Genet. Res., Camb. (1990), 55, pp. 63-68 Printed in Great Britain 63 Book reviews The Selfish Gene. By RICHARD DAWKINS. New Revised selfishness in individual behaviour... Universal love and the Edition. Oxford University Press. 1989. 352 pages. welfare of the species as a whole are concepts that simply do Cloth £17.50, Paper £5.95. ISBN 0 19 217773, not make evolutionary sense...My own feeling is that a human society based simply on the gene's law of universal 0 19 286092 5. ruthless selfishness would be a very nasty society in which to The first edition of this book, published in 1976, was live. But, however much we may deplore something it does hailed with fulsome praise even in non-scientific papers not stop it being true. Be warned that if you wish, as I do, to build a society in which individuals cooperate generously (' the sort of popular science writing that makes the and successfully towards a common good, you can expect reader feel like a genius' wrote the New York Times), little help from biological nature. Let us teach generosity and it became an 'international best seller', with and altruism, because we are born selfish.' 150000 sales in English and translation into 13 The reader may well brood gloomily on this gloomy languages. This first edition retains quite a lot of its picture and wonder how it is that there is a fair' original interest, but is clearly out-of-date, and author amount (if far too little) of altruism detectable in and publishers thought the book was due for revision. many human societies. I also feel tempted to accuse In revising it, however, Dawkins has taken the easy Richard Dawkins of undue optimism in supposing way out by leaving the original text of 200 pages that we few who realise the threat posed by our selfish unchanged and adding no less than 66 pages of genes can persuade societies to reach levels of altruism endnotes, together with two new chapters and an far beyond any achieved by Old and New Testament extended bibliography. These endnotes, which add Prophets, Christ, Divines, Preachers, Philosophers, 33 % to the length of the original text, are a serious Politicians and anyone else except when war is delared, imposition on the reader's time and temper, and I whereupon nearly everyone becomes maddened by think Oxford University Press should have insisted on patriotism (which is a kind of restricted altruism). a properly updated and integrated text, which would We now have to consider Dawkins' replicators and have been of much greater value. vehicles. Clearly an organism (survival vehicle or Dawkins' argument, briefly, is that natural selection lumbering robot) is an obvious concept which can does not act on the species, group or the individual usually be defined unambiguously for operational and organism, but on the genes - or rather on the experimental purposes. But the replicator is opera- 'replicators' which are the fragments of DNA on tionally a nebulous concept which is not amenable to which natural selection acts through their effects on experimental study. It might be a complete chromo- phenotype. He generally equates 'replicators' with some, linked genes held together by an inversion, an genes, and contrasts the ' ruthlessly selfish genes' with operon or even a homeobox. It may change radically the vehicles alias machines alias 'lumbering robots' in size and constitution as natural selection wafts it alias organisms. Only the 'genes' are passed on from onwards, under the pressure of recombination, mu- generation to generation (I think he has forgotten the tation, etc. and, whatever it is, it is entirely misleading cytoplasm), while the soma or rest of the organism is to call it a 'gene'. This word has a perfectly definite just a vehicle, discarded once gene transfer has been operational meaning in genetics, and to equate gene achieved. Successful genes are those that produce and replicator will only confuse the many readers of organisms which survive to pass them on to the next Dawkins' book who are beguiled by its attractive title. generation, and the most successful genes are those If asked 'What, then, is a replicator?', I would answer which have survived for millions of years and now that at present it is only a 'Meme' in Dawkins' brain reside in Richard Dawkins and other members of H. (read his chapter 11 to discover what a meme is), and sapiens. that it is up to him to identify a few, follow their Dawkins writes: progress as they change under the influence of natural The predominant quality to be expected of the successful selection, and so prove that they can have an gene is ruthless selfishness. This will usually give rise to operational and experimental reality. Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.33.14, on 02 Oct 2021 at 08:36:32, subject to the Cambridge Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0016672300025209 Book reviews 64 The book describes a number of complex behaviour any case, it has to be pointed out that, if a 3:1 sex patterns and inter-specific interactions, which will ratio were definitely established in bees and ants then make fascinating reading for those who do not know this sex ratio could be explained by the selfish gene the literature. Examples include the cuckoos and their theory but would certainly not prove it. various victims, large carnivorous fish with the small, A word should be said about 'Memes'. These are brightly striped fish which clean them (and mimics of tunes, ideas, catch-phrases, etc. etc. which, once the latter), naked mole rats, a variety of social insects, planted in a brain, tend to stick and to spread to other wasps which dig solitary burrows and lay one egg in brains - i.e. they multiply by a process analogous to each, and caddis larvae which build houses some of natural selection. Dawkins enthusiastically promotes which, in well-chosen stone, should be of interest to this 'concept', and seems to think it will be of value in the Prince of Wales. These can be fitted into the grand analysing brain functions and thought processes. My Dawkins scheme without too much difficulty, but own view is that it is an ill-considered and superficial there is very little genetic analysis of any of these cases concept which will not help (but may hinder) brain and insufficient other data are available for one to scientists, Psychologists and Philosophers; and my make any critical assessment. guess is that this concept, being a meme itself, is In the absence of experimental tests, the theorists already firmly implanted in Dawkins' own mind and have been busy with their computers. One example is will not be easily dislodged. a hypothetical population of birds infected with ticks Of the two new chapters in the second edition, carrying a lethal virus. The birds can groom each Chapter 12 (' Nice Guys Finish First') is quite the best other but not their own heads (see chapter 10: entitled chapter in the book and is well worth study. It 'You scratch my back and I will sit on yours'). discusses the Axelrod-Hamilton computer simulation Mutual head cleaning is of obvious benefit to all, and study of the ' Prisoner's Dilemma' game, with Axel- the birds who clean any proffered head ('Suckers') rod's further developments. Tests of different strate- form a stable population until a mutant 'Cheat' gies against each other show that, at least in the games appears who won't clean any other head. He wins examined, 'nice' strategies in which the player's because of the energy he saves, but then gets killed off aggression is limited to retaliation and the player has because he cannot get his head cleaned. So the theorist a short memory generally win in the long run over invents a third class of 'Grudgers' who clean the 'nasty' strategies which throw in aggression more heads of any birds who have never refused to clean frequently. An essential factor here is, of course, the theirs (they have long memories!). Computer simu- ability of the ' nice' player to react just as aggressively lation of populations with these three classes yields as his opponent, so that the odds are not loaded interesting results, but we never learn whether against him, e.g. he does not have to cope with a large Grudgers have actually been seen in Nature. One bully or a multinational corporation. It should be of would like to know whether birds could develop a particular interest to theologians that one of the most Grudger-type memory: if not, the example is a little successful strategies was recommended by Jesus. John academic. Maynard Smith named it 'Tit for two Tats', without, A more intriguing case is the control of sex ratio in I suspect, realising its New Testament significance: it honey bees and social ants. Because males are haploid actually consists of turning the other cheek to the and females (workers and queens) diploid, in single- opponent before retaliating against further aggression, queen hives or nests two workers have § of their genes and no doubt its success in Axelrod's struggle for in common while a worker has only \ of her genes in survival between strategies surprised everyone. Before common with a brother and \ her genes in common you choose this as your personal strategy, however, with the queen. This leads to the deduction that, to you need to check whether Jesus would have allowed best propagate her own genes, a queen needs a 1:1 you to retaliate after turning both cheeks.