This article explains the evolution of living things through natural selection and group selection, and in particular, why altruistic behavior has been able to survive and thrive through group selection rather than individual selection. It also discusses the limitations of group selection and the importance of institutions that can compensate for it.
How did giraffes, which once had short necks, come to have long necks today? Why are moths, which were once predominantly white, now predominantly black? Why aren’t pests easily killed by pesticides these days? The answer has a lot to do with Charles Darwin’s theory of natural selection. Natural selection is a phenomenon in which only individuals with traits that are adapted to survive in a given environment survive and pass on their genes to their offspring.
According to Darwin’s theory, as individuals are selected for survival, species change to adapt to their environment. In the case of giraffes, long-necked individuals are able to eat the leaves of tall trees, which is a more favorable environment for them to survive in, resulting in more long-necked individuals. This is a classic example of natural selection, showing how nature selects and changes species.
However, according to natural selection, when a selfish individual competes with an altruistic individual, the selfish individual will survive and the altruistic individual will be culled and disappear, so how did the altruistic individual survive? There are many hypotheses about this problem, which could be a big loophole in the theory of evolution, but we will explain some of them to support the theory of evolution.
Population selection is a similar concept to natural selection, but it is applied to different things. Whereas natural selection as described above focuses on individual selection, where each individual giraffe or moth is selected for, population selection assumes that natural selection acts on populations rather than individuals. Therefore, when population selection comes into play, populations with the most traits and characteristics that are best suited to a given environment are more likely to be maintained, and those that are not are likely to be weeded out. For example, in the caveman era, a group of people with large genes would have had a better chance of surviving in an environment where hunting, gathering, and other forms of strength were important than a group of people with smaller genes, and would have persisted for a longer period of time. Of course, in this case, there is not much difference between individual and collective selection. Both individual and group selection would favor larger genes.
The difference between individual and collective selection is in the case of altruistic and selfish groups. What happens when group selection occurs between altruistic and selfish individuals? Since time immemorial, altruistic individuals have been much more helpful than selfish individuals from the perspective of society as a whole. This is because altruistic humans put the good of the group ahead of their own interests, while selfish humans only prioritize their own interests. For example, in a war, altruistic humans will fight far more valiantly and aggressively than selfish humans to ensure the group’s victory, so all else being equal, a group of altruistic humans is much more likely to win the war than a group of selfish humans. Thus, at the population level, we can see that a group with more altruistic humans than selfish humans is much stronger in a given environment or society. Therefore, due to collective selection, groups with a high proportion of selfish humans are culled and disappear, and groups with a high proportion of altruistic humans survive, allowing altruistic humans to continue to survive. If individual selection had occurred, selfish humans would have survived and altruistic humans would have been eliminated, but the opposite would have happened with collective selection.
In modern society, the principle of group selection is at work in many ways. For example, organizations that value teamwork and cooperation within a company tend to outperform those that don’t, showing that altruistic behavior is an important factor in contributing to the success of a group. Furthermore, societies that promote community well-being by helping the less fortunate are more stable and sustainable than those that do not. These phenomena prove that group selection is not just a theoretical concept, but can be applied in the real world.
It is based on “group selection,” which is natural selection that targets groups. Only groups with a large number of altruistic humans who have an advantage in survival at the group level can be maintained by group selection, while altruistic humans who are at a disadvantage in individual selection can survive. However, there are two flaws. First, the rate at which group selection occurs is slower than the rate at which individual selection occurs. Even in a population with many altruistic individuals, individual selection will occur at a faster rate than group selection, so the altruistic individuals will be eliminated by the selfish individuals before group selection can occur. Also, the source of group selection is the difference in the characteristics of selfish and altruistic individuals. However, in the process of collective selection, groups will disappear and the differences between groups will decrease, making it difficult for collective selection to occur anymore. In order to solve these problems, it is expected that research on ‘institutions’ that only humans have will become more urgent in the future.
In particular, in human societies, institutions such as laws, morals, and culture play an important role in regulating individual behavior and promoting group interests. These institutions can increase the rate of collective selection by discouraging selfish behavior and encouraging altruistic behavior. For example, environmental legislation that seeks to protect public goods promotes altruistic behavior, and social welfare systems increase the stability of the group by protecting the weak within the community. These institutions provide the basis for the principle of collective choice to work effectively in the real world.
In conclusion, altruism explains an important mechanism that has allowed altruistic behavior to survive and thrive over the course of evolution. Although there are theoretical limitations, institutional research and application to compensate for these limitations is essential for the betterment of our society. It is important to understand that altruistic behavior is not simply a sacrifice, but a strategic choice for collective prosperity, which can lead to a more cooperative and sustainable society.
