The insula is underqualified

I have noticed a motif in storytelling. Salvation comes from participation in revulsion.

Humans have had the disgust centers of the brain (insula) co-opted for social use. We can be disgusted by rotten milk and racism. Same mechanism. Rotten milk is called disgusting. Rotten behavior is called evil.

This disgust mechanism evolved to protect four-legged ground-sniffers from eating harmful substances. Disgust kills curiosity, which is invaluable for survival when you live with your nose in the dirt. Humans went bipedal, raising our sniffers off the ground. The insula was taken away from food inspection and promoted to HR. But he brought with him the black-and-white fight-or-flight approach from his fester-detection days to something much more subtle. I repeat, the insula went from quality control to human resources.

There is a weakness built into the insula: acquired taste. Even this hard-nosed judge can be swayed by consistent exposure. A person's first time tasting beer or wine is usually met with sourpuss and scoffing noises. But consistent exposure lets the body know that it is not the poison it smells to be. Too much and you may have to lay off the wine for a while.

This part of the brain meant to save us from edible poisons, like I said, is now also in charge of detecting social poisons. What would the acquired taste phenomenon look like when governing morality? We would call that being jaded, desensitized. Something like crime becomes a way of life. This is how WWI soldiers could casually take target practice on dead soldiers' faces. The initial moral revulsion to killing someone gave way to the acquired taste for dead soldier target practice.

Perhaps, when dealing with human interaction, it may be a worthwhile pursuit to find a more solid foundation on which to build a moral system. The insula is a mechanism designed to kill curiosity, hijack the body's defenses, and eventually fade with consistent exposure, giving way to the tolerance and even enjoyment of the formerly disgusting activity. A sandy foundation erodes with exposure to the elements. I seek bedrock.