I like the recap of cooperation types across time and at different scales, it provides a good overview to situate the usually human-centered studies of the evolved psychology of cooperation.
I think people often have the wrong picture of 'evolution' as purely selfish, largely because of the misleading 'selfish gene' idea. We shouldn't view genes as the only true replicators. Instead, ‘multi-level selection’ suggests that cells, organisms, and groups of organisms also count as replicators - all nested within each other like Russian Dolls.
Inside a single Russian doll, the inner units usually cooperate because they rely on each other (intra-cooperation), but conflict arises if a single unit starts reproducing selfishly at the expense of the whole (intra-conflict). Between two separate Russian dolls, they might work together for mutual benefit (inter-cooperation), or fight over limited resources (inter-conflict).
Admittedly, when I picture evolution, I usually only think of that last dynamic, the classic 'dog-eat-dog' struggle, completely forgetting the other three. I only realized this thanks to the great book 'Evolution and the Levels of Selection' by Samir Okasha.
I would like to point out that Margaret Thatcher's full quote was:
"I think we have gone through a period when too many children and people have been given to understand 'I have a problem, it is the Government's job to cope with it!' or 'I have a problem, I will go and get a grant to cope with it!' 'I am homeless, the Government must house me!' and so they are casting their problems on society and who is society? There is no such thing! There are individual men and women and there are families and no government can do anything except through people and people look to themselves first. It is our duty to look after ourselves and then also to help look after our neighbour and life is a tenure of work and duty and we look beyond that to a much wider range."
She wasn't denying the existence of community, but rather attacking the depersonalisation of responsibility.
Her target was the idea that "Society" is a nebulous entity that owes you something, without you owing anything in return.
Agency: By saying "there is no such thing," she was asserting that "Society" doesn't pay taxes or provide services—people do. She was attempting to re-establish the link between the individual's effort and the collective's well-being.
This is exactly how the examples you give from the gene level to society work. It is cooperation where every component has a role to play in the success of the whole.
Now what humans can do which every prior evolved cooperative structure doesn't do is help those who cannot contribute. In other words go beyond cooperation to charity and benevolence. And that is what Huxley was encouraging and what Thatcher urged in her frequent references to the parable of the Good Samaritan. The political debate is about the right balance between state and individual, compulsory or voluntary support. And the content of that debate while framed in moral terms is at root practical. Does pure voluntary do enough or leave a resentful suffering underclass, does pure state so limit individual responsibility that it becomes unaffordable.
I like the recap of cooperation types across time and at different scales, it provides a good overview to situate the usually human-centered studies of the evolved psychology of cooperation.
Some great uncommon examples!
I think people often have the wrong picture of 'evolution' as purely selfish, largely because of the misleading 'selfish gene' idea. We shouldn't view genes as the only true replicators. Instead, ‘multi-level selection’ suggests that cells, organisms, and groups of organisms also count as replicators - all nested within each other like Russian Dolls.
Inside a single Russian doll, the inner units usually cooperate because they rely on each other (intra-cooperation), but conflict arises if a single unit starts reproducing selfishly at the expense of the whole (intra-conflict). Between two separate Russian dolls, they might work together for mutual benefit (inter-cooperation), or fight over limited resources (inter-conflict).
Admittedly, when I picture evolution, I usually only think of that last dynamic, the classic 'dog-eat-dog' struggle, completely forgetting the other three. I only realized this thanks to the great book 'Evolution and the Levels of Selection' by Samir Okasha.
Here I ramble more about 'multi-level selection' but in regards to actual examples like cancer, culture, kin selection... if you are interested: https://paleoposition.substack.com/p/critiquing-veritasiums-video-on-evolution
Raihani's book is wonderful.
I would like to point out that Margaret Thatcher's full quote was:
"I think we have gone through a period when too many children and people have been given to understand 'I have a problem, it is the Government's job to cope with it!' or 'I have a problem, I will go and get a grant to cope with it!' 'I am homeless, the Government must house me!' and so they are casting their problems on society and who is society? There is no such thing! There are individual men and women and there are families and no government can do anything except through people and people look to themselves first. It is our duty to look after ourselves and then also to help look after our neighbour and life is a tenure of work and duty and we look beyond that to a much wider range."
She wasn't denying the existence of community, but rather attacking the depersonalisation of responsibility.
Her target was the idea that "Society" is a nebulous entity that owes you something, without you owing anything in return.
Agency: By saying "there is no such thing," she was asserting that "Society" doesn't pay taxes or provide services—people do. She was attempting to re-establish the link between the individual's effort and the collective's well-being.
This is exactly how the examples you give from the gene level to society work. It is cooperation where every component has a role to play in the success of the whole.
Now what humans can do which every prior evolved cooperative structure doesn't do is help those who cannot contribute. In other words go beyond cooperation to charity and benevolence. And that is what Huxley was encouraging and what Thatcher urged in her frequent references to the parable of the Good Samaritan. The political debate is about the right balance between state and individual, compulsory or voluntary support. And the content of that debate while framed in moral terms is at root practical. Does pure voluntary do enough or leave a resentful suffering underclass, does pure state so limit individual responsibility that it becomes unaffordable.
Humans cooperate in order to compete and compete in order to cooperate. https://arnoldkling.substack.com/p/the-cooperative-competitor