Customer Reviews

The Origins of Virtue: Human Instincts and the Evolution of Cooperation

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(9)
3 star:		(8)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book is a truly inter-disciplinary venture. It explores evolution (group selection BY survival of it's individuals) and works gradually up into game theory, ethics, human psychology, anthropology and finally, the possible biological origin of good government.

Ridleys main argument is to show that human cooperation is not- contrary to popular thought- a biproduct of government and law, but a natural development. What's odd about this is that cooperation seems to come straight out of the prisoners dilemma which is generally depicted as a selfish game. For those not familiar, in brief, the prisoners dilemma is- 2 or more players are in a game. If each cooperates with eachother, they share the reward equally but if one deciedes to cheat the others, she alone gets the full reward. Rationallity dictates that it's in the individuals interst to cheat, getting the full reward. Ridley shows us that emotions, possibly evolutionary ones, come in to counter this and encourage cooperation. In other words, Ridley blows holes in the theory that cooperation comes out of 'group selection'- rather, it comes from individual selection.

The only problem with books as inter-disciplinary as this one, is that one doubts from time to time whether the author really knows about biology, government, law, psychology, anthropology, history AND philosophical ethics. I can't say that Ridley is definitely overstretching. His statements do appear sound and error free. Still, his tendency to make sweeping statements in so many fields detracts from his credability. Not enough to loose a star though.

For the interested reader, another great book on the evolution of law as an extention of human nature (coming to much the same conclusion as Ridley's) is Judge Richard Posner's "The Economics of Justice." Albeit a bit more academic and not as coversational, Posner's book serves as a good paralell read to Ridley's.

Does true morality exist? Does altruism exist? Does true co-operative spirit exist? Or are all of these mere examples of subtle selfishness? In other words: are moral, altruistic and co-operative looking people just acting these behaviors to manipulate others? Are they in fact being opportunistic and selfish? Many economists claim altruism does not exist. They would say that, even when a person would do a nice thing to another, it would be, in the end, for his own benefit, and thus be an act of subtle selfishness. He would do it to gain the trust of the other person, to make a good impression and build a reputation of friendliness and trustworthiness or perhaps to create a dependency. Most of economic theory is still based upon the idea that people are in the end selfish and opportunistic. These economist call this 'rational'.

Matt Ridley does not deny that individuals can act out of selfishness bu he argues that harmony generally prevails over selfishness. This book explains the paradox that our minds have been build by selfish genes to be social, trustworthy and co-operative. He says we owe our success as a species to these social instincts. He explains that morality is the stuff society is made of. In short his argument goes like this:

1. Society is important because is allows for divison of labor. It allows for people to specialize. And the sums of all our specialized efforts are greater than they would be if we all had been generalists. In other words: society is synergy between specialists.

2. In order to have a harmonious society, we have to be well-connected to each other. This requires us to be co-operative, social and trustworthy.

3. Being social, co-operative and trustworthy is a way to thrive and thereby an evolutionairy advantage. These traits are built into our nature by evolution.

Matt Ridley carefully argues his case. He uses findings from many disciplines like biology, psychology and economics. Very important parts of this book, and a delight to read, are the chapters where he explains the great work of Robert Axelrod (see: The Evolution of Co-operation, 1984) and the inspiring theory of moral sentiments of economist (!) Robert Frank (see: Passions within Reason, 1988).

The message of this book is important. One lesson is that it is wise to teach our children to be good, because in the long run it pays. If you only act rationally (in the sense of the rational man from economic theory) you can only expect to reap short-term benefits. Another wise suggestion is that we need to build our institutions in such a way that they draw out our co-operative instincts (instead of building mechanisms aimed only at suppressing our supposed selfish nature). Ridley: "Pre-eminently this means the encouragement of exchange between equals. just as trade between countries is the best recipe for friendship between them, so exchange between enfranchised and empowered individuals is the best recipe for co-operation. We must encourage social and material exchange between equals, for that is the raw material of trust, and trust is the foundation of virtue."

Inspiring material...

Like other reviewers, I enjoyed Ridley's interesting anecdotes and his debunking of popular myths (i.e. noble savages). However, in the last two chapters he ventured into politics and made some shaky conclusions.

In Chapter 12 ('The Power of Property'), he argues that conservation is best achieved through private ownership. He admits that this is effective for static resources (trees) and not those resources that move through the owner's area (big game). Then he seems to assert that private ownership is the answer to the problem of pollution. Huh? Air and water (at least for moving bodies of water) are primarily communal in nature, are they not? I fail to see how private ownership can be the answer.

In Chapter 13 ('Trust'), he argues that humans instinctively cooperate, as long as government gets out of the way. He hopes that 'national and international governments wither into their minimal function of national defence...'. After 9/11 it is apparent that defense is not a minimal function and letting international governments 'wither' is exactly the wrong prescription.

In both of the above examples, Ridley makes archaic arguments that fail to recognize the new realities (even before 9/11) brought about by technological evolution. Modern problems are tending to become more global in nature, not local.

Although 'The Origins of Virtue' contains some valuable insights into cooperation, I recommend reading Robert Wright for more reasoned, visionary thinking.

- Ken
...

A very compelling and readable book. The general premise of this work is that virtue is innate in human nature. Some fascinating examples from biology lend strong credence to this argument. How primative societies adapted and grew is explained in terms of human nature (and virtue). Finally, the simple example of why strong government just doesn't work is applied to what we've learned about human nature. Fairly short at 265 pages and not too scholarly to be boring.

This is a well-written book, larded with intellectual plums, so even if you don't follow the main line of argument, you will enjoy its details. However, following the main argument is not terribly difficult. Ridley really makes a single point and draws an important conclusion: whatever else we are we are by nature cooperators, yet key forms of cooperation are thwarted by the conditions of modern life.

We are 'groupish'; we form teams and do our part, and disapprove of those who don't do their parts. We form friendships based on mutual favors, and our accounting of who owes whom what and how much is exquisitely honed and compulsively indulged. We have first-class cheat-detectors, and we use our miraculous language abilities mostly to gossip about others, and whether they are holding up their ends, are free-riders, or perhaps do more than their share, blaming and praising and so keeping everyone more or less in line.

These behaviors were 'designed' by evolution to aid us; those who got along with others by being generous, friendly, and trusting, yet also firmly punishing betrayal, tended to do better in life and to leave more offspring of the same ilk. These behaviors do not always translate into being 'nice', and certainly hardly ever translate into a universal love of mankind. But they do lead us to get along with those we feel are a part of our group of the moment.

Anyway, given this constellation of reciprocal altruism/cheat detection along with our always-vigilant looking out for Number One, it seems that we do have within us the makings of a workable social mechanism that can deliver benefit to everyone without requiring lots of police. We can, it turns out, avoid The Tragedy of the Commons and the 'war of each with each'. Most people are willing to give the benefit of the doubt in dealing with strangers -- to trust them and be honorable towards them -- if the social climate encourages this. So people all over the world have always been able to deal with common resources in the only way that really assures they can be profitably and sustainably exploited: by making them private properties.

Much of the first part of this book was adequately covered in Robert Wright's book "The Moral Animal". I don't think Ridley adds anything new there, but his discussion of the consequences of reciprocity, or reciprocal altruism, is much more extensive than Wright's. He discusses groupishness, our tendency to operate in groups, which to him is not the same thing as submerging ourselves into some group identity. We cooperate, we trade, we work together by means of groupishness and reciprocity: they explain trust, retribution, gifts, and sharing; they allow us to gain greatly from trading with each other.

He notes, amusingly, that we seem to have a built-in dislike of hoarding, and that this sits uncomfortably with the vast possibilities for hoarding of property that modern societies provide. At the same time, private ownership is the engine that has ramped up our prosperity so spectacularly. People work for themselves directly and also for things that they can own. At the same time, people sort themselves into groups of similar levels of resources [that is, of wealth] so as to not have to deal with the hoarding taboo.

I think this book makes an important political point in a novel way. And its conclusions can be applied to other than the economic sphere. For example, laws enforcing political correctness often have the unintended consequence of reducing the tacit cooperation that would otherwise enforce community morals.

Anyway, Ridley basically is saying that we should use some aspects of our innate nature to control other aspects and get to the good society. Cooperation and trust, properly employed, can do more than squadrons of police to keep people in line. It's an uplifting message. I wonder how many will believe it?

I read this book because of my interest in conflict resolution in the environmental arena. I was initially impressed by the scope of literature from game theory to genetics that the book covers in its arguent. However, I was quite disappointed that Ridley bascially keeps coming back to his zoological credentials and hammering in the "selfish human" hypothesis. In many ways this book is an embellished version of Dawkins' "The Selfish Gene."

There are also a few instances where Ridley oversteps his knowledge base to make inferences about human behavior that are not well-argued. For example, chapter 11, entitled "ecology as religion" reiterates revisionist notions that Native Americans were not environmentally sensitive. While there are some aspects of this argument that are credible, the tone of Ridley's narrative is at times journalistic, condescending, and not well-argued.

Ridley clearly has the potential for writing some of the most lucid scientific prose. However, this particular work gets away with too much simply on account of engaging anecdotes.

Matt Ridley is my favorite popular science writer, but this is his worst book. Maybe it's not that bad, but his others are much better, especially "Genome" and "The Red Queen."

Anyway, a lot of research has been done since "The Origins of Virtue" was published. In its time it was better than it is now, but I recommend getting a more recently written book instead.

As above, I especially recommend "Genome" and "The Red Queen."

But here are some other books you may want to check out before deciding what to purchase:

Jared Diamond's classic "Guns, Germs and Steel"

Robert Wright's "The Moral Animal" (predates "Origins of Virtue" but is still better)

Steven Pinker's "The Blank Slate"

Sarah Hrdy's "Mother Nature"

Pascal Boyer's "Religion Explained"

This book presents a good and interesting defense of the idea that virtue is innate and humans cooperate with their own self-interest at heart. I think the idea is presented more accurately and better in the words of Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett, though Ridley conceives of the idea in a few different ways. He relies a bit too much on personal anecdotes and stories, though many of them were very intriguing.

However, the problems with the book start when Ridley begins making pronouncements outside of his field of expertise. His chapters on the environment, private property, moral sentiment, and trade make a number of unwarranted political conclusions and at times indulge the naturalistic fallacy. His conclusion that establishing private property will clean up the environment is outright ridiculous. Private property is a fundamental cause of environmental damage due to the pursuit of profit. If Ridley were to take his original arguments and draw a correct conclusion from them, he would have argued for decentralized, communal ownership and not private ownership. Private ownership tends to centralize things (which is what Ridley wanted to avoid in the first place).

To summarize, Ridley makes good observations and a good argument, but faulty conclusions.

Ridley is at his best when describing the dynamic equilibrium of evolution, as in "Red Queen." In "Origins of Virtue," those portions of the book dedicated to explaining how cooperative behavior can promote the genetic information of the individual are the most instructive. The text suffers from two shortfalls, however. The first problem is that Ridley relies heavily upon anecdotal references, often from personal experience, that may or may not bear any resemblance to what is typical. The second problem, and by far the more damaging to Ridley's credibility, comes when he weighs in on issues of law in general, and property law in particular. From what he writes I would imagine he has no more expertise in these fields than the average homeowner with a mortage. What is especially unfortunate is that most of this discussion is irrelevant to what I might have supposed was the purpose of his book. But, as another review notes, the book, though only 300 pages long, is highly repetitive. It would have been a slight volume, indeed, had all the irrelevant portions been removed.

This is a wonderful book. Ridley is an engaging writer and his book is hard to put down. The content and presentation are flawless. For other interesting books on evolutionary psychology, I also recommend "The Moral Animal" and "Survival of the Prettiest."

Unfortunately, Ridley's thesis, to prove that virtues are genetic, is flawed. To be honest, I couldn't pick this up on my own, but after finishing Ridley's book, I read an article in the Boston Review by H. Allen Orr that laid waste to Ridley's thesis. Nonetheless, I wouldn't have understood the argument had I not read Ridley's book. Therefore, I recommend this book as a great introduction to the debate over their source of altruism.