caravelair

very good points made, monkeybot!

Peez

No. There has been research on exactly what factors determine whether or not it is advantageous for an individual to join a group, and it is clear that under certain circumstances it can be very advantageous. Behaviours that make such social groups work better can benefit all members of the group. Your point is valid.

Peez

Albert Cipriani

Dear Peez,
Thanks for your response. You are a patient man, and I appreciate that.

One of my disconnects here with others and with you is that I am coming at evolution from a philosophical/theological perspective. Whereas you guys are all just being good scientists. I hope your scientific explanations can resolve my abstracted non-scientific objections.

Right off, I accept all of your definitions. My incredulity over human altruism is not contingent upon any specialized meanings of words.

Allow me to reframe the issue. It seems to me that both the strength and the Achilles heel of evolution is that it’s a continuum. Like a chain, it holds sway only if all of it is intact. Like a freight train that’s crossed a continent, every inch of its progress has been dependent upon the railroad ties that it left behind. Each evolutionary development relies on some preceding evolutionary development.

For example, if we ever find a hairy fish with digits or a placenta-born feathered crocodile, it would prove evolutionary theory to be seriously flawed. In a much more modest way, human altruism seems like that. As evolution predicts that we’ll never find a fossil of a fish that had evolved digits, it would seem to also predict that humans could not have ever evolved into altruistic beings.

But virtually all healthy human beings exhibit altruistic tendencies. Ergo, wherefore doth altruism come? This is where theology posits a soul, that is, a spiritual capacity to act supernaturally. But if there’s a purely natural explanation for the seemingly unnatural behavior of altruism, I’d like to know of it.

You wrote:
To me altruism is more like the snowflake that has landed on my bedpost. It’s not the path it took to get here that’s baffling, but how the dickens it passed through the roof of natural selection.

Altruism has survival value for the species but not the individual who practices it. Ergo, my conundrum over its emergence. If it emerged all at once in everyone everywhere, then the playing field would be level and the human species could reap its benefits. But if evolution forces me to suppose that it originated in an individual or small group through genetic drift, all I can see is that individual or small group getting mowed down by the Grim Reaper.

1) Human altruism may be defined as the sacrifice of one’s personal needs for one’s perception of another’s needs.
2) Neanderthal’s diet was 97% meat.
3) Dead Neanderthals were meat.
4) Starving Neanderthals did not eat dead Neanderthals.
5) Starving Neanderthals buried their dead with flowers.
6) Ergo, Neanderthals sacrificed their personal needs for their perception of another’s needs.
7) Ergo, Neanderthals practiced altruism.
8) Ergo, humans ever since, who are so much as tempted to do likewise (Donner Party, 1846) practice altruism.

This seems like a broad brushstroke. At this point, I can only agree that genetics is the basis of instinctual behaviors, like those you described in the legendary Gronks.

All that seems clear to me is that evolution explains instinctual altruism, that is, altruistic behaviors that are autonomously non-rational. If my own personal experience of altruistic tendencies were of this nature, we would not be having this dialogue. If I reflexively reached for my wallet when I saw a bum as I reflexively kick my doctor when he taps my knee, then human altruism would need no further evolutionary explanation.

Ergo, you are asserting that if human altruism is an adaptation, evolution selected it because of its competitive advantage.

But how is altruism competitively advantageous to the altruistic individual who practices it? What chance have the altruistic alleles got of getting replicated when they program their host to be predisposed to self-sacrifice? Evoking kin selection as an answer only seems to beg the question in that the first altruistic individual -- not his/her kin -- is the one who is carrying the altruistic torch that needs to get passed on. – Sincerely, Albert the Traditional Catholic

caravelair

i think that if you look at a group or band of humans rather than an induvidual being, it becomes much clearer how altruism is an evolutionary advantage. for ancient homonids, the survival of the group was advantageous to the individual in many ways, as monkebot has pointed out. since altruistic behaviour benefits the group as a whole, it clearly helps the individual to pass on genes.

such behaviour is also advantageous if you just look at a single family unit. since children require so many years of development before they can fend for themselves, putting one's child's needs ahead of one's own needs would clearly help one's genes to be passed on to the next generation.

now, this doesn't explain not eating dead people, but i suggest that such behaviour is simply a biproduct of a usually advantageous characteristic. you see, it would be much more complicated to evolve a behaviour for each and every single situation. it's much simpler to evolve altruism as a general characteristic. since it's advantageous in some situations, it doesn't matter that it presents a disadvantage in others. the survival of one's child is clearly more important than a single meal of human flesh.

scombrid

Unless of course that person is a member of a group that is perceived as having done you harm. Look at how a Palestinian responds when an Isrealite is killed in a suicide attack. In your example you relate to the total stranger more than to your ingreat relative. This isn't contradictory to social behavior as predicted by reciprocal altruism. Reciprocal altruism also predicts tit for tat. Ingreat relatives that don't pull their weight are to be rewarded in kind.

Extreme altruism is likely a mistake much like a robin feeding worms to koy.

Albert Cipriani

Dear Monkeybot and Peez,
You’re talking reciprocal altruism here, you scratch my back I’ll scratch yours, or that old USSR joke: “We pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us.”

Again, this definition is just another version of you pick my lice and I’ll pick yours. It’s more a description of contract law than morals.

What you’ve said here sounds like reductionism. Are monkeys being moral by virtue of the fact that they live in a group? If rules they’ve hit upon that allow them to group more effectively are to be seen as morals or even proto-morals, then my herd of goats are acting morally by always grazing together. And why stop there? Schools of fish must be highly moral. They turn on a dime without any deviancy.

Fact is, the rules that govern collective behaviors are nothing more than survival skills, which come under the heading of reciprocal altruism. Human altruism, on the other hand (the active ingredient of morality) might be described as suicidal skills. The group may reap empirical benefits from it, but the altruistic behavior necessarily reaps the altruistic practitioner. That’s why I don’t think it has a natural explanation. – Sincerely, Albert the Traditional Catholic

Colander of Truth

Wouldn't a Christian follow Christ *all* the time, and not intermingle other thinkers/writers as auxilliary sources of wisdom? What does Nietzsche offer that Christ does not already say, or does Nietzsche even contradict?

Nevertheless, the bible indeed states that "the meek shall inherit the earth." What does this say for the bible, that you find this reference to fitness so alien?

Majestyk

Considering that without even some of the most basic of today’s medical practices, death by disease was probably common (or not, depending on whether diseases were common only after animal husbandry was developed). Consuming the flesh of the dead under those circumstances would certainly seem to be a tremendous risk. Therefore it would not seem unreasonable for a natural aversion to it to develop.

Just a thought.

Peez

Thank you, and I appreciate your efforts to conduct this discussion in a respectful way.I will do my best, but it seems that you are looking for scientific reasons that evolution might not be reasonable, rather than anything philosophical or theological. I can appreciate that someone might not agree that the scientific method is a valid way of learning about the universe, or that it may be flawed because it is restricted to naturalistic explanations. However, science works through attempts at empirical falsification, and it seems to be the latter that you are exploring. Please correct me if I am wrong.Given that we are using the definition of "theory of evolution" that I outlined above, finding a "hairy fish with digits" or "placenta-born feathered crocodile" would not pose any problems at all for the theory of evolution. There is nothing in this theory that predicts that fish could not evolve hair or digits, nor that crocodiles could not evolve a placenta or feathers (interestingly enough, ancient fish did evolve hair and digits, and some ancestors of crocodiles did evolve feathers, and some more ancient reptiles did evolve a placenta). To use altruism to challenge evolutionary theory, one must show that evolutionary theory is insufficient to explain the evolution of altruism. Since I have already shown that evolutionary theory is sufficient to explain the evolution of altruism, this seems to be a lost cause (unless there is some objection against the model which I presented).With respect, I already gave it. Note that the existence of a naturalistic explanation does not prove that altruism evolved through naturalistic processes, it only shows that it could have. It certainly does not prove that there was (or is) no supernatural process involved.Except that I have already explained how the "snowflake" could have got to where it is. If you have found some flaw in my model, please point it out.I must admit that I am baffled by your line of argument. Just to be clear, the model of how altruism could have evolved (in my post near the bottom of page 2 of this thread) was meant to show how altruism could evolve through the mechanisms described in the theory of evolution. As far as I can tell, this models demonstrates that altruism can evolve through purely natural means. If there is some problem with the model, please let us know.I don't know about the "perception" there, but for the purposes of this line of logic I can accept this definition.I will take your word for it.In part.You should provide a reference for this assertion, but I doubt that it is important here. For the moment I will accept this.There is good evidence of this.This is a non-sequitur. I see no reason to think that burring one's dead is automatically sacrificing one's needs or providing for the perceived needs of others. You seem to be implying that by burying their dead, these Neanderthals were sacrificing their own needs (in terms of food) and providing for the perceived needs of their friends (by preparing them for the next life. This rests on a number of unsupported assumptions. First, you are assuming that the Neanderthals were forced to eat less if they did not eat their dead. This might be true, but then again it might not if they had plenty of other food available. Next, you are assuming that Neanderthal meat was a healthy alternative to other food types. In fact, cannibalism can be very dangerous: eating members of one's own species is much more likely to pass on diseases than eating members of other species. Another assumption is that burying the dead was necessarily providing for the perceived needs of the deceased. The burying of dead bodies helps reduce the spread of disease, and so could have begun to serve the needs of the live Neanderthals doing the burying. Even the added flowers could be seen to serve the needs of the living: keeping the departed spirits happy so that they would not return to harm the living.

However all this is moot. I have already demonstrated that altruistic behaviour can evolve naturally, unless you can show us why my model is flawed.Altruism is not restricted to humans.I don't want to get into a discussion of what "instinctual" means, but it is certainly clear that human behaviour is influenced by genetics.[I have already explained that we simply do not understand exactly how human thought processes work. Are you willing to accept that altruism can evolve by the mechanisms of the theory of evolution, while not accepting that human behaviour cannot be explained by such processes?Although I made no such assertion, I do now.I already explained this, in the post near the end of page 2 of this thread. If there is something in my model that you do not understand, or do not agree with, please draw it to my attention.

Peez

Peez

This is a tangent, since I have already explained how altruism (not reciprocal altruism) could evolve. That being said, the distinction does not disqualify human morality from consideration. A few things to consider:

1) Individual organisms may decide whether or not to join or to stay joined to a group. If there is a net benefit to group membership, natural selection can favour behaviours that tend to make one join a group. Under these circumstances, natural selection can also favour behaviours that maintain the group. Further, natural selection can favour behaviours that increase the efficiency of the group, because that would tend to increase the survival and reproduction of the members of that group (this can be more complex, I have simplified somewhat).

2) Reciprocal altruism is just as difficult (or easy, depending on your point of view) to explain in terms of the theory of evolution as is non-reciprocal altruism.

3) Evolution is an opportunistic, and not a perfecting, process. A pattern of behaviour that has evolved because it increased the chances that a close relative would survive and reproduce, or even because it provided for reciprocal advantage, could easily result in entirely altruistic behaviour towards unrelated individuals who provide no reciprocal advantage, particularly if social conditions change.

4) It has not been established that humans tend to be truly altruistic. It seems obvious that at least some altruistic behaviour does occur, it also seems obvious that a very great deal of selfish and in fact mutually destructive behaviour occurs. This is entirely consistent with an evolutionary origin for our behaviour.

5) It is a scientific fact that we have evolved from non-human ancestors, so it is not a stretch to think that our behaviours evolved as well.

Peez