(from http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/13/books/review/the-social-conquest-of-earth-by-edward-o-wilson.html)
on ‘The Social Conquest of Earth,’ by Edward O. Wilson
". . . one can stack up log-style all humans alive today into a cube that’s about a mile on each side, easily hidden in the Grand Canyon. And all the ants on earth would fit into a cube of similar size. More important, humans and certain insects are the planet’s “eusocial” species — the only species that form communities that contain multiple generations and where, as part of a division of labor, community members sometimes perform altruistic acts for the benefit of others. . .
. . . Wilson’s own theory is far too extreme, though. He adopts a Manichaean view of evolution, in which group selection is responsible for all of our virtues (“honor, virtue and duty”), while individual selection produces nothing but sin (“selfishness, cowardice and hypocrisy”). But it’s long been known that unrelated individuals can benefit from repeated cooperation with one another, so long as there are mechanisms in place to encourage reciprocity and punish betrayal. There is now evidence — from computational modeling, observations of real-world human interactions and laboratory studies — showing that our altruistic and eusocial choices are sensitive to past interactions with individuals and that we are inclined to reward cooperators and punish cheats and free-riders. This evidence suggests that group conflict is not the sole force that has shaped human eusociality. Wilson must be familiar with this research, but doesn’t acknowledge how it complicates his account. . . "
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