Evolution, Games, and God: The Principle of Cooperation
416Evolution, Games, and God: The Principle of Cooperation
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Overview
Assembling experts in mathematical biology, history of science, psychology, philosophy, and theology, Martin Nowak and Sarah Coakley take an interdisciplinary approach to the terms “cooperation” and “altruism.” Using game theory, the authors elucidate mechanisms by which cooperation—a form of working together in which one individual benefits at the cost of another—arises through natural selection. They then examine altruism—cooperation which includes the sometimes conscious choice to act sacrificially for the collective good—as a key concept in scientific attempts to explain the origins of morality. Discoveries in cooperation go beyond the spread of genes in a population to include the spread of cultural transformations such as languages, ethics, and religious systems of meaning.
The authors resist the presumption that theology and evolutionary theory are inevitably at odds. Rather, in rationally presenting a number of theological interpretations of the phenomena of cooperation and altruism, they find evolutionary explanation and theology to be strongly compatible.
Product Details
ISBN-13: | 9780674047976 |
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Publisher: | Harvard University Press |
Publication date: | 05/07/2013 |
Pages: | 416 |
Sales rank: | 564,441 |
Product dimensions: | 6.40(w) x 9.30(h) x 1.40(d) |
About the Author
Sarah Coakley is Norris-Hulse Professor of Divinity and Deputy Chair of Arts and Humanities at the University of Cambridge.
Heather D. Curtis is Associate Professor of Religion at Tufts University.
Dominic D. P. Johnson is Alistair Buchan Professor of International Relations at St Antony’s College, University of Oxford.
Stephen M. Kosslyn is John Lindsley Professor of Psychology in Memory of William James, Emeritus, at Harvard University and Director of the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University.
Read an Excerpt
Chapter 4: Five Rules for the Evolution of Cooperation
Evolution is based on a fierce competition between individuals and should therefore only reward selfish behavior. Every gene, every cell and every organism should be designed to promote its own evolutionary success at the expense of its competitors. Yet we observe cooperation on many levels of biological organization. Genes cooperate in genomes. Chromosomes cooperate in eukaryotic cells. Cells cooperate in multi-cellular organisms. There are many examples for cooperation among animals. Humans are the champions of cooperation: from hunter gatherer societies to nation states, cooperation is the decisive organizing principle of human society. No other life form on earth is engaged in the same complex games of cooperation and defection. The question how natural selection can lead to cooperative behavior has fascinated evolutionary biologists for several decades.
A cooperator is someone who pays a cost, c, for another individual to receive a benefit, b. A defector has no cost and does not deal out benefits. Cost and benefit are measured in terms of fitness. Reproduction can be genetic or cultural. In any mixed population, defectors have a higher average fitness than cooperators (Figure 4.1). Therefore, selection acts to increase the relative abundance of defectors. After some time co-operators vanish from the population. Remarkably, however, a population of only cooperators has the highest average fitness, while a population of only defectors has the lowest. Thus, natural selection constantly reduces the average fitness of the population. Fisher’s fundamental theorem, which states that average fitness increases under constant selection, does not apply here because selection is frequency dependent: the fitness of individuals depends on the frequency (=relative abundance) of cooperators in the population. We see that natural selection in well-mixed populations needs help for establishing cooperation.
Kin Selection
When J.ºB.ºS. Haldane remarked, “I will jump into the river to save two brothers or eight cousins,” he anticipated what became later known as Hamilton’s rule (Hamilton 1964). The ingenious idea is that natural selection can favor cooperation if the donor and the recipient of an altruistic act are genetic relatives. More precisely, Hamilton’s rule states that the coefficient of relatedness, r, must exceed the cost-to-benefit ratio of the altruistic act:
r > c/b (1)
Relatedness is defined as the probability of sharing a gene. The probability that two brothers share the same gene by descent is 1/2, while the same probability for cousins is 1/8. Hamilton’s theory became widely known as “kin selection” or “inclusive fitness” (Grafen 1985; Taylor 1992; Queller 1992; Frank 1998; West, Pen, and Griffin 2002; Foster, Wenseleers, and Ratnieks 2006). When evaluating the fitness of the behavior induced by a certain gene it is important to include the behavior’s effect on kin who might carry the same gene. Therefore, the “extended phenotype” of cooperative behavior is the consequence of “selfish genes” (Dawkins 1976; Wilson 1975).
Table of Contents
Preface xi
Introduction: Why Cooperation Makes a Difference Sarah Coaklet Martin A. Nowak 1
I Evolutionary Cooperation in Historical Perspective 35
1 "Ready to Aid One Another": Darwin on Nature, God, and Cooperation John Hedley Brooke 37
2 Altruism: Morals from History Thomas Dixon 60
3 Evolution and "Cooperation" in Late Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century America: Science, Theology, and the Social Gospel Heather D. Curtis 82
II Mathematics, Game Theory, and Evolutionary Biology: The Evolutionary Phenomenon of Cooperation 97
4 Five Rules for the Evolution of Cooperation Martin A. Nowak 99
5 Mathematical Models of Cooperation Christoph Hauert 115
6 Economics and Evolution: Complementary Perspectives on Cooperation Johan Almenberg Anna Dreber 132
III Psychology, Neuroscience, and Intentionality in the Cultural Evolution of Cooperation 151
7 Social Prosthetic Systems and Human Motivation: One Reason Why Cooperation Is Fundamentally Human Stephen M. Kosslyn 153
8 The Uniqueness of Human Cooperation: Cognition, Cooperation, and Religion Dominic D. P. Johnson 168
9 Self-Denial and Its Discontents: Toward Clarification of the Intrapersonal Conflict between "Selfishness" and "Altruism" Maurice Lee 186
IV Philosophy of Biology and Philosophy of Mind: Adjudicating the Significance of Evolutionary Cooperation 199
10 Unpredicted Outcomes in the Games of Life Jeffrey P. Schloss 201
11 What Can Game Theory Tell Us about Humans? Justin C. Fisher 220
12 How Not to Fight about Cooperation Ned Hall 234
V Cooperation, Ethics, and Metaethics 251
13 The Moral Organ: A Prophylaxis against the Whims of Culture Marc D. Hauser 253
14 A New Case for Kantianism: Evolution, Cooperation, and Deontological Claims in Human Society Friedrich Lohmann 273
15 Nature, Normative Grammars, and Moral Judgments Jean Porter 289
16 The Christian Love Ethic and Evolutionary "Cooperation": The Lessons and Limits of Eudaimonism and Game Theory Timothy P. Jackson 307
VI Cooperation, Metaphysics, and God 327
17 Altruism, Normalcy, and God Alexander Pruss 329
18 Evolution, Altruism, and God: Why the Levels of Emergent Complexity Matter Philip Clayton 343
19 The Problem of Evil and Cooperation Michael Rota 362
20 Evolution, Cooperation, and Divine Providence Sarah Coakley 375
List of Contributors 387
Index 389