You don't gain anything by hurting yourself just so you can hurt someone else. So why hasn't evolution weeded out all the spiteful people? As psychologist Simon McCarthy-Jones argues, spite isn't just what we feel when a car cuts us off or when a partner cheats, it's our fairness instinct, and it is one of the building blocks of human civilization. Indeed, McCarthy-Jones suggests that some of history's most important developments—the rise of religions, governments, and moral codes—were actually redirections of spiteful impulses.