The Smoke Detector Principle
dc.contributor.author | Nesse, Randolph M. | en_US |
dc.date.accessioned | 2010-06-01T22:04:01Z | |
dc.date.available | 2010-06-01T22:04:01Z | |
dc.date.issued | 2001-05 | en_US |
dc.identifier.citation | Nesse, Randolph M. (2001). "The Smoke Detector Principle." Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 935(1 UNITY OF KNOWLEDGE: THE CONVERGENCE OF NATURAL AND HUMAN SCIENCE ): 75-85. <http://hdl.handle.net/2027.42/75092> | en_US |
dc.identifier.issn | 0077-8923 | en_US |
dc.identifier.issn | 1749-6632 | en_US |
dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/2027.42/75092 | |
dc.identifier.uri | http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=retrieve&db=pubmed&list_uids=11411177&dopt=citation | en_US |
dc.description.abstract | Defenses, such as flight, cough, stress, and anxiety, should theoretically be expressed to a degree that is near the optimum needed to protect against a given threat. Many defenses seem, however, to be expressed too readily or too intensely. Furthermore, there are remarkably few untoward effects from using drugs to dampen defensive responses. A signal detection analysis of defense regulation can help to resolve this apparent paradox. When the cost of expressing an all-or-none defense is low compared to the potential harm it protects against, the optimal system will express many false alarms. Defenses with graded responses are expressed to the optimal degree when the marginal cost equals the marginal benefit, a point that may vary considerably from the intuitive optimum. Models based on these principles show that the overresponsiveness of many defenses is only apparent, but they also suggest that, in specific instances, defenses can often be dampened without compromising fitness. The smoke detector principle is an essential foundation for making decisions about when drugs can be used safely to relieve suffering and block defenses. | en_US |
dc.format.extent | 2116987 bytes | |
dc.format.extent | 3109 bytes | |
dc.format.mimetype | application/pdf | |
dc.format.mimetype | text/plain | |
dc.publisher | Blackwell Publishing Ltd | en_US |
dc.rights | 2001 New York Academy of Sciences | en_US |
dc.subject.other | Evolution | en_US |
dc.subject.other | Natural Selection | en_US |
dc.subject.other | Smoke Detector | en_US |
dc.subject.other | Defenses | en_US |
dc.subject.other | Anxiety | en_US |
dc.subject.other | Stress | en_US |
dc.subject.other | Signal Detection | en_US |
dc.subject.other | Pharmacology | en_US |
dc.subject.other | Darwinian Medicine | en_US |
dc.subject.other | Medicine | en_US |
dc.title | The Smoke Detector Principle | en_US |
dc.type | Article | en_US |
dc.subject.hlbsecondlevel | Science (General) | en_US |
dc.subject.hlbtoplevel | Science | en_US |
dc.description.peerreviewed | Peer Reviewed | en_US |
dc.contributor.affiliationum | Department of Psychiatry, The University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48104, USA | en_US |
dc.identifier.pmid | 11411177 | en_US |
dc.description.bitstreamurl | http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/75092/1/j.1749-6632.2001.tb03472.x.pdf | |
dc.identifier.doi | 10.1111/j.1749-6632.2001.tb03472.x | en_US |
dc.identifier.source | Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Sternbach, R.A. 1963. Congenital insensitivity to pain. Psychol. Bull. 60 ( 3 ): 252 – 264. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 2 Kluger, M.J., Ed. 1979. Fever, its Biology, Evolution, and Function. Princeton University Press. Princeton, NJ. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | DuPont, H.L. &R.B. Hornick. 1973. Adverse effect of Lomotil therapy in shigellosis. JAMA 226: 1525 – 1528. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 4 Schopenhauer, A. & R.J. Hollingdale. 1970. Essays and Aphorisms. Penguin Books. Harmondsworth, England. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 5 Darwin, C. & F. Darwin. 1887. The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin (including an autobiographical chapter), 3rd ed. J. Murray. London. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 6 Wilson, E.O. 1975. Sociobiology. Harvard University Press. Cambridge, MA. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Harvell, C.D. 1990. The ecology and evolution of inducible defenses. Q. Rev. Biol. 65 ( 3 ): 323 – 340. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 8 Edmunds, M. 1974. Defence in Animals. Longman. Harlow, Essex, England. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 9 Janzen, D.H. 1981. Evolutionary physiology of personal defence. In Physiological Ecology: An Evolutionary Approach to Resource Use. C.R. Townsend & P. Calow, Eds.: 145–164. Blackwell. Oxford, England. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 10 Tollrian, R. & C.D. Harvell. 1999. The ecology and evolution of inducible defenses. Princeton University Press. Princeton, N.J. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 11 Mrosovsky, N. 1990. Rheostatis. Oxford University Press. New York. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 12 Nesse, R.M. & G.C. Williams. 1994. Why We Get Sick: The New Science of Darwinian Medicine. Vintage. New York. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 13 Cosmides, L. & J. Tooby. 1987. From evolution to behavior: evolutionary psychology as the missing link. In The Latest on the Best: Essays on Evolution and Optimality, J. Dupre, Ed. MIT Press. Cambridge, MA. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Lima, S.L. &L.M. Dill. 1990. Behavioral decisions made under the risk of predation: a review and prospectus. Can. J. Zool. 68: 619 – 640. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 15 Green, D.M. & J.A. Swets. 1966. Signal Detection Theory and Psycho-physics. Wiley. New York. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 16 Macmillan, N.A. & C.D. Creelman. 1991. Detection Theory: A User's Guide. Cambridge University Press. Cambridge, England. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Nesse, R.M. 1990. Evolutionary explanations of emotions. Hum. Nat. 1 ( 3 ): 261 – 289. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Williams, G.W. &R.M. Nesse. 1991. The dawn of Darwinian medicine. Q. Rev. Biol. 66 ( 1 ): 1 – 22. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 19 Gramlich, E.M. 1990. A Guide to Benefit-Cost Analysis, 2nd ed. Prentice Hall. Englewood Cliffs, NJ. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Hart, B.L. 1990. Behavioral adaptations to pathogens and parasites: five strategies. Neurosci. Biobehav. Rev. 14: 273 – 294. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Yoshimura, J. &W.M. Shields. 1987. Probabilistic optimization of phenotype distributions: a general solution for the effects of uncertainty on natural selection. Evol. Ecol. 1: 125 – 138. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | McEwen, B. &E. Stellar. 1993. Stress and the individual mechanisms leading to disease. Arch. Intern. Med. 153: 2093 – 2101. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 23 Sapolsky, Robert M. 1994. Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers: A Guide to Stress, Stress-Related Diseases, and Coping. W.H. Freeman. New York. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Munck, A., et al. 1984. Physiological functions of glucocorticoids in stress and their relation to pharmacological actions. Endocr. Rev. 5 ( 1 ): 25 – 44. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | 25 Nesse, R.M. & E.A. Young. 2000. The evolutionary origins and functions of the stress response. In Encyclopedia of Stress. G. Fink, Ed.: 79–84. Academic Press. San Diego. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | McEwen, B.S. 1998. Protective and damaging effects of stress. N. Engl. J. Med. 338 ( 3 ): 171 – 179. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Marks, I.M. &R.M. Nesse. 1994. Fear and fitness: an evolutionary analysis of anxiety disorders. Ethol. Sociobiol. 15 ( 5–6 ): 247 – 261. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Curtis, G.C., et al. 1976. “Flooding in vivo” during the circadian phase of minimal cortisol secretion: anxiety and therapeutic success without adrenal cortical activation. Biol. Psychiatry 11: 101 – 107. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Koob, G.F. 1999. Corticotropin-releasing factor, norepinephrine, and stress. Biol. Psychiatry 46 ( 9 ): 1167 – 1180. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Poulton, R., et al. 1998. Evidence for a non-associative model of the acquisition of a fear of heights. Behav. Res. Ther. 36 ( 5 ): 537 – 544. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Cole, J.O. 1988. The drug treatment of anxiety and depression. Med. Clin. N. Am. 72 ( 4 ): 815 – 830. | en_US |
dc.identifier.citedreference | Nesse, R.M. &K.C. Berridge. 1997. Psychoactive drug use in evolutionary perspective. Science 278: 63 – 66. | en_US |
dc.owningcollname | Interdisciplinary and Peer-Reviewed |
Files in this item
Remediation of Harmful Language
The University of Michigan Library aims to describe library materials in a way that respects the people and communities who create, use, and are represented in our collections. Report harmful or offensive language in catalog records, finding aids, or elsewhere in our collections anonymously through our metadata feedback form. More information at Remediation of Harmful Language.
Accessibility
If you are unable to use this file in its current format, please select the Contact Us link and we can modify it to make it more accessible to you.