The first think I like to do when I am assigned a new book to read is analyze the title. The title of this book is The Selfish Gene. A selfish something is one that wants all it can find for itself. A gene is what makes human beings so if you put them together it might mean the selfish human beings. As I started reading I saw that our genes are not very different from us. According to Dawkins: "Made the erroneous assumption that the important thing in evolution is the good of the species (or the group) rather than the good of the individual (or the gene)" (pg.2). This reminded me for an obvious reason of Confucius and Epictetus. After reading this part of the book I realized that according to this book Epictetus is correct and Confucius is wrong. The very genes of humans determine that we are selfish race and we will prefer the good of the person over the good of the group. Epictetus said that you should strive to survive without worrying what happens to the ones you love and the genes apparently are proving that we humans are designed by our genes to do this. Confucius has the opposite idea and strongly approves of the good of the group rather than the good of the individual. If these three persons had to choose sides then the teams would be Epictetus with Dawkins against Confucius. How can this difference happen if according to this book all humans are machines directed by our genes? I think that the environment can greatly affect the genetics of a person. If Epictetus and Dawkins were exposed to human beings that were selfish and wanted all to themselves, but Confucius lived in an opposing environment, then the differences are very possible.
Writing events that have happened throughout history is a very important thing that is done. For example if we forget that an event like the rise of Nazism there may be a future rise of a different group but we wouldn't be able to predict it because we forgot what happened previously. If we have a written record of it if we see a political movement similar to it we might be able to stop it before it becomes bigger. In the gene world it is not so different. According to Dawkins: "It may not necessarily have been the biggest or the most complex molecule around, but it had the extraordinary property of being able to create copies of itself" (pg.15). This shows that in the world of the genes there was also a gene that was in charge of keeping records and copying the genes. This gene maybe appeared by accident, but in genetics sometimes the accidents that occur are the ones that are most needed to happen. There is always one thing that is more important than all the rest and in this phase of genes it was the replicator. The replicator was the bridge and a step from simple to a bit more complex genes. Accidents in genes are the most important step in evolution as said by Dawkins in the quotation: "Erratic copying in biological replicators can in a real sense give rise to improvement" (pg.16). In the world of the genes the mistakes are a big difference with what he have in human world. In genetics mistakes are used for development and trying new things. In genes the mistakes are the ones that provide the biggest steps in evolution. In real life we treat mistakes as if they were done by people who did not know what they were thinking when they did the mistake. If we see the good side of making mistakes we can also use it like genes. We can learn a lot from mistakes and therefore we won't do that same mistake again. Genes have the ability to use all things even if they are wastes from other genes or mistakes. The question that I asked myself then was why are we so different to them if they are the ones who operate us?
Altruism: unselfish
regard for or devotion to the welfare of others (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/Altruist)
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