The Selfish Gene

The Selfish Gene, by Richard Dawkins.

Genes control human

• the closer the genes, the more love they share
• investment in one’s own genes – parents don’t love their children, they merely try to protect their own genes that have passed down
• investment management – the mother stops breastfeeding her kids because she needs to allocate her nutrition to future kids
• selfish man – polygamous male would like to pass down his genes without taking responsibilities
• selfish woman – because the female know that she would invest more for the birth of the child, often the female develops a strategy. For example, the male bird needs to nest a home, the male needs to be economically sufficient, etc.

But man is different – we’re often unselfish. The term, meme, means model human culture. Richard argues that human often be more involved with meme instead of driven by selfish genes.