The So Called Altruism

When I started reading chapter 10 I thought: "Finally, Dawkins has talked about that so called altruism that was underestimated by the selfishness of genes!" I was actually beginning to like it, he was talking about something else besides selfishness, until he wrote: "There is no altruism here, only self exploitation by each individual of every other individual"(168). The example of the 'model' he created was apparently not altruistic at all. Then, my hopes got up again when he came to the alarming bird example it was altruistic but it ended up selfish again. Dawkins wrote:"The best policy is indeed to fly up into a tree, but to make sure everybody else does too. That way, he[the bird] will not become an odd man out and he will not forfeit the advantages of being part of a crowd,but he will gain advantage of flying out into cover. Once again, uttering warning call is seen to have a purely selfish advantage"(170).  So, once again no matter how hard we try we end up putting our benefits first than the others.

 It is actually quite true. Living in a third world country has made it more possible to believe. Every christmas my mom and I recollect clothing and give it to the poor, we are helping people, but then my "selfish gene" of personal satisfaction comes to the game. I end up happy because I helped, even if the help was not for myself.

If you are still not convinced I checked on the New York Times an article called "Schools to Start Offering Swine Flu Shots" it said: "Swine flu vaccinations will begin in the city’s public elementary schools next week, officials said Tuesday as they encouraged parents to sign consent forms being sent home with students now"(NYT oct 20). This may seem altruistic because schools are concerned with the children's health and want to do everything to protect them. But then again it comes to selfishness when the school offers the vaccination for its own protection so the children in the institution don't infect or harm the sake of the educational curriculum.

So it seems that we were just "survival machines" that were meant to be selfish.