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Author Topic:   Altruism and the selfish gene
Flamingo Chavez
Inactive Member


Message 1 of 12 (38097)
04-25-2003 9:15 PM


Okay, so I'm reading The Selfish Gene and I've just finished like just the first chapter and I can't get past the idea that alterism conflicts with his concept that genes are inherently selfish.
For Example he says:
"They made the erroneous assumption that the important thing in evolution is the good of the species (or group) rather than the good of the individual (or gene)"
"it seems to follow that anything that has evolved by natural selection should be selfish."
He then seems to say that selfish genes will survive in spite of the alteristic genes. It seems to me, by this logic the alteristic genes should have all been selected from the gene pool.
Maybe I'm missing something (this is probably the case). I really would like to see this point clarified for me. Thanks in advance.
------------------
"Science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind." - Albert Einstein

Replies to this message:
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crashfrog
Member (Idle past 1466 days)
Posts: 19762
From: Silver Spring, MD
Joined: 03-20-2003


Message 2 of 12 (38098)
04-25-2003 9:30 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by Flamingo Chavez
04-25-2003 9:15 PM


I haven't read the book, but I have glanced over the selfish gene explanations and I think what he's getting at is this:
Altruism is a kind of genetic selfishness because there could be situations where an organism actually propagates more of its genes by giving its life for several of its close relatives. Consider that you share half of your genetic material with your siblings, as well as 100 percent between your two parents. giving your life to save the lives of your siblings, parents, or other family actually protects MORE of your genes than the other way around.
Ergo, even self-sacrifical behaviors have a genetic advantage. That's a loose explanation, I'm sure Dawkins gets into it a little better.

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NosyNed
Member
Posts: 8996
From: Canada
Joined: 04-04-2003


Message 3 of 12 (38099)
04-25-2003 9:51 PM
Reply to: Message 1 by Flamingo Chavez
04-25-2003 9:15 PM


Bees and things
It's been awhile since I read it so you should finish the book for the "official" explanation.
Dawkins discusses a number of situations where apparently altruistic behavior can be shown to be based on conserving individduals who share genes with the altruistic individidual. The genetics of the bee hive is particularly interesting.
My concern is that he may be overstating the case. I wonder (without evidence) if genes can be preserved in a population in individuals that are not closely related but all carry a gene for behavior which preserves the population as a whole. I don't remember this being discussed. Ok, I haven't thought it through. This thread might be the place to work it a bit.

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Flamingo Chavez
Inactive Member


Message 4 of 12 (38105)
04-26-2003 2:52 AM


"giving your life to save the lives of your siblings, parents, or other family actually protects MORE of your genes than the other way around."
I've considered this arguement, and it seems like it requires some sort of group consciousness. I'm not ready to ascribe that to birds etc.
"I wonder (without evidence) if genes can be preserved in a population in individuals that are not closely related but all carry a gene for behavior which preserves the population as a whole."
The problem with this is, if the entire population doesn't have these alteristic genes, then the animals that are not alteristic will survive. Thus the nonalteristic gene is passed on. I'm not sure if this is so far fetched of an explanation... For example in his book Dawkins cites a bird's alarm call as being alteristic (because this alarm call draws unwanted attention to the bird by the predator). I used to have a pair of parrakeets, everytime I had anything that resembled a snake, they went insane. Neither had ever seen a snake before. It astounded me (hey, I was like 10). I now know this to be true in monkies also. I would really like to figure out the mechanism that something like that would come about. I'm not entirely convinced that the selfish gene theory can account for it.
I also have issues with the bee hive example. Worker bees don't reproduce. They are genetic pawns. But, this is a good example of how an organism can be sacrificed for the good of the community and the alteristic genes will not be sacrificed.

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PaulK
Member
Posts: 17822
Joined: 01-10-2003
Member Rating: 2.2


Message 5 of 12 (38109)
04-26-2003 5:29 AM
Reply to: Message 4 by Flamingo Chavez
04-26-2003 2:52 AM


A couplr of comments. It doesn't require any sort of group consciousness (after all the point is that this behaviour is instinctive). What it means is that organisms can recognise close relatives and will tend to aid them in some situations where these promote survival of the genes for such behaviour.
In the bird call example the behaviour persists because those that don't probably do not gain so much from not calling as they would lose if few or none called.
The bee hive example is good BECAUSE worker bees do not reproduce - they can only aid the perpetuation of their genes by "altruistic behaviour". And they do.

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lpetrich
Inactive Member


Message 6 of 12 (38111)
04-26-2003 7:36 AM


Cells of Multicelled Organisms
What we are discussing here is often called "kin selection".
And one important place it happens is among the cells of a multicellular organism. Each one has its own genetic material, so a cell is a sort-of organism. But the large majority of cells ultimately die without leaving any successors.
A blue whale contains around 10^17 cells, but on average, it is survived by only two cells -- all the rest ultimately die. And that whale has many cells that die before that: skin cells, digestive-system lining cells, blood cells, etc.
Likewise, a tree is mostly dead -- the only actively-metabolizing parts of its trunk and branches are the cambium (the thin green growing layer) and some cells that act as valves. All the other wood and bark cells are dead. A giant sequoia may thus contain 10^19 dead cells -- and a much smaller number of active ones.
And many trees drop their leaves in preparation for poor conditions -- dryness or winter. Meaning that all those leaf cells die at the end of a growing season.
[This message has been edited by lpetrich, 04-26-2003]

  
Chavalon
Inactive Member


Message 7 of 12 (38114)
04-26-2003 8:49 AM
Reply to: Message 5 by PaulK
04-26-2003 5:29 AM


It doesn't require any conciousness at all, in principle. If individuals help others in a group, and they give help proportional to the average relatedness of a random individual, then they will be behaving more or less as if they were being deliberately altruistic, especially in a close family group.
Being able to recognise specific individuals allows for 'delayed reciprocal altruism', ie 'If you scratch my back, then I'll scratch yours after.' This makes a lot of sense, maybe it's one of the drivers of the evolution of intelligence.
There's something special about the genetics of bees that makes workers more closely related to their sisters than potential daughters IIRC, making this kind of altruism easy to explain by kin selection.

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Wounded King
Member
Posts: 4149
From: Cincinnati, Ohio, USA
Joined: 04-09-2003


Message 8 of 12 (38115)
04-26-2003 10:47 AM
Reply to: Message 7 by Chavalon
04-26-2003 8:49 AM


Re: Re:epigenesis?
Bees, wasps and ants and share a characteristic of the females being diploid while males are haploid. Consequently sister sibs are 3/4 related while offspring are only 1/2 related.

This message is a reply to:
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Flamingo Chavez
Inactive Member


Message 9 of 12 (38130)
04-26-2003 8:15 PM


Thanks for the responses. This kin selection idea seems to be very valid.
------------------
"Science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind." - Albert Einstein

  
Quetzal
Member (Idle past 5872 days)
Posts: 3228
Joined: 01-09-2002


Message 10 of 12 (38140)
04-27-2003 5:27 AM
Reply to: Message 1 by Flamingo Chavez
04-25-2003 9:15 PM


I don't want to spoil the surprise, as it were, so I won't go into excruciating detail here. You should read "Selfish Gene" with the understanding that Dawkins (at the time) was arguing a "gene's eye view" of evolution at a time when one of the dominant paradigms was "group selection". Read the book as an "introduction" to his viewpoint, and understand that it was a book designed primarily for a lay audience. Then read his "The Extended Phenotype" immediately afterwards. TEF expands on his behavior and gene selection ideas, and although still very readable, is written for a more technical audience (and as a way of answering many of the critics of "Selfish Gene"). Don't expect a really good answer to your altruism questions in the first book. The second covers it completely and thoroughly. But by all means read "Selfish Gene", especially the chapters on memetics - IMO the most important part of the book. TEF is the book he SHOULD have written first.
On to your quotes:
They made the erroneous assumption that the important thing in evolution is the good of the species (or group) rather than the good of the individual (or gene)"
This is part of what I was talking about above. Here Dawkins is arguing against the group selection prevalent at the time (1976) - although in my opinion it was already dying out. What's interesting is that Dawkins, after taking to task the group selectionists, takes to task the individual selectionists next (in TEF, especially, but introduced here). E.O. Wilson, for instance devotes an entire chapter in his superlative "Sociobiology", written the year before "Selfish Gene" to theories of group selection - so obviously this was an important theory at the time. (If you ever get a chance to go to the library and look up Wilson's book, check out chapter 5, Group Selection and Altruism).
"it seems to follow that anything that has evolved by natural selection should be selfish."
I'll let it go by saying he's setting you up for his main argument concerning genes.
He then seems to say that selfish genes will survive in spite of the alteristic genes. It seems to me, by this logic the alteristic genes should have all been selected from the gene pool.
There's some fairly abstruse pop gen mathematics that show why this wouldn't occur, but for an introduction, try googling on "iterated prisoner's dilemna", "tit-for-tat strategies" etc.
I don't think you're "missing anything". You're simply encountering the same problem I had with SG. He doesn't write as clearly as he could have - and his style is to take you from a very brief intro in Chap 1 leading you by the hand through the rest of the book explaining what the hell he was talking about. It's worth sticking with even if you don't (as I don't) necessarily agree with him on the gene's eye view of evolution. Enjoy!

This message is a reply to:
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Itzpapalotl
Inactive Member


Message 11 of 12 (38146)
04-27-2003 10:55 AM
Reply to: Message 7 by Chavalon
04-26-2003 8:49 AM


This is a good article on kin selection:
Kin selection: fact and fiction
more papers on the subject can be found here: http://westgroup.icapb.ed.ac.uk/social.html

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Mike Holland
Member (Idle past 483 days)
Posts: 179
From: Sydney, NSW,Auistralia
Joined: 08-30-2002


Message 12 of 12 (38195)
04-28-2003 9:23 AM


Just to confuse everything once you have got a handle on selfish genes, you could glance at Stephen Gould's tome 'The Structure of Evolutionary Theory'. Gould suggested that selection works at all three levels - gene, individual and species. Makes sense to me!
Thesis, antithesis, synthesis, I guess.
NB. I don't recommend actually READING the book - one doesn't live that long. I read about a quarter, then skipped through the rest.
Mike.

  
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