DWill wrote: kick for RD to come up with the chapter title, fan of Shakespeare that he is. The title doesn't exactly fit the content, though, since it's not the 'coils' that are immortal but the genetic units that make them up. Still, it's hard to pass up such a pun opportunity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortal_coil links to the Hamlet reference.
RD's claim for gene selection, vs. group or individual selection, made sense. Groups are amorphous and temporary, and therefore there's little possibility that an allele of a group can exist, which is essential for selection to occur. Individuals also consist of too large a collection of temporary traits to be usable in natural selection.
Yes very logical. However, the emergence of human reason seems to me to involve group selection. The situation for the planet now is that unless group selective traits win out then there is high risk of human species extinction. Dawkins might say this is a matter of indifference to selfish genes, but it also shows how human genes for rational goal setting are perhaps the first unselfish genes to evolve.
Interesting that traditionally we have held to a belief that each one of us, a temporary and unique collection of traits, can be preserved in another dimension for eternity. The fact seems to be that nature has no need for uniqueness; indeed, uniqueness is inimical to natural selection. Genes must be almost always unvarying, perfect copies of each other, and this makes them, not us, the immortals. We humans are as unique but also as ephemeral as snowflakes. There has never been two of us alike (including identical twins, who may not have exactly the same in utero experience, and then each has different life experience influencing personality). But this existential situation can be seen as a rather cool thing; it depends on how you view it. I choose to take some satisfaction in the fact that some of 'me' goes spiraling down the generations of the future, even though this is not the unique me and in fact a lot of it is also common to a pumpkin. But I like pumpkins, too.
Yes,
The Selfish Gene is a decisive refutation of the traditional Christian doctrine of the soul.
