Sociobiology
The
History of an Idea
The Problem
•
Many great ideas begin
with a problem
•
If evolution by natural
selection is true we are confronted by a very curious problem
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How can altruism be explained?
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Altruism defined:
•
1. Unselfish concern for the welfare of others;
selflessness. 2. Zoology Instinctive cooperative behavior that is detrimental
to the individual but contributes to the survival of the species.
A Solution?
• Kin
Selection
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Developed by William Hamilton in 1964
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If an organism sacrifices itself for another, as long
as it shares genes with the other there is a benefit, not to itself, but to the
shared genes.
• By helping
your kin you are actually helping the genes you share in common.
• The
test of any good scientific idea is evidence. . .
The evidence
• The
existence of social insects can be well explained by kin selection
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Social insects are in the order Hymenoptera: bees,
ants, wasps, and termites.
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They have well developed caste systems
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They have a unique form of reproduction: haplodiploidy
• See one page
(front and back) reading from “The Naturalist” for details
E.O.Wilson
• A very
smart professor from Harvard took the idea of kin selection and ran with it. .
.
• He
realized that evolution by natural selection was essentially responsible for
the behavior of insects.
• He
wondered if other organisms’ behavior could be explained using natural
selection?
• The
result was his magnum opus. . .
Sociobiology
•
In 1975 E.O. Wilson
publishes, Sociobiology.
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The most controversial
book written in the last 140 years, since The Origin of Species
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The writer and essayist,
Tom Wolfe, in an essay calls Wilson, Darwin II
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Wilson argues that the
at the root of all animal behavior is the driving force of evolution by natural
selection
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His book wouldn’t
have been so controversial except that he decided to include who in the last
chapter????
•
US!!!! Homo sapiens
Sociobiological Controversy
•
People went ballistic
•
Why?
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Wilson suggested that
human behavior was nothing more than the result of natural selection acting on
our genes
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This idea can be
interpreted to lead to what is known as “genetic determinism”- the
idea that our behavior is “determined” by our genes. It seems to
deny human freedom.
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As for Wilson, he was
simply describing a “theory”, an idea that was worth pursuing and
testing.
The Attack
• E.O.
Wilson is attacked by his critics
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Unbeknownst to him, Stephen Jay Gould and Richard
Lewontin, both colleagues of his at Harvard University, wrote a critical
article in the NY Times Review of Books
• Protestors
take over the podium at a conference and dump ice water on Wilson’s head,
saying “Wilson, you are all wet.”
Wilson’s Response
•
Wilson was honestly
surprised by the response to his work
•
He felt that he was
“just doing science. . .”
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He didn’t start
this “fire”. . .
“Stephen Jay,
Takes the Day,
Selfish Gene,
Sounds Obscene,
Icy Water on My Head,
Lots of People Want me Dead.”