Oxytocin: the Trust Chemical
| January 31st, 2008 
Today, I found a video by way of Paul Kedrosky’s always radical ninja blog: Infectious Greed. It’s a Google lunch talk by Michael Shermer, author of “The Mind of the Market.” It’s a long talk, but fascinating. it’s sort of a quick overview of the state of neuroscience, anthropology, and psychology, and how they relate to one another.
In his talk, he discussed Oxytocin. You can actually buy this stuff here. This hormone is produced in the body during sex, and during moments of physical affection. It’s also, evidently, flooded into the female body during labor, likely producing the intense and lasting love for the child.
What Shermer points out is that this chemical is basically liquid trust. It seems to be used to burn a degree of trust for specific persons into the brain. Oh, the huge manatee! This stuff could be quite dangerous in the wrong hands, provided it can make it past the blood/brain barrier.