The Selfish Gene
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I tutor kids at a Quaker prep school and every year, I help my sophomores with a research project of their choice. This year, one of my students is focusing on the nature of altruism. Her English teacher recommended Richard Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene and my student was like well this is 430 pages of dense content so…no thanks! Turns out, I already had the book. I bought it for Devin a few years ago and he never read it (shade). So, I saw this as an opportunity to combine my own mix of altruism and selfishness– I’m lowkey being pretty altruistic by helping her out with the reading but selfishly, I wanted an excuse to tackle this behemoth. I’ve also read The God Delusion and loved it, so I knew what I was working with.
Yes, it’s intimidating, but he makes it as manageable as possible, splitting his chapters into specific chunks but continuously weaving in his thesis so that we clearly get the throughline. Having that constant, academic structure is very helpful for understanding his work. I have the 40th anniversary edition, as he originally published it in 1976, catapulting him into fame. So, each chapter is riddled with endnotes that update us on the latest developments. I like this in theory, not in practice. I’m reading this for a reason: I wanna learn about shit. But flipping back and forth is a pain and the material is already so demanding. In fact, I was kind of rude to a waiter one time because I was trying to understand the formulas for determining the probability of genetic relatedness and I was tired of him interrupting. That’s on me. Don’t read The Selfish Gene at brunch. It’s obnoxious and now I know that first-hand.
Still, like anything that’s hard to digest, it’s extremely satisfying when it clicks. He argues (compellingly) that natural selection operates at the level of the gene. Genes seek replication and natural selection favors genes that successfully replicate. In certain contexts, genes that favor certain forms of altruism flourish because it helps the gene replicate, not because altruism is inherently good. Also– and this is a key point– not because of group selection. Group selection is a common but disputed (and totally debunked by Dawkins, IMO) theory that individuals are altruistic for the good of the species. As in, I might do something that jeopardizes my own life or ability to reproduce in order to help the species as a whole continue. I wouldn’t do that because I’m a selfish bitch, but you get it. Dawkins puts the kibosh on that whole thing. He argues that evolution should be viewed from a gene’s point of view, so the idea that someone would do something for the good of the entire species doesn’t work, because that individual gene doesn’t care about the entire species. That gene isn’t present in a lot of other members of the species and therefore won’t be replicated through their survival/reproduction, so the gene would have no reason to care about them. Of course, this becomes more complicated when talking about kin, so kin selection is a real thing.
One quick thing to clear the air: my dumbass didn’t know that the word ‘gene’ does not refer to a specific, fixed amount of material. I’m guessing that I’m not the only one in this boat. I loosely knew genetic mechanics (meiosis, mitosis, double-helix, yada yada yada) but I falsely assumed that the word ‘gene’ indicated a known unit of DNA. It does not. It’s a unit of evolution. Meaning, it’s a sequence of DNA that is replicable; some units will be longer than others.
Anyway, that’s getting a bit more in the weeds, but I hope that it shows how enlightening his work was for me. I legitimately learned some things and I can (kind-of) articulate them. I’m sure I’ll be an absolute joy at dinner parties. I learned about genetic reasons behind aging, sex differences, reproduction, altruism, etc. I also learned some really cool facts about other animals!
Richard Dawkins is without a doubt the smartest person whose work I’ve had the pleasure of reading. He’s incredibly knowledgeable, a true king at clarifying analogies, thorough so that you know the point of view of his dissenters, and funny in that he sassily takes digs at them. He’s the David Foster Wallace of non-fiction. I can somewhat compare him to Yuval Harari who I also respect and enjoy; however, Dawkins is a biologist and Harari is a historian, so their approach to content is different. Dawkins is more of a deep-dive. I wholeheartedly recommend this book. I know that it’s scary and I certainly had some reluctance picking it up, but let me reassure you that it’s well-worth the investment. I give it 5 out of 5 flames.
