise on its own grounds of useful insights into psychology, but this has to be tested further.

But is this theory of behavior true? Do humans truly strive to maximize options of behavior, or is there another motive?

Different people will give different answers. To this author this is a testable, workable hypothesis that marries well with evolution, and it raises larger issues of the human motivations and purpose. Humans are at a point in their history where they must maximize all their available options, if the species or even the ecosystem of the planet is to survive at all. The purpose of knowledge, all knowledge, including of science, evolution and behavior, is to delineate for humans what their real choices are in the most unambiguous way. We discuss it elsewhere and in the final chapter, but this premise too can be worked into a theory even of psychiatry or counseling. Each individual, even one in deep personal crisis has a set of options in life from any given point forward. We counsel individuals to establish what those options are, if they are realistic and achievable, or if there is a deeper behavioral problem preventing an individual maximizing those options that should normally be available. This approach can be worked into a full theory of psychology that captures how people behave, without negating facts about psychology already known. Every day at the office or home, in business or politics, we could not understand human motives from a working premise that each individual is striving to maximize reproductive fitness. Yet proposing as hypothesis that humans are motivated to maximize the options of behavior does make everyday sense. Plus we are not trying to convert anyone to a viewpoint. We are just explaining to people in everyday terms that they do have options, this is how they evolved, and the deepest satisfactions in life will come from feeling in control of a situation, and that the choices in life are real and viable.

So, these two theories taken together as the "Theory of Options", are not proposing a separate force in the universe called 'options' to which evolution and motivation is mysteriously committed. If anything the theory begins as a debate or impasse over how humans explain their evolution and behavior. The Theory of Options provides a way around the impasse, by a plausible premise of human motivation that greatly assists in explaining why many human attributes evolved the way that they did. The mature human male grows a long beard, but we do not know why that attribute would maximize the options of behavior, or if it does. So, for this attribute the Theory of Options can provide no more insight than any other theory, except to pose the question differently. But once we turn to troubling issues, such as why the human brain is so large, why we have morals, or basic motivation, how we pose the question is pertinent. If we stop asking 'why is this fit?' and ask instead 'how would this help maximize the options of behavior?' we see answers (sometimes) more quickly. The irony is that once the question is posed that way it becomes easier to see why the attribute was fit anyway. It is like with morals and brain size. Regardless of how we think animals behave it is never fit to have morals in a sense that there could be a gene specifically "for" a self-sacrificial act. But if a creature is maximizing options of behavior it is fit to have a large, versatile brain. And if large versatile brains require inhibitory mechanisms to make them work reliably it is fit to have those mechanisms too. We have to regress this argument until we uncover why it is fit for humans to maximize the options of behavior at all, but all the answers can be found once we know which questions to ask.

These then, are the broad hypotheses of the Theory of Options. The theory does not commit us to any forces of nature that are not already known about, or any perspective of human nature that does not make credible sense in everyday terms. Even the concept of 'options' is one of explanation, useful as a mechanism for arriving at a deeper understanding, but not itself a force independent of how humans behave. The complexity to the new ideas instead lies in the explanations themselves. There is a process of transformation and interaction between the many small events of evolution building into large ones, which does not seem adequately considered in current theory.

The Theory of Options begins from a premise that humans are a product of evolution and that the biological disposition of modern humans was selected from individually fit ancestors. It also allows that genes strongly motivate behavior. Or, even if human motivation is more complex than genes can allow, the explanation of why it is that way will still exist in the record of DNA. Yet it is unimpeachable by observation that most human behavior is not motivated by genes directly. It is also unimpeachable, one of the few truths we know for certain, that socially or symbolically organized thinking is context free genetically. Yet if it appears contradictory to say that human motivation arises from genes but is not directly a product of them, it is only lack of deeper explanation that makes this seem so. It is neither the facts of how humans evolved nor the facts of how they behave that are wrong. It is how we interpret the facts.

As mentioned, we are reaching a point now in all our science and philosophy where there are more theories than facts to support them. Even if the Theory of Options proves popular, every proposition contained in it will have to be researched, and little of this has been done. Especially, for the theory of behavior there has been no research into whether humans in fact do try to maximize options. It is only inferred from other arguments that this is what they must do, as an explanation that makes the most sense.

On the other hand, while this author accepts that the theory might be overstated and not researched in many areas, the theory is also strong in several areas where competing theories are quite weak. Among the areas this author would count as strong points are;

• generality of approach
• accordance with the known facts
• correct theory of knowledge
• credible theory of morality

Let us recapitulate some of these points.

There are today many theories of behavior, but they all lack generality, in that accepting the theory means commitment to a particular "cause" of behavior, exclusive of another equally valid explanation. For example, Daniel Dennett concludes his interpretation of Darwinism with a statement 'you be the judge'. We agree that all knowledge ends in choices, but that is not what his theory says. Dennett reduces all of nature to a mechanism, in this case a Darwinian algorithm, though in earlier ages it might have been springs and levers or vortices of atoms. Even theories of psychology, which are less mechanistic often become focused on narrow drives such as cultural or childhood conditioning, or sexual trauma. The Theory of Options too has a predictive theory of behavior, which would be used for testing or analyzing behaviors in a clinical sense. But the theory avoids inferring that any one mechanism for modeling or analyzing behavior is the sole explanation of it. Human behavior is very complex, so that genetic urge, psychological trauma, cultural conditioning, and independent evaluation all play their role. Yet, whatever the explanation of behavior, we still end up making choices. Scientific, or any factual or testable knowledge is valuable to us because it can delineate choices in the least ambiguous ways. The new theory avoids a particular view, apart from seeking answers that increase human options.

The Theory of Options has a generalized approach then, in the sense that the only explanation of behavior we seek is the correct one! Even 'options' is just a word in the English language, not a force of nature existing as a gene or mechanism. It is convenient to say that humans try to maximize the options of behavior, and that the human physiology seems evolved for that purpose. But this metaphor is an aid to explaining the options effect. The theory is not to prove particularly that an evolutionary explanation of behavior is superior to a psychological one, or that nature predominates over nurture. The new theory begins, not ends, from all human behavior resulting in choice, then tries to discover why. Although one conclusion is that the primary drives of modern humans are psychological, the theory avoids the trap of being limited to these drives alone. It explains how psychological drives arose by evolution, or even why early learning would be a deep psychological influence, or why modern humans would feel that someone or something was in control. Yet, current evolutionary theories have no explanation of how humans behave psychologically. Dennett say, can only appeal to the existence of memes to explain human complexity. Other theorists try to sound more scientific, but they all commit the error of trying to explain the psychological drives as genetic ones, rather than explain how it was to the advantage of genes to transform behavior into psychology in the first place.

Any theory must accord with the facts. That is obvious. Yet, facts form broad categories. There are facts as researched details and these are being updated all the time. The fossil record is constantly being updated with new data. Details of early life are uncertain, and need revising. The age of the universe is an approximation until more facts are known. New discoveries are made about DNA every day. Similarly, though we write of genes and human behavior, within a few more years the entire human genome might be mapped, which will provide a new set of facts and details again. Apart from this there are so many facts relating to such a complex range of topics that one cannot simply know them all. Details of the Theory of Options will need constant update and revision if it is not to fall behind.

On the other hand a theory should accord with not just particular facts as details, but general facts of life and the universe, such that any update to the details would not destroy the whole theory. All the time new facts are discovered about how genes affect behavior. But some 85% of the human neural mass is modifiable circuits of learning and memory, plus humans have an order of magnitude more information in their brains than their genes can encode. The ratio of learned to inherited knowledge will be updated as fresh facts are discovered, but that the learned is more than the inherited knowledge in the human brain is a gross fact, which will not change with further discovery. This is why all theories that human behavior is totally controlled by genes eventually fail, no matter how fresh the discovery that resurrects interest in this line of reasoning. The challenge has always been that the genes must explain how humans behave because humans evolved that way. This is true, and the Theory of Options does explain how genes determine human behavior through a transformation of biology into psychology. Except the new theory is formulated not just to be in accordance with a few fresh details, but with all the known facts and experience of human evolution and modern behavior.

Dispute over facts applies less to human behavior, which is so variable anyway, and more to the new model of evolution. Biology, in particular seems to be the science where for any thesis one can propose there will be at least one fact to prove it wrong. This principle applies to genes. Genes have evolved for 3.8 billion years, and while not every combination has been tried every strategy of propagation has. The current orthodoxy simplifies this complexity by a model in which all genes are roughly the same quality, and mutate at similar rates. This simplification works for small changes over short distances. However, the new theory proposes a more general model in which shorter, more compact genes evolve first, express the basic homologies of life, and mutate at slower rates. Longer, more complex genes evolve later, express life's more variable properties, and mutate at higher rates. But which model is more in accordance with the facts? Again, any one fact about genes can find flaws in either model. The issue is the relative importance of different facts, and how hard we search for answers we wish to find. Here we only insist that whatever model of evolution we use the final one must be able to account for human complexity and the punctuated pattern of evolution. In this author's view the current simplified model of gene flow cannot explain that, so this model, widely used, is not in accordance with other facts we know. So, we must keep looking until we find a better model.

This point seems pedantic, but the greatest human power comes from abstraction. All the theories of how the mind works and evolved mean nothing if humans lack means to evaluate truths independently of how the mind works. Regardless of whether our minds are driven by the Freudian subconscious, genes, or memes, or whether we are awake or asleep, or if we are humans or aliens, 2 +3 still equals 5 if that is how we define it. Again, this problem occurs with other theories of behavior. The researcher concludes that human minds are dominated by this or that drive, but somehow the researcher himself remains miraculously free of the drive, that he could make an autonomous evaluation of it. The Theory of Options takes a different approach. Just as we assume from the start that knowledge ends in choice, and we must discover why, we assume too that the brain can make autonomous evaluation, so we must discover why.

When we investigate the problem this way we discover that abstraction maximizes the options of how to use knowledge. We can explain this as a philosophical argument, quoting relevant sources from the long debate over this. But the startling discovery, which can be researched, is that abstraction also optimizes knowledge from an evolutionary perspective. All change in evolution comes at a cost so any change must have an advantage for it to evolve at all. Humans evolved to maximize the options of behavior but their brains evolved away from an average neural function of behavior controlled by reflex. Instead, the human brain optimizes sense and data gathering as reflex, but optimizes behavior, athletic control and higher thinking as abstraction. The brain evolved by nature in a way that philosophers had already concluded was the way the mind should work to maximize knowledge. The human mind is good at math not because there is a gene for it. It is because mathematics is the highest form of abstracting knowledge, and the human brain was evolved to abstract. Yet, the human brain also evolved in a way that optimized reflex for the senses, especially fact gathering senses such as those for visual, aural, and tactile communication and information gathering.

There are some complications with this theory though. The first is that if fitness required a large brain to evolve quickly, the easiest way to do this is to multiply precisely those circuits useful in learning and abstraction. This is because these are general-purpose circuits programmable after birth, so they do not need prolonged design by selection. A human capability for mathematics might then have been a side consequence of rapid brain expansion rather than any teleology towards abstraction. The more serious problem concerns that philosophers or not, we only reach conclusions about the brain via the brain we already have. Cynics will argue that concluding that the correct way to think was the way in which the brain has evolved has no more relevance than it does for poets to claim that the human form is beautiful. However, we contest that this theory of how the brain evolved has combined analytical truths we know are true with facts from evolution and neurology we know are true in a way that no other theory has achieved.

There has never been, all through history, a credible secular theory of morality. If critics challenge this we need only ask them which secular theory they had in mind as a credible one. The only answer can be a theory that some individual thinks is credible because that person has happened to read about it, but the rest of the world has never heard explained and cares about even less. For humans there are practical sources of moral authority such as laws and the courts, but the only inspirational moral sources are religions, poets, sayings, or great teachings. There is no secular theory that explains why we should be moral that anybody cares about, and no credible theory based on evolution.

Moreover, the problem has never been explaining the social value of morality. The difficulty has always been explaining an internal guide, or an intimate, universal human perception that somebody or something is watching over us, judging our every move. There has never been a secular explanation of why such a guide would exist, or where it came from. Without an explanation of why an internal, intimate guide to behavior would exist we could only assume that all moral guides were conditioned by teaching. When people have found a comforting belief in an all-knowing God, we have presumed that this teaching is implanted by a priesthood, who exploit human ignorance for religious ends. We have never explained why the priesthood finds the human mind so pliable to the theory of an all-knowing God, or why a religious explanation has arisen universally in human society.

Again, the Theory of Options begins with real human feelings and actions, and then seeks to discover why. Language and social organization will interpret the intimate feelings into Gods, tribal myths, or complex ethical systems depending on the level of language and complexity of social organization to be explained. Only the intimate feelings exist for evolutionary reasons. It is to do with the large brain and humans evolving along a pathway that will maximize the options of behavior. The full effects are explained in the relevant chapters on morality, ethics and neurology. Just that in the new theory we acknowledge the reality of intimate feelings of which all humans are aware. Plus we explain these feelings in terms that while technically complex, can nevertheless meets people's needs and expectations of plausibility. So, while the Theory of Options is not intended as an inspirational source of moral authority, it is not in conflict with the inspirational sources in terms that intimate feelings of moral quandary still must be explained.

Now let us examine how we might apply the Theory of Options.