The Wilsons think evolutionists must embrace multilevel selection to do fruitful research in sociobiology—“the study of social behavior from a biological perspective.” When doing so, other investigators can keep in mind the Wilsons’ handy rule of thumb: “Selfishness beats altruism within groups. Altruistic groups beat selfish groups.”

Note: This article was originally printed with the title, "What's Good for the Group".

6 Comments

1. 1. iconoclasm 10:51 AM 12/18/08

   Is there really a debate about this?
   
   What is the difference between individual bacteria in a group relationship, a multi-celled organism where some cell lines get advantage as the cost of others, even down to the organelles within a cell and back up to individual organisms in a symbiotic relationship that share no genes?
   
   Every gene is "selfish". "Altruistic" genes are "selfish" in that thier behavior creates an improved condition for thier own surivial. The "struggle" that is evolution is not a all-or-nothing "game" it is merely for continued survial by any means necessary even if that means being "nice".

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2. 2. EvoPsych 12:27 PM 12/18/08

   Studying mainstream evolution I have a hard time buying into group selection theories. When it comes down to it natural selection works on an individual level even if those changes may seen to benefit the group in the end it still benefits the individual's chances of passing genes within the group. With that said I do think it is important to continue work in this area and maybe multilevel selection theory will hold up or maybe we will realize that when all is said and done selection is working on the gene. Either way more research is needed. www.evopsych.com

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3. 3. The E O 06:49 AM 12/19/08

   Considering your Pseudomonas fluorescens bacteria example, the relevant genes in successful non-polymer producing variants are still acting for their own individual replication. Given their new environment, containing the so called altruistic types, some have a gene which prevents them from over producing. It is this gene that will increase in frequency in future generations. There is no need to invoke any group selection, just the selection of genes which favour individual variants which are better at replicating in the new environment of polymer and non-polymer producing individuals.

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4. 4. biggus56 07:16 AM 12/19/08

   Before you incur the wrath of Dawkins, he's at Oxford, not Cambridge. And yes, it does make a difference.

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5. 5. ait10101 03:19 AM 2/13/09

   Interestingly, Williams and his father, also a biologist, presented a case of group selection that was well confirmed some time before the younger Williams published his influential book. His book, Adaptation and Natural Selection, was more concerned with refuting the casual use of notions like "for the good of the species" used by the likes of Konrad Lorenz. The book was widely misinterpreted as disproving group selection in general. The reasons for this need careful historical and sociological examination.

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6. 6. Salviati 10:47 PM 2/18/09

   Group selectionists need to meet a challenge they have never been forced by their opponents to confront, at least to my knowledge, namely, to explain how they know that when they use a word like �pride� to refer to lions living together, they are actually referring to a higher-level entity rather than, for example, fifteen lions hunting, feeding, sleeping, and otherwise interacting in the same area. To put this bluntly, how do they--and how do we--know that groups exist? This question may strike almost everyone as bizarre, but the biologists do ask a similar question about species, which are groups of a sort (that is, if they exist). The reality of species has been question mostly because of their fuzzy boundaries, but someone can reasonably wonder whether, irrespective of the issue of boundaries, people who use the noun phase �the species Panthera leo� are merely referring to, say, 40,000 lions rather than a higher-level entity comprising the individual organisms. Further, imagine for a second that the species skeptics are correct and that what exist are individual lions and nothing that can be called �the lion� or �Panthera leo.� Ask yourself what exactly is lost. Evolutionary biologists can still say most of the things they want to say about the evolution of lions. The lions currently extent can still be said to be descendents of proto-lions, which in turn were descendents of proto-proto-lions, and so on. The evolutionary tree still stands, it still has roots. Now ask yourself the same question about denying the reality of smaller groups, such as packs and flocks. What is really lost by rejecting their existence and claiming that group talk--use of terms like �group�and �pack�and �flock�--is just a way of talking about individual conspecifics that are living in proximity and causally affecting each other in important ways? To help in answering this question, let me point out that the group rejectionist will redescribe the Pseudomonas fluorenscens bacteria example by saying, not that the bacteria who develop the beneficial mutation are group saving, but that their secretion of the polymer saves both their own lives and the lives of the freeloaders, at least up to the point that the freeloaders outreproduce the polymer-secreting bacteria, causing death and destruction for all. This account does not require accepting that there is some higher-level entity comprising altruists and freeloaders, it just requires acknowledging the obvious fact that what happens in the neighborhood depends on who lives in the neighborhood.

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