Altruism from a biological perspective

Philosophy Forums Science, Technology, and Math
1

Humans have a tendency to act altruistically toward each other.

I assume that all human behavior has come to be as a result of evolution; therefore, any tendency in human behavior can be explained by the theory of evolution.

Here is how I am going to define altruism: Altruism is when an individual aids others in surviving and passing on their genes at the expense of his own ability to survive and pass on his genes.

Here are a couple of examples of humans behaving altruistically:

  1. Soldiers go to war and risk their lives (survival) in order to help their country prosper.
  2. People donate time and money, both of which could be used to aid their own survival and reproduction, to help those less fortunate than themselves.

Why do people do this? From an evolutionary perspective, how has this tendency come to be? How have we evolved the tendency to behave altruistically?

Richard Dawkins, in his book The Selfish Gene, claims that each individual organism is a survival machine with the sole purpose of propagating its genes in the gene pool. In this book, he discusses altruism. He explains how animals appear to behave altruistically, but are actually working to propagate their genes in the gene pool. For example, he discusses animals which behave altruistically toward family members, who share their genes, and he discusses animals who enter mutually beneficial agreements of altruism. However, much of human altruism is toward people who are not blood relatives, and does not take place in mutually beneficial situations.

Human altruism could, therefore, be said to be more “true” altruism than animal altruism. So, once again, I ask: Why?

Here is my answer: Humans have evolved the ability to, during development, determine what their society wants them to be, and become that. This is a trait which we undeniably have, and one of the most uniquely human traits. It has allowed individuals to thrive in social environments since the beginning of time. It is the reason why, excluding the most recent history of the western world, it has been traditional throughout the world for sons to take up the same occupation that their fathers had.

The reason why humans behave altruistically is because humans like altruistic behavior. Since we teach our children that they will be accepted if they strive for their land, or for the people around them, or even for people they’ve never met, they grow up to have the unconscious desire to do so.

Anyone agree? Disagree?

I’d love to hear a different answer to the question I posed of how we’ve evolved to act altruistically.

2

Reciprocal altruism is actually a pretty powerful selective factor. If people help each other altruistically, it makes sense that they would also be the beneficiary of altruistic actions as well. So it creates a positive feed-back loop.

To a point, anyway. There are cheaters who try and game the system. But that path is ultimately self-defeating. There has been a lot of good research on altruism in slime mold that helps illustrate this.

3

What about the specific cases I mentioned? Surely you’re not suggesting that donating to charity actually directly increases the likelihood that an individual will be on the receiving end of altruism?

I mean, I think I understand the significance of reciprocal altruism - at least to the point that Dawkins emphasized it - but I see more altruism in the world than can be explained reciprocally. Do you disagree?

4

No, I don’t disagree. There are plenty of examples of non-reciprocal altruism. Even slime mold has it :slight_smile:

In terms of how they developed, that is still a bit of an unknown. Group selection is a controversial theory that would model it quite well but, it is controversial. But that needn’t be brought into it. Basic game theory pretty effectively demonstrates the virtue of cooperation and the vice of competition. So it makes sense that cooperators will outcompete competitors.

If the slime mold is any indicator, it is a balancing act. If there is no altruism (everyone is a cheater), then during periods of crisis everybody dies. If everyone is altruistic (no one games the system) times of plenty are underutilized. But if there is a mix, then the system manages to perpetuate itself pretty darned efficiently.

Now, humans do clearly like and value altruistic behavior. Indeed, in gift-based economies altruistic behaviors are both the focus and display of power – and there are plenty of anthropologists who will argue that gift-based economies are the most primitive out there.

5

Selections are made by minds. Collectivity derived from the habit of human settlements and civilizations. Group selections are being influenced by both majority and the ruling class in societies. Religious speaking, the God has influenced on us. If the existence of the God has been proved by sciences, we will be capable of understanding the nature of the God. Thus, we can explain all the social phenomenon in a more accurate and detailed way. Sciences do not mention about the existence of the God (or a conscious object to dominate/control/influence the world) are not even close to the truth. A scientific idea which eventually explain and solve the mysterious existences of the God is the only solution to all myths. Such a scientific hypothesis will provide a solid ground for the development of sciences.

Teru Wong

6

Where we evolved anyone you met was either family or a potential ally, and yes giving charity or in those circumstances increased the liklihood of returned altruism. People don’t fight modern wars due to evolving some social sense (BS group selectionism) but rather because people can be naturally violent towards out-groups and central authority knows how to manipulate evolved psychology towards violent ends.

Macdonalds cheeseburger giant has millions of customers, they know how to exploit evolved psychology to power their agenda, the same is true of many efforts behind war.

People have evolved psychological defences against predators and disease. These defences can be manipulated, Hitler made the jews out to be half men, tainted with evil in their blood, they were a source of disease (14 pages Hitler dedicated to ranting about syphilis and jews) that held the germans down. There need be nothing but human psychology and a dedicated manipulator to bring thousands to war.

In tribal/hunter-gatherer societies war and homicide are constant, we don’t need to envoke modern societies.

7

Only in extended interactions that is, in which adopting a tit for tat tactic works quite well, anyway altruism DOES NOT require INCOHERENT group selectionism. For one kin-selection makes 100% sense in regards to Raltruism and ROBERT MOTHERFUCKIN TRIVERS covered reciprocal altruism.

Since Cosmides/Tooby found/researched cheator-detection adaptations (a fundamental to successful R-altruism) it seems easy to understand on the level of gene selection.

8

Sure, when I feed my puppy its because its face turns on some kind of “human DETECTION” scanner in my fusiform gyrus bringing about fast empathy. Theres a lot of altruism out of that. Anymore most altruism is PROBABLY reciprocal, AS IN WE EVOLVED IN TINY BANDS where the poor ass bum on the street would be a recurrent feature to life, or those sick kids right there.

When I give to charity its because I want them to suffer less, the exact urges that promote getting a RETURN in ancestral environments.

9

Group selection seems to be garnering more support. Neither kin selection nor reciprocal altruism are sufficient to explain phenomena like the activities of unicolonial ants, who live in huge colonies of hundreds or thousands of nests, each with multiple queens. Despite their great numbers, there is no fighting. There is free migration among nests - no territoriality - so each ant is generally surrounded by total strangers that share none of their genes.

The migratory nature may be the fundamental driver, at least, that’s the suggested explanation for the outcome of this simulation:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhTnlxhq0Tc[/youtube]

10

Thats grossly UNTRUE about ants.

Ants ARE best explained through GENE selection, its actually been done 30 odd years ago, where ant behavior IS VERY WELL EXPLAINED.

Queens are effectively slaves.

All these ants could ban together if there were common threats to their survival, OR a billion other reasons that make sense at the level of gene selection.

  1. Most evolutionary biologists support the gene-centric view of evolution.
  2. Mountains and mountains of evidence support it.
  3. Again and again group selection is found lacking, it has super weak evidence and is incapable of explaining coherently most evolved organisms.

If we see examples of group selection, always (to date) they’re revealed as gene selection, the organism just requires future study. Like an antelope showing off for a lion or a crocodile raising other crocodile’s babies. Its ASSUMED that group selection best fits a particular animal, these claims are COMMON, but RARELY are ever supported upon further research.

Its a fad among certain small populations of biologist to popularize group selection, WHETHER OR NOT the organisms bear out these qualities.

11
  • Richard Dawkins

cooperation can be an evolutionary stable stratedgy for unrelated organisms.

12

Hey Cyrene, I kind of thought I’d hear from you on this one. :slight_smile:

The statements I made above re: supercolonies of ants were prompted by a fairly recent study I read about, which showed some support for group selection. It stuck with me because it seemed to contradict almost everything else I’d read on selection. I don’t think the intent of the study was to suggest that group selection supercedes gene-level selection, but it was offered up as another possible mechanism at work in evolution. It didn’t claim that group selection should replace gene selection; nor did I mean to portray it in that light.

Neither do I mean to imply that the study is definitive, only that it seems to lend support to the idea that group selection may explain some behaviors which can’t otherwise be explained. It also seemed to be aligned with the modeling done in the computer simulation.

13

Thats the problem, the behaviors are explainable. They are explained through gene-selection just fine.

#2 Gene-selection and group selection are largely incompatible, they refer to fundamentally different units of selection.

#3 group selection has little evidence, little evidence its a force of anything BUT imagination, like researcherers looking at things from odd perspectives not born out by biological proccesses.

14

Theres cases in nature which group selection is 100% incapable of explaining which gene-selection explains JUST FINE. For example certain species of insect almost dying out because of the XY/XX chromosome imbalance. genes on X can harm XYs as long as their beneficial to XX (where they will most likely be) species can likely be wiped out (some almost have been) by a skewed sex ratio (no males)

There are a lot of cases like this group selection fails to account for (despite its famous popularizers changing definitions and lies) there are no such cases of gene selection failing to explain biological proccesses ONLY EXPLAINABLE through group selection.

So again; theres biological proccesses that group selection CAN’T EXPLAIN, and most observed organisms are EXPLAINED BETTER by gene-selection. Esp when we’re talking about animal forms, shapes and patterns.

Evolutionary developmental biology seems to support gene centered selection, as well as any of these subfields of biology.

15

Cooperation because of a unity. All living organisms in a Conscious Earth

[size=150]Are Big Bang and Evolution Incomplete?[/size]

“Big Bang” is a theory illustrating the beginning of our universe. Everything based on assumption without scientific proofs. By the way, nobody can “observe” the origin after its formation for centuries.

“Evolution” is incomplete. The failure to notice the Earth as a conscious living object has turned our scientists into the wrong directions.

Below is my latest findings.

  1. Microorganisms are equivalent to “our body cells” in the Earth. Microorganisms evolved into animals. Thus, the evolution of animals is also the life cycles of the Earth. In the meantime, “animals” are offspring of the Earth. Hence, the evolution of animals is also the evolution of the planet. Activities of the animals are also the life cycles of the Earth.

  2. Some of the microorganisms remain as the “body cells” of the Earth. They diversified into plants. The diversifications of plants are the “evolution” of the Earth herself*.
    (*From biological prospective, the Earth is our mother-in-common and a higher form of lives.)

  3. Both the diversification of “plants” and the evolution of “animals” are the process of growth of the Earth.

  4. The control experiments are the planets* nearby. (*They are being classified as planets according to our modern technology. They may not be the real case because of the rigidity of technology.) When their life cycles come to an end, no living organisms (including microorganisms) exist. The regeneration of a planet cannot be infinite.

  5. The evolution of the planet (as stated above) and the activities of the offspring (included in her life cycles) marked the higher form of lives as the planets. The indivisibility in-between the planet and the animals (including humankind) physically is solid.

  6. The life cycles of the planets will eventually come to an end. It satisfies the biological principles of aging. Although the existence of the planets are in a higher level, they cannot escape the fates from death.

  7. My hypothesis “Planets are living things” explained the absence of space arrivals and the absences of lives in the planets nearby. The planets are conscious living objects in a higher level. The end of their live cycles (over-exploitations of their resources and the unrecoverable damages by activities of offspring - animals) will be resulted in the EXTINCTION of all species inside*. (*Due to the distances and the time differences of the life periods of various planets, space migrations are impossible. Spaceships without sufficient supplies of resources cannot make their journeys to the another closest living planet. At the same time, these planets which still alive are conscious.) As a result, the Earth has no space visitors. Planets nearby have their life cycles end.

I am still working on it. Scientists have too much imagination. Please look at the sky through telescopes and think in the base as the Earth as a conscious living object. Space stations are coffins without enough supplies of resources. You are not going to migrate to other planets if their life cycles have come to an end.

Reason 1. Life cycles of the planets nearby have come to an end. The civilizations (which were there once) are not going to survive because of the differences in time of the life cycles of the planets. The evidences cannot be tracked because of the decays caused by time. The rapid development of civilizations (activities of the offspring -animals- of the planets) will definitely shortened the life span of the planets. That is similar to the situation on the Earth nowadays. Meanwhile, resources of these planets may have been used up by the civilizations. It does not necessarily means that there are no minerals, but it will be hard for search and explore.

Reason 2. The end of the life cycles marked the absence of living organisms. These living organisms are going to multiple and evolve if the environment is suitable. However, a closed environment like greenhouses will not recover the entire life cycles of a planet. Thus, the space migrations into other “dead” planets are not going to work. Several constraints come here: 1. Air pressure; 2. gravity; 3. Suitable environment and temperature for living organisms (from the Earth); 4. How to carry living organisms (from the Earth); 5. Recycle/Find alternate sources of resources. You cannot recover the life cycles of planets after they are dead. Living organisms are not likely to be “transplanted” into any “dead’ planet. I am not 100% sure here, but it is not seemingly to work. Life cycles of the planets cannot be reverted. Instead, we can slow down the process of aging. Reason 2 still need further investigation.

Teru Wong
If it’s an end, it should not be far. One has to take up the consequences - the God exists as always.