The difference being that algae isn't consciously *deciding* to stay at the right level, whereas human beings go through an evaluation process leading to explicit decision making.
On Wed, Oct 5, 2011 at 9:36 PM, Nicholas Harvey <[email protected] > wrote: > Hello, > > "Selfishness" a requirement for the human race? I don't think so. Let me > get a little anecdotal here. There is an algae (forgotten the specific name > sorry) which to live happily needs to sit part way between the surface of a > pool of water and the bottom. If it sits too low it gets no oxygen. To help > it not sink it forms a colony, in the colony some of the algae takes a > strange form and sort of forms a spongy mass which helps the entire colony > float. If a particular algae expresses this then it looses out on > respiration and reproduction significantly but if not enough express this > then the hole lot sinks and dies. If too much does then the colony sits to > high and not enough reproduction occurs. > > The same is true of humanity (in my opinion) we need some selfless people > and we need some selfish people. With too many of either things go a bit > pear shaped. > > Cheers, > Nick > >
