SURVIVAL of the NICEST: HOW ALTRUISM MADE US HUMAN and WHY IT PAYS to GET ALONG by Stefan Klein









Published in 2014 by The Experiment

German science writer Stefan Klein looks into the concept of altruism vs. egocentrism and the current thinking behind why people act altruistic or egocentric in Survival of the Nicest. This has been a popular topic in many news reports as the idea of a "stingy gene" or a "sharing gene" is discussed. 

Of course, the idea of a single stingy or sharing gene is simplistic, but Klein does spend a lot of time discussing altruistic behaviors and egocentric behaviors and why people actually act as altruistic as they do, even going so far as to donate money to people they will never meet in countries they will never go to. Why is that?

Klein reports that the current thinking is that simple Darwinian competition is too simplistic to explain altruistic behavior - giving away resources or time that could be used to raise one's own offspring makes no sense in a simple Darwinian worldview.

But, when you move out a little bit and look at groups of people and see that groups of people who are willing to give to one another and enforce a set of norms that expect a certain amount of fair play and giving to help the entire group have more success than groups that do not than you see that the Darwinian model may yet have some merit - it is not a single person vs. a single person but groups of people vs. groups of people.

Klein compares the behavior of chimpanzees to people, looks into tests of when young children start to display altruism and into experiments involving games that are supposed to test the altruistic nature of people (to be honest, I had a hard time understanding the value of the games, they were rather poorly explained). 

Survival of the Nicest has its interesting moments but vague explanations of the experiments and games and meandering discussions about other animals like vampire bats made the book an up and down read at best. There are some wonderful ideas in this book and a good editing could have knocked off about 50 pages and made it a tighter, more effective read.

I rate this book 3 stars out of 5. It can be found on Amazon.com here: SURVIVAL of the NICEST: HOW ALTRUISM MADE US HUMAN and WHY IT PAYS to GET ALONG by Stefan Klein.

Reviewed on February 19, 2013.

Comments

Popular posts over the last 30 days

THE GILDED AGE: A HISTORY from BEGINNING to END (kindle) by Hourly History

BATMAN - ONE BAD DAY: CLAYFACE (graphic novel) by Collin Kelly and Jackson Lanzing

BOUND for CANAAN: THE EPIC STORY of the UNDERGROUND RAILROAD, AMERICA'S FIRST CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT (audiobook) by Fergus Bordewich

COMMEMORATIVE HISTORY of the GEORGE ROGERS CLARK BICENTENNIAL EXHIBIT by The Indiana State Museum

FREE FALL (Elvis Cole #4) (audiobook) by Robert Crais

IN the PRESENCE of MINE ENEMIES: SEVEN YEARS as a POW in NORTH VIETNAM by Howard and Phyllis Rutledge

SUPERMAN '78 (graphic novel) by Robert Venditi

THE RED DRAGON (Action Adventures Short Stories Collection #10) by L. Ron Hubbard

DOWN ALONG with THAT DEVIL'S BONES: A RECKONING with MONUMENTS, MEMORY, and the LEGACY of WHITE SUPREMACY (audiobook) by Connor Towne O'Neill

THE INSTINCT for COOPERATION: A GRAPHIC NOVEL CONVERSATION with NOAM CHOMSKY (graphic novel) by Noam Chomsky and Jeffrey Wilson