Joseph Henrich

And so this fools a lot of people into thinking there was a lot more

individualistic voting and things like that.

There was actually no voting.

But yeah.

So in Greece, in Athens, Athens is unique because it does a bunch of things in the laws of Solon that break down the intensive kinship.

So for example, in Greece, you get monogamy for the first time.

And Athens is considered unusual.

So males can only marry one Athenian woman, which has potentially positive effects among the competition among

Athenian men, but they can have as many slave concubines as they want.

So when Christianity spreads, it ends the whole slave concubine thing, which was also common in Rome.

And that's another effect on this whole thing.

Well, we know that, I mean, in the book I talk about data where we can look at contemporary kinship practices and we can look at the number of centuries that that part of Europe was under the church based on the diffuse.

So we have a database of the diffusion of bishoprics and there's a clear connection between the intensive kinship practices and the number of years under the church.

Sure, sure.

So, I mean, that all the what you're talking about is just the idea that culture has imbued institutions and various practices with a logic that we might not understand.

So it's not calling for never changing the institutions.

It's saying, make sure you figure out the logic and the costs and benefits.

So I've been I was an expert witness in in Canada for the Attorney General of British Columbia asked the Supreme Court of British Columbia questions.

whether the statutes against polygyny were legal.

And so my job is just to inform the court that polygyny has this unfortunate effect of the elite and high status males tend to get a disproportionate share of the wives.