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Sociobiology is a branch of biology that attempts to explain
animal behavior and social
structures in terms of evolutionary advantage or strategy. It uses techniques from
ethology, evolution and population genetics.
The term 'sociobiology' was coined by E. O. Wilson in
1975 with the publication of his famous book,
Sociobiology: The New Synthesis. Sociobiology attempts to explain the evolutionary mechanics behind social behaviors
such as altruism, aggression, and
nurturance. Wilson's book sparked one of the greatest scientific controversies of the 20th century.
Sociobiological Theory
Sociobiologists do not believe that animal or human behaviour can be
explained entirely by "cultural" or "environmental" factors. They believe that in order to fully understand behaviour it must be analyzed
with some focus on its evolutionary origins. If Darwin's theory of evolution is accepted, then evolved behavioural mechanisms that allowed an
organism a greater chance of surviving and reproducing would be more likely to
survive in present organisms. Many biologists accept that these sorts of
behaviours are present in animal species. However, there is a great deal of
controversy over the application of evolutionary models to human beings.
Sociobiologists are often interested in instinctive, or intuitive behaviour. They are interested in explaining the similarities, rather than the
differences, between cultures. They are interested in how behaviours that are often taken for granted can be explained logically
by examining selection pressures in the history of a species.
Individual genetic advantage fails to explain many social behaviors. However, genetic evolution appears to act on social groups. The mechanisms responsible for selection in groups are statistical
and can be harder to grasp than those that determine individual selection. The analytical processes of sociobiology use paradigms and population statistics similar to actuarial analyses of the insurance industry or game
theory.
A vivid example of altruism is when a serviceman throws himself onto a hand
grenade to save his buddies. A genetic trait encouranging this "altruism" may help
his society expand its gene pool at
the expense of societies that lack this trait. So, this genetic trait will survive and increase even though it destroys
individuals
Anthropologist Colin Turnbull found another supporting example
(described in his controversial issue The Mountain People) about an African
tribe, the "Ik," which he said so lacked altruism that the society lost battles with neighboring tribes.
E.O. Wilson proved that altruists must reproduce their own altruistic genetic traits for altruism to survive. When altruists
lavish their resources on nonaltruists at the expense of their own kind, the altruists tend to die out and the others tend to
grow. In other words, altruists must practice the ethic that "charity begins at
home."
An important concept in sociobiology is that temperamental traits within a gene pool and between gene pools exist in an
ecological balance. Just as an expansion of a sheep population might encourage the expansion of a wolf population, an
expansion of altruistic traits within a gene pool may also encourage the expansion of individuals with dependent traits.
Controversy
The application of sociobiology to humans was immediately controversial. Many people, such as Stephen Jay Gould, and R.C Lewontin feared that sociobiology was
biologicially determinist. They feared that it would be
used, as similar ideas had been in the past, to justify the status quo, entrench ruling elites, and legitimize authoritarian political programmes.
They referred to social Darwinism and eugenics of the early 20th century, and to other more recent ideas, such as the IQ controversy of the early 1970s as cautionary tales in the use of evolutionary principles as applied to human society. They
believed that Wilson was committing the naturalistic
fallacy. Several academics opposed to Wilson's sociobiology created "The Sociobiology Study Group" to counter his ideas.
Other critics believed that Wilson's theories, as well as the works of subsequent admirers were not supported scientifically. Objections were raised to many of the ethnocentric assumptions of early sociobiology and to the sampling and mathematical methods used in informing conclusions. Many of the sloppier early
conclusions were attacked. Sociobiologists were accused of being "super" adaptationists, believing that every
aspect of morphology and behaviour must necessarily be an
evolutionarily beneficial adaptation. Philosophical debates about the
nature of scientific
truth and the applicability of any human reason to a subject so complex as human
behaviour, considering past failures, raged. Furthermore, from a philosophical standpoint, science is distinguished from other
pseudo-sciences, such as alchemy, by the falsifiability of new scientific theories. Critics believe that proponents of
sociobiology do not allow their theories to be falsifiable, rendering it a pseudo-science.
Wilson and his admirers countered these criticisms by denying that Wilson had a political agenda, still less a right wing one. They pointed out that Wilson had personally adopted a number of
liberal political stances and had attracted progressive sympathy for his outspoken
environmentalism. They argued that as scientists they had a duty to
uncover the "truth" whether that was politically correct or
not. They argued that sociobiology does not necessarily lead to any particular political ideology as many critics implied. Many subsequent sociobiologists such Robert Wright and Anne Campbell have used sociobiology to argue quite separate points. Noam Chomsky surprised many by coming to the defense of sociobiology on the grounds that political
radicals need to postulate a relatively fixed idea of human nature in order to be able to struggle for a better society. They
needed to know what human needs were in order to build a better society.
His defenders also claimed that the critics had greatly overstated the degree of Wilson's biological determinism. Wilson's
claims that he had never meant to imply that what is, ought to be, are supported by his writings, which are descriptive, not
prescriptive.
Science and Sociobiology
Twin studies suggest that behavioral traits such as creativity, extroversion and aggressiveness are between
45% to 75% genetic. Intelligence is said by some to be about 80% genetic
after one matures. Others, such as R. C Lewontin, reject the idea of 'dividing' environment and heredity in such an artificial
way.
Here's how scientific sociobiology usually proceeds: A social behavior is first explained as a sociobiological
hypothesis by finding an evolutionarily stable strategy that matches the observed behavior. Stability can be
difficult to prove, but usually, a well-formed strategy will predict gene frequencies. The hypothesis can be confirmed by
establishing a correlation between the gene frequencies predicted by the strategy, and those expressed in a population.
Measurement of genes and gene-frequencies can also be problematic, because a simple statistical correlation can be open to
charges of circularity. Circularity can occur if the measurement of gene frequency indirectly uses the same measurements that
describe the strategy. Though difficult, this overall process finds favor.
As a successful example, altruism between social insects and
litter-mates was first satisfactorily explained by these means, and it was correlated to the degree of genome shared by the altruists, as predicted. Another successful example was a quantitative description of
infanticide by male harem-mating animals when the alpha male is displaced. Female infanticide and fetal resorption are active areas of study. In general,
females with more bearing opportunities may value offspring less. Also, females may arrange bearing opportunities to maximize the
food and protection from mates.
Criminality is actively under study, but extremely controversial. There are persuasive
arguments that in some uncivilized environments criminal behavior might be adaptive [1] . Some authorities say that capital punishment may be the traditional way to weed criminal traits
from the gene pool.
Some types of sociobiological results could justify mass oppression of innocent human beings. Most people therefore find them
very suspect. For example, Dr. Norman Hall wrote an article "Zoological Subspecies in Man" (Mankind Quarterly, 1960) that argued that "racism" actually exists in most
mammalian species, because racial groups within mammalian species (such as
moose, rats, and reindeer) tend to compete for space and fight rather than mate and form offspring. Hence, "racism" could have an
instinctive component in humans as well as other mammalian species. Further, Sir Arthur Keith (in A New Theory of
Evolution) said that "racism" could be adaptive because it enables groups with superior genetic characteristics to inbreed
and preserve genetic advantages. If these arguments are right, racism might be adaptive.
Such theories are bound to draw fire, both on political and scientific grounds. Usual political argument is, that even if
racism was adaptive, it still wouldn't make it ethically acceptable, because the ethical considerations should be based on the
harm racism causes for those who are the target of it. Scientific critism of this kind of research usually centers on pointing
out that these theories often include only those aspects of the processes they are dealing with which can best be used to come to
"politically preferred" conclusions. For example, including the complete genetic dynamics of in- and outbreeding might lead to
completely different conclusions in above mentioned theories of adaptive nature of racism. Also, it is widely known in scientific
community that when certain outcome of reseach is expected or preferred by the researchers, they are often likely to subconsciously incorpororate the bias into their interpretation of the results. Therefore, any research which has serious political implications should
be met with rigorous criticism, and not least by the researchers themselves. In other words, in order to make good science, it would be necessary for the scientists themselves to be highly aware and critical
of their own biases, and this kind of self-criticism is often conspiciously absent from these controversial studies.
Sociobiology must be distinguished from memetics. In sociobiology the evolving
entities are genes, while in memetics they are memes. Sociobiology is concerned with the
biological basis of human behaviours, while memetics treats humans as products not only of biological evolution, but of cultural
evolution also.
Well-known sociobiologists:
Related articles and books:
- "Sociobiology: The New Synthesis" by Dr. Edward Wilson;
- "The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature" by Steven
Pinker
External references
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