Consider what we call "disorders" - many of them, of course, are genuinely maladaptive. But some appear only contextually maladaptive and perhaps even beneficial in other contextual circumstances. Consider, for example, the fear of being alone (autophobia) - frequently classified as a disorder. Of course, there are symptoms (or traits) that may be maladaptive, particularly in modern society - i.e. that negatively affect the person who has it, and that the person may need relief from these. But consider that for much of the last 5 or 10 million years of our evolutionary history, our way of life was probably largely relatively approximately something between modern hunter-gatherer societies, and the way the chimps in the documentary Rise of the Warrior Apes lived (and still live) - frequently in dangerous conflict with neighboring tribes. Likewise our last common ancestor with the chimps. In these societies in which our ancestors lived, finding yourself lost and alone from your...
