What is the evolutionary advantage of existential crises?

>>8941691
an existential crisis is not neccessarily something one would evlove to have more of a byproduct of an advanced brain capable of recognizing its enviroment

You seem to be implicitly assuming that we evolved to feel existential crises. I'd imagine that in fact they're simple a side-effect of increased intelligence. You'd probably find that humans of low intelligence don't even experience existential crises.

>why didn't evolution plan for 200,000 years in the future when free time is so available that we can sit around crying about death

gee I don't fucking know retard

>>8941708
That would be interesting.
>>8941711
>early intelligent humans had no free time
>dread and hopelessness don't inhibit survival

Dont want to create a new thread just for this, so im gonna use this one
Whats the evolutionary advantage of laughter?
And why does our brain find shit like accidents and falls funny?

>>8941748
First off, not every result evolution is advantageous. Plenty of shit is sheerly accidental or incidental, and sometimes detrimental.

Psychological evolution is also a dicey territory prone to bias, as you're basically working backwards to justify something that already exists.

That said, laughter seems to be largely a stress release. It is caused not only by seeing buffoonery resulting in mild suffering, but also from absurd contradictions. You might laugh at a video of someone taking a hit to the balls, but are less apt to if you see it in person, and if they get their arm cut off, aren't apt to laugh at all, unless you've spent too much time on /b/.

>>8941691
Natural selection has not prepared you for a world where all the natural selection pressures you evolved from have been removed, allowing this line of thought to emerge and become commonplace.

It also usually doesn't hit you until your past classical breeding age, and genetics doesn't give a shit about anything that happens to you at that point.

>>8941774
It personally hit me pre puberty but that does make me wonder if people with children are less prone to them .

>>8941781
Children do rather provide a resolution for some aspects of it. More importantly, they eat so much time you don't get to dwell on it.

>questioning evolutionary advantage of a trait which isn't immediately life threatening or immensely ruins chances at reproduction for all afflicted by it
Doesn't work that way. Might as well ask why chickens haven't evolved so they don't taste good.

>>8941781
Meh, in my 40's and I still haven't had one.

At about that same age, I came to the conclusion that nothing really matters, save what I choose, is both the most freeing and empowering thing there could be. Plus the idea of life after death has always simply terrified me, so it's been a relief that all the "evidence" for it has been dicey at best. Can't imagine anything more personally freeing than simply ceasing to exist.

Though the fact that reincarnation has a certain "rhyme" with the general pattern of things always nags me a bit. Hopefully just coincidence. *shiver*

>>8941781
What, specifically, about your existential crisis has been bothering you?

Here's a possible list:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwRDwES-jt8

>>8941691
The evolutionary advantage is the ability to abstract, which comes with its own disadvantages

>>8941691
So that through religion and science we form a better cohesive group to live longer, live better, and expand more.

>>8941691
Do you even know what an existential crisis is? It's an anxiety that arises from feeling like you should be doing more. It obviously serves the purpose of pressing you to be more productive. We just face the issue of being uncertain what "more productive" is in the current era.

I might be wasting my time on 4chan, or one of my posts might have prevented the man who eventually cures cancer from killing himself. It's just so hard to tell what impact your actions have, if any, on the scale of the world today.

>>8942032
I suppose it's an extension of that "feeling useless" emotion, but generally when one uses the phrase "existential crisis" they are speaking of something a bit grander than that - more along these lines:
https://i.4cdn.org/wsg/1496038034308.webm

Granted, even the "feeling useless" doesn't really encourage being useful, oddly enough, it more often just leads to depression, making one even more useless - but again, these things aren't by design. Electrify an area around a dog long enough, and soon it won't try to leave the area, electrified or not. Certain behavioral tendencies that are useful in the short term, are not always so in the long nor in all circumstances.

>>8941691
no such thing as an evolutionary purpose or advantage

>>8941691
this is assuming that the human brain developed perfectly, however it is possible that depression when not avoided by means of distraction is actually a good mechanism for coming up with new solutions and creativity

>>8941691
It forces you to reassess your priorities and everything you hold dear. One could say, it clears the mind assuming you stop dwelling on it and points you towards thinking about the bigger picture.

Some would say the meaning of existence is to grow until singularity. But there's an equal chance that it could be to disperse until the point of singularity. Either way, it really clears your head and points you towards the bigger things.