I need to see this. Gene Hackman, Max Von Sydow and Ian Holm... Three of my favourites!

I've read this thread. I want you to answer the question, that way I will not misattribute words or meaning to you.

The title of the book is The Selfish Gene, not The Selfishness Gene; if you take the former to mean the latter, that's on you.

Indeed. But we are born survivors, so the better metaphor I'd "Gene the Survivor". — Olivier5

No no, the aim of every gene is to go extinct, not to survive, because genes are antinatalists. Fortunately, most genes achieve this sooner or later, and it is only the unlucky or incompetent few that find themselves continuing to be reproduced. (This is a metaphor.)

Where has anyone said that competition in nature is a metaphor? It's one of the three postulates of natural selection. — Kenosha Kid

Alas, I am losing all respect. Genes cannot have an aim, they cannot compete because they cannot know a win from a loss. Competition in nature is not a metaphor when it is used about organisms that can envisage an outcome that is preferable to another outcome. Eg, Stags compete during the rut. It is not the case that genes compete because they are guaranteed 100% aimless.

This is the danger of metaphors. They start off as handy ways of thinking about unfamiliar things and with familiarity become taken literally by people who really ought to know better.

genes are antinatalists. — unenlightened

"Gene the Suicidal" doesn't have the same ring to it, I'm afraid. Your metaphor has limited blockbuster potential.

The title of the book is The Selfish Gene, not The Selfishness Gene; — Srap Tasmaner

Actually it was a typo. The title should read: "Gene the Shellfish".

Competition in nature is not a metaphor when it is used about organisms that can envisage an outcome that is preferable to another outcome. — unenlightened

Competition in nature is not a metaphor full stop.

This is the danger of metaphors. — unenlightened

I can kill someone with a hammer. That is not the danger of hammers but of killers. Hammers are still very useful.

The title of the book is The Selfish Gene, not The Selfishness Gene; if you take the former to mean the latter, that's on you. — Srap Tasmaner

:up:

I've read this thread. I want you to answer the question, that way I will not misattribute words or meaning to you. — creativesoul

I'll refer to myself:

Genes undergo mutations which may vary biological characteristics, and selection pressures choose from those characteristics, and thus those mutations, those that will be most frequently propagated via reproduction (e.g. the theory of natural selection). Thus metaphorically genes are adapting to propagate themselves. Even if the biological characteristic is altruistic, such as human altruism, the genes responsible for that altruism are individually adapting to increase their own longevity. This is a useful metaphor. — Kenosha Kid

What does it take in order for something to be metaphorically selfish? — creativesoul

Genes undergo mutations which may vary biological characteristics, and selection pressures choose from those characteristics, and thus those mutations, those that will be most frequently propagated via reproduction (e.g. the theory of natural selection). Thus metaphorically genes are adapting to propagate themselves. Even if the biological characteristic is altruistic, such as human altruism, the genes responsible for that altruism are individually adapting to increase their own longevity. This is a useful metaphor. — Kenosha Kid

What does it take for something to be selfish?

What does it take for something to be selfish? — creativesoul

To act in its own self-interest.

Are genes capable of acting in their own self-interest?

Oh well. I've finished the paper now and it's shockingly bad. I'm disappointed.

pp. 451 - 454 at least graze the issue of the unit of selection, but mainly to entertain group selection and mainly reject it and then quote Gould.

There are two excellent issues here that she could have spent the entire paper on:

• the issue in the Gould quote, that environmentally driven selection has to take or leave whole individuals and cannot reach down to the genetic level;
• the issue of the gene's integrity, its reality as a unit that can be inherited.

All the rest of the paper was junk and her treatment of these issues was insubstantial.

Are genes capable of acting in their own self-interest? — creativesoul

Literally speaking? No, of course not. They are dumb chemicals.

All the rest of the paper was junk and her treatment of these issues was insubstantial. — Srap Tasmaner

Yeah, it's not good. The Selfish Gene is a book about reciprocal altruism, and yet Midgley believes that 'not all altruism is reciprocal' is a genuine criticism. She seems to have low expectations of her readers and I dislike that immensely.

the issue in the Gould quote, that environmentally driven selection has to take or leave whole individuals and cannot reach down to the genetic level; — Srap Tasmaner

Yes, a mutation is beneficial only if it benefits the entire organism, which in turn benefits it's entire genome. Like a group that benefits from a particularly good hunter. But there still had to be a benefit due to that mutation.

So there are no such thing as selfish genes.

So there are no such thing as selfish genes. — creativesoul

If there are no such things as metaphors

"Did Mary Midgley understand The Selfish Gene? I always thought she was attacking a straw man. Was I wrong about that?" - Nigel Warburton

"I think she was. Which is too bad, because there are very good reasons to criticize that book, on biological grounds." - Massimo Pigliucci

https://twitter.com/mpigliucci/status/1317860473111498752

Why are you guys so caught up in this? If you dislike the metaphor so much, fine. As I mentioned earlier, Dawkins did too and preferred the term Immortal Gene. You can google it. My problems with the book is that it's outdated science, don't waste your time going around in circles because the terminological usage offends you so much.

Acting in one's own self-interest(being selfish) is not existentially dependent upon language use. Being metaphorically selfish is being called "selfish" despite the fact that that which is being called so is not capable of being so(despite the fact that what is being called "selfish" is not). Being metaphorically selfish is existentially dependent upon metaphor. Being selfish is not. You're conflating the two.

don't waste your time going around in circles because the terminological usage offends you so much. — Saphsin

:up: Yes, we appear to be a long way from where we started. Which is good.

My problems with the book is that it's outdated science — Saphsin

The reigning theory of reciprocal altruism at the time was group selection, an idea that is now niche.

Being metaphorically selfish is being called "selfish" despite the fact that that which is being called so is not capable of being so. Being metaphorically selfish is existentially dependent upon metaphor. Being selfish is not. You're conflating the two. — creativesoul

The emboldened part holds true. Your penultimate sentence is irrelevant, since nothing and no one holds that genes are literally selfish. What are you getting at here, that the book should have at worst been called The Metaphorically Selfish Gene? Is that your experience of how metaphor is done? "All the world is a metaphorical stage, and all the men and women merely metaphorical players?" "Advertising is the metaphorical rattling of a metaphorical stick inside a metaphorical swill bucket." I see a problem here...

Being metaphorically selfish is being called "selfish" despite the fact that that which is being called so is not capable of being so.
— creativesoul

The emboldened part holds true. — Kenosha Kid

There is no such thing as a selfish gene.

There is no such thing as a selfish gene. — creativesoul

That is correct. And the world is not really a stage.

If you're looking for me to defend the use of metaphor when doing science or philosophy, you're wasting your time. Metaphor is a poor substitute for either.

If you're looking for me to defend the use of metaphor when doing science or philosophy, you're wasting your time. Metaphor is a poor substitute for either. — creativesoul

Then don't use it. Most of us are comfortable with it.

There is no such thing as a selfish gene.
— creativesoul

That is correct. — Kenosha Kid

:ok:

You understand the whole thread is visible, right? :rofl:

Said more crudely, a book making more or less the same Hamiltonian case about how our social behavior might have some evolutionary background rather than be pure 'nurture', but titled "The Altruistic Gene" would not have sold so well in the late seventies. It would not have resonated quite as much as "The Selfish Gene" did. — Olivier5

Yes,

If you dislike the metaphor so much, fine. As I mentioned earlier, Dawkins did too and preferred the term Immortal Gene. You can google it. My problems with the book is that it's outdated science, don't waste your time going around in circles because the terminological usage offends you so much. — Saphsin

I agree. The 'metaphor' means something quite true and oft forgotten: that genes can only replicate themselves.

Soooo selfish of them! I can't believe the scoundrels... You'd think they would have the good grace of replicating a few alternative versions of themselves, rather than replicating just themselves all the sodding time, right?

I really wish my genes could replicate silver spoons and bank notes. I think that's the least they could do, but apparently they are just too selfish, huh?

This sort of thing is amusing:

He draws all his material from 'sociobiological' evolutionists such as W. D. Hamilton, Edward O. Wilson, and John Maynard Smith — p. 444

Yeah, that's a list (and throw in Robert Trivers too) of names nearly forgotten these forty years later, names disgraced and buried in a dusty corner of the annals of biology, practically heaped in ignominy.

Yes, a mutation is beneficial only if it benefits the entire organism, which in turn benefits it's entire genome. Like a group that benefits from a particularly good hunter. But there still had to be a benefit due to that mutation. — Kenosha Kid

I wonder if a shortcoming of the organism-centered view is that evolution might only happen to be non-Lamarckian. If evolution is about changes from one generation to the next in a gene pool, rather than changes in a population of organisms, then evolution is necessarily non-Lamarckian.

And something tells me biological evolution must be necessarily non-Lamarckian. Might be the difference between replication and imitation. Might be the reality of species. I'm honestly not sure, and I'm out of my depth.

If evolution is about changes from one generation to the next in a gene pool, rather than changes in a population of organisms, then evolution is necessarily non-Lamarckian. — Srap Tasmaner

That touches on another problem with Midgley, which is that she dismisses the genetic theory of evolution on the basis that genes aren't propagated, only their likenesses. But, persuant to your question, a gene is identified as the type within a population, not the token within the individual. Reproduction is the means by which a gene propagates through that population over generations. I don't see it as either/or: one is part of the other.

I really do think you can agree with Dawkins on disliking the connotation of the metaphor and get over it in 2 minutes, and then go and discuss the science. Why are you wasting your time arguing with people online about it?

Why are you wasting your time arguing with people online about it? — Saphsin

Partly because I find bizarre, convoluted metaphors funny, but also because I believe it is wrong to miseducate lay people with the wrong ideas about evolution. If you want to discuss a specific point of sociobiology, I'd be happy to.