Animals behave selfishly, in terms of their genes. That dosn't mean
that they won't help blood relatives or mates, mind you, because
they have a selfish interest in them as well.
Don't forget that animals will help others, even if they are not
related, for genetic reasons.
Suppose you help other animal, which may be of the same species, but
not a near blood relation, or of another species
-- and your risk of death for attempting to provide this help is 10%;
-- and your benefit if you survive is a 20% increase in your
probability of reproducing.
In this case, the variant of this species that tends to help others
will increase over time; the variant will be selected for.
When the process occurs between two different species, it is
often considered a process that leads to more symbiosis.
When the process occurs within a species, but between distantly
related individuals, the process is often called `group selection'.
Group selection often has a very low probability of occuring because
so much else can occur. Its influence may be heavily diluted.
Put another way, it is often the case that you are more likely to
increase the probability that your genes will be passed on if you save
the life of a nephew than if you save the life of a stranger.
Nonetheless, you can argue that some animals, and perhaps we humans,
have a genetic predisposition to help others who are not blood
relations, at least, in some circumstances.
This hypothetical genetic predisposition fits the notion that people
help those within a group they define as `ours' and are willing,
sometimes eager, to kill those who are not `one of us'. Statistically
speaking, a 100,000 years ago, your genes gained if you helped
non-relatives in your group; but your genes gained little or nothing
if you helped an outsider.
Put another way, groups do not commit genocide on their own members;
they kill people whom they define as different even if they are
neighbors - Bosnian Serb vrs Bosnian Muslim; Hutu vrs Tutsi;
Englishman vrs Tasmanian.
One of the characteristics of civilization has been to define a wider
and wider portion of humanity as `us'. This is happening so quickly
-- in under 10,000 years -- that this redifinition must be memetic,
not genetic.
For readers of science fiction, the meme of `who we are' has gone further.
Non-human sentients may well be `one of us'.
But not long ago, two people, one a Christian, the other a Muslim,
told me that even if we could build a robot that could feel, think,
and was as wise as a human, it should not have the same legal rights
as a human unless it also looked like a human. (I was careful to
specify the `feel' and `be as wise' criteria as well as the `think'
criterion)
If the robot did not look human, even if it felt, and thought, and was
as wise as a human, it should not have the same rights, because it was
not in `God's image'.
--
Robert J. Chassell [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Rattlesnake Enterprises http://www.rattlesnake.com
