 The hypothesis is that these adaptively plastic traits served the biological interests of Pleiostocene humans well, achieving the joint benefits of tribalism under conditions where it was fitness-enhancing and more inclusive morality under conditions where tribalism was counterproductive and greater inclusivity was beneficial. For us today, this constitutes a mixed inheritance: on the one hand, it provides us with the seeds for moral progress insofar as we can foster and maintain the socio-institutional contexts that allow more inclusive dispositions to flourish; on the other hand, it saddles us with vulnerability to destructive tribalism when we find ourselves (or even just perceive ourselves to be) in circumstances characterized by sufficient out-group threat cues. Buchanan and Powell argue that this makes human beings dangerously susceptible to moral regression due to the manipulation of perceptions through demagogic populism, for example—a danger that is exacerbated where disinformation is rapidly spread through social media. If they are right, then the situation is ripe for media-savvy politicians to manipulate popular beliefs in ways designed to trigger the threat cues that energize tribalist tendencies in thought, feeling and behavior for political gain—from reflexive anti-immigrant nationalist sentiment to racially charged scapegoating during a pandemic.