The Selfish Gene By Richard Dawkins - 871 Words

Book Review: The Selfish Gene Richard Dawkins reaffirmed the power of the individual and natural selection in his seminal book The Selfish Gene. This popular science classic breaks down the nature and foundations behind the complex and seemingly strange world of animal behavior. Dawkins revolutionarily provides a simple and original tome steeped in the intricacies of evolutionary psychology. The book, which has been praised by literary experts and scientists alike, gives a modern and articulate recap of Darwin’s natural selection, while solving the problems surrounding group selection. And that what makes it stand out to me. This past semester I have had the opportunity to read the third edition of the book within a greater context of evolutionary biology and animal behavior. The lucid and simple positions that Dawkins is able to create, stimulates the core arguments that define the generative tone of the book and ultimately make it a great read. Dawkins’ main focus throughout his book revolves around its namesake, gene selfishness. For Dawkins in the 1970s the contemporary wide-held belief of evolution and natural selection had drifted away from Darwin and his fundamental breakthroughs. Dawkins recreates the idea that the basic unit of evolution is genes, and that their unfettered desire for longevity dictates individual behavior that constitutes basic and societal actions. The bodies and minds of animals to Dawkins are a mere vehicle for our genes who direct behavior toShow MoreRelatedRichard Dawkins s The Selfish Gene, And Jonathan Kozol s Savage Inequalities3047 Words   |  13 PagesIntroduction This paper is an integrated critique of Richard Dawkins’, The Selfish Gene, and Jonathan Kozol’s, Savage Inequalities. The premise of my critique is to compare how these two books by two different authors on two different subjects can relate. I believe this is done by exampling how Dawkins describes the general make up of individuals and how they interact in their specific groups that they as a species have come up in over millennia and how Kozol describes that where you are born andRead MoreThe Selfish Gene917 Words   |  4 PagesThe Selfish Gene Author: Richard Dawkins Book Criticism †¢Ã¢â‚¬Å"Genes cannot be selfish or unselfish, any more than atoms can be jealous, elephants abstract or biscuits teleological. This should not need mentioning, but Richard Dawkinss book The Selfish Gene has succeeded in confusing a number of people about it† (Midgley). †¢There are many things to disagree with in the book, depending on one’s viewpoint. Some people may       interpret the term â€Å"selfish gene† in a       literal way, believing thatRead More The Selfish Gene Essay914 Words   |  4 PagesThe Selfish Gene We are survival machines—robot vehicles blindly programmed to preserve selfish molecules known as genes. -- Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene (1). Can genes alone determine your DNAs place in the next generation? Are humans simply vessels for these genes? With his provoking work entitled The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins attempts to answer such questions as he proposes a shift in the evolutionary paradigm. Working through the metaphor of a selfish gene, DawkinsRead More Nature vs Nurture Essay804 Words   |  4 PagesThe Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins presents his viewpoint that living organisms are but survival machines, that the individual [is a] selfish machine, programmed to do whatever is best for its gene as a whole. In fact, this is the central concept in his book that he brings across. An individuals behaviour and actions are 100% determined by its genes and the individual behaves in accordance to ensure the best persistence of its gene in any circumstances. There is no doubt where Dawkins standsRead MoreGenes and Their Control Over Humans Essay810 Words   |  4 PagesGenes and Their Control Over Humans They (genes) are in you and me; they created us, body and mind This statement by Richard Dawkins poses the question of how much and in what way our genes control us, whether they are responsible for our hereditary features only, or for all behavior and environmental aspects of our persona. A reductionist view implies that only specific tasks are carried out by the genes.We know that most genes synthesize for proteinsRead MoreDawkins and Kozol Essay3200 Words   |  13 Pagesdarwin Running Head: DAWKINS AND KOZOL The Meme concept from Dawkins and the Educational Funding concept from Kozol Kevin Edmundson Oklahoma University LSTD-5013 Interdisciplinary Foundations The Meme concept from Dawkins and the Educational Funding concept from Kozol Introduction Jonathan Kozol, one of the most zealous advocates of the idea, wrote a series of books, which depict below the critical school, where children from poor, mostly belongingRead MoreIdeas Of Personal Identity, Human Nature, And Reality877 Words   |  4 Pagesidentity, human nature, and reality. The following essays and films will be analyzed: Divided Minds and the Nature of Persons, The Selfish Cooperator, Does the Real World Exist, Transfer, I Am and The Signal. In Derek Parfit s Divided Minds and the Nature of Persons, we learn that personal identity is ever changing, whereas in Richard Dawkin s essay The Selfish Cooperator we are taught that human nature is circumstantial, and finally John Searle argues in Does the Real World Exist thatRead More Nature vs. Nurture Essay examples2491 Words   |  10 Pagesstrategy for the selfish and above all we care for our genes. It is this view of determined materialism which is often assumed, at times unthinkingly, to be the de facto tru th. The idea has therefore developed that if an aspect of human behaviour is genetically predisposed, it cannot be helped and, so the thinking goes; if it cannot be helped then blame cannot be apportioned. That view is tantamount to a council of doom which, if accepted, allows us to believe that the selfish, the self-centredRead MorePersuasive Essay : The Selfish Gene 1733 Words   |  7 Pagesgoes about success in the wrong way. According to Richard Dawkins’ ‘The Selfish Gene’, we are all born with inherently selfish genes, in-built for our survival: to self-preserve, to keep oneself safe from predators, to get what you need and keep it to survive. But this does not fit in our current society. As Dawkins states himself, â€Å"Let us try to teach generosity and altruism, because we are born selfish. Let us understand what our own selfish genes are up to, because we may then at least have theRead MoreA Lone Wolf Vs The Pack1672 Words   |  7 Pagestheories and ideas. The tension between the two groups can be similarly seen in Susan Blackmore’s essay, â€Å"Strange Creatures, â€Å"in which she comments on how human behavior is based on imitation. She backs her argument through the term meme coined by Richard Dawkins, a premiere British ethologist and evolutionary biologist, in which Blackmore uses the meaning of the word meme, as being an idea or phrase that can find success through being imitated and made the connection to other individuals to depict the