Does Evolutionary Theory Imply Genetic Tribalism?

Many people believe that the theory of evolution implies genetic tribalism. They believe that organisms act for the good of the species, or that organisms are altruistic toward others who share their genes. These beliefs are false. Evolutionary theory does not imply genetic tribalism or altruism.

Belief in genetic tribalism comes from the idea that we have natural genetic interests in those who share our genes. This seems superficially plausible. We have a natural interest in our children, don’t we? That interest is because we share genes, right? If so, we should also have a genetic interest in our ethnic groups or races, by extension of the same principle.

The fundamental misconception is that we have natural genetic interests based on shared genes. Evolution does not create entities with genetic interests. It creates reproducing machines. Those are different things.

But isn’t reproduction an instrument of genetic interests? Isn’t the purpose of reproduction to spread our genes and increase their numbers in the world?

No. Reproduction isn’t instrumental to genetic interests.

The concept of genetic interests is hard to define. If we have genetic interests in people based on shared genes, then you have almost the same interest in everyone, because you share about 99% of your genetic information with every other human. You share most of it with all other mammals, and a significant amount with most living beings.

Of course, that raises some interesting questions. What does it mean to share genetic information? Does it mean that the genes derived from the same ancestral molecule with no modifications? What if a gene is slightly different, but has basically the same effect on the phenotype? What if there is an identical gene that has different effects in different organisms? What if the genes are identical but evolved independently? Genetic similarity is not a simple, well-defined concept. It is actually very difficult to define.

No matter how those questions are answered, however, you share almost all of your genes with every other human being. Your genetic similarity to your own child is not much higher than your genetic similarity to a random person. And yet, people care a lot more about their own children than about other, randomly selected people. They don’t care about them 0.5% more. They care about them much, much more, perhaps infinitely more. That alone suggests that the basis for selection is not shared genes, but reproduction.

If you wanted to increase the frequency of your genes in the world, what should you do? Reproduction wouldn’t be a good strategy. Simply by living, you destroy far more copies of your genes than you could ever create by reproducing. Every day, you consume organisms that share most of your genes. Thus, the effect of your existence on the frequency of almost every gene in your genotype is negative. Having children would only make matters worse.

It’s not clear that doing anything would have much impact. Perhaps killing yourself would be the best strategy, or killing as many complex organisms as possible, since they consume more energy per individual, and most of your genes are shared by simpler organisms. Maybe a few of your genes would fall by the wayside, or be reduced in number, but overall the number of copies of your genes would increase. (Let’s say an individual carrying gene X is considered to be one “copy” of X.)

However, you might argue that if you don’t reproduce, other complex life forms will occupy whatever niche your offspring would have occupied anyway, so you might as well reproduce. Killing yourself or other complex life forms would not have a net impact, because those niches would be filled by other complex life forms.

That is true, but it “negs” the question. It assumes that other living beings will not act in their “genetic interests”, but rather as selfish reproducers. Yes, other complex life forms will fill those niches, precisely because they were not selected to act in their “genetic interests”, but to act as reproducing machines.

Now, let’s talk about biological functions or purposes.

What does it mean to say that trait X has the biological function Y? It means that X was selected to do Y. In other words, that X has a positive effect on Y and Y has a positive effect on the reproduction of X. Biological forms have functions because they affect their own reproduction. To say “X has the function Y” means that the selective basis of X is Y: X causes Y, and Y causes X to be reproduced.

Evolution generates forms with functions. The eye has a function (to see), the ear has a function (to hear), the hand has a function (to grasp), the kidney has a function (to extract certain wastes from blood), etc. The largest biological form, the body, has the largest biological function: to reproduce.

Reproduction is the biological purpose of life. Reproduction isn’t instrumental to some higher purpose, such as increasing the frequency of genes. We reproduce because that is what our forms were selected to do. Reproduction is the basis of selection, and thus it is the telos of life. Reproduction is the cycle that generates functionality from causality in nature.

For something to be the basis of selection, it must happen over and over again in many different individuals. Does maximizing the frequency of your genes in the population happen over and over again in many different individuals? No. Can it be the feedback loop that creates forms with functions? No. Reproduction is an event that occurs over and over again in many different individuals. It depends on the individual form and it copies the genetic information expressed by the individual form. That is why reproduction, not “genetic interests”, is the basis of selection.

Now, I will give an example of how a species or a gene can be selected to act against its own “interests”, so to speak.

Male lions kill the cubs of other males. This behavior generally increases the cost of making new lions, because many cubs are killed by other lions before they have a chance to grow up and reproduce. Infanticide probably reduces the number of lions in an ecosystem. Yet, lions have been selected to act in this way. Why?

Because it is a good reproductive strategy. By killing the cubs of a female, a male can impregnate her sooner, and then his offspring will get the full benefits of her motherhood. If he did not kill her cubs, it would take longer to impregnate her, and his offspring would compete with her existing offspring for parental resources. Infanticide is an adaptive behavior. It evolved because it contributed to the reproductive success of individual males, even though it probably results in fewer lions. It makes lions fitter as individuals, but less fit as a species.

Infanticide by males occurs in many species. It is a common adaptation. Humans have been known to do it.

Suppose that there is a population of “nice” lions that don’t commit infanticide. Then, in one lion, there is a genetic mutation that causes the infanticide behavior. Let’s call this mutation “the K-variant”. Over time, the K-variant increases in frequency, because it is adaptive. Males with the K-variant have more surviving offspring, which go on to reproduce the K-variant themselves. Eventually, every lion has the K-variant.

Now, when males kill cubs because of the K-variant, they are destroying copies of the K-variant. The K-variant is not acting in its own “interest” as a gene. However, there is no way for the K-variant to change itself. A mutation of the K-variant would be a different gene. And any new gene that shut off the K-variant would be selected against. The K-variant is stable at 100% in the population, even though, in that equilibrium state, it is not acting in its own “interest”, viewed as a “selfish gene”.

The apparent paradox comes from the metaphor of the gene “acting” in the world. Genes aren’t little demons that make organisms act for the “good of the genes”. Genes are just DNA sequences that are expressed in organisms. Genes are selected (positively or negatively) based on their effects on reproduction.

Evolution does not generate forms that act for the good of the species, or for the good of the genes in some abstract sense. Evolution generates forms that are good at reproducing themselves.

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Many people believe that evolutionary theory implies racial or ethnic tribalism. They believe that a racial or ethnic group is a biological unit, and that individuals should act for the good of their group. This view could be called “genetic tribalism” or “genetic collectivism”. It portrays evolution as a competition between genetic tribes rather than individuals or genes. This view is incorrect. People do not generally display ethnic or racial solidarity.

Let’s consider an example: the European conquest of Latin America. The Spanish marched against the Aztecs with Tlaxcalan allies. The Tlaxcalans spoke Nahuatl (the same Uto-Aztecan language as the Aztecs). They were genetically and culturally much more similar to the Aztecs than to the Spanish. Yet, they chose to ally with the Spanish against their close cultural and biological relatives. Why? Because the high-ranking members of Tlaxcalan society thought it would benefit them, as individuals, to ally with the Spanish against the Aztecs. They knew that the Spanish were powerful enemies. They made a pragmatic calculation that it was less risky for them and their society to ally with the Spanish against the Aztecs than vice versa. The low-ranking members made similar calculations about their personal interests, and they went along with their leaders.

History has many other examples. The Spanish conquered the Inca with the help of native allies. The Iroquois and the British fought against the Huron and the French.

During the Spanish conquest of Mexico, Eurasian diseases swept through the native population, making them more susceptible to conquest. Roughly 90% of the native people died. They were replaced by a mixed population descended mostly from European men and native women. The strategy of mating outside one’s race was extremely successful for both sides. The women got the benefits of European civilization, and their children got resistance to Eurasian diseases. The men got women at a relatively low cost in labor, compared to the expense of shipping brides from Europe, and the native women had the cultural knowledge of how to survive in the Americas. The mixed-race population of Latin America has been very successful, despite being descended from “race traitors”.

It would have been better for the native people, viewed as a biological unit, to ally against the Spanish and kick them out. It would have been better for the Spanish people, viewed as a biological unit, to annihilate and fully replace the native population. Neither thing happened, because races or “peoples” don’t act as biological units.

Here’s another example. This time it’s a thought experiment. Suppose that every white person in the world is required by decree of the global techno-state to mate with a person of another race and have 2 children, and this law is ruthlessly enforced. If a person cannot find a mate, one is assigned. After 100 years or so, the white race would be gone. No white people would exist.

However (assuming no social collapse or other major disaster), every gene that existed in the white population would still exist, at the same frequency as before. Almost everyone from the original white population would have descendants, except for the few who died young from accidents or disease. The genes were replicated, and the individuals reproduced, but the race disappeared.

The survival of one’s race is not necessary for individual reproductive success, or for the perpetuation of one’s genes. A race is just a cluster of genetic variation. It consists only of correlations between genes. Mixing races decorrelates genes. It doesn’t destroy them.

Biology is far more individualistic than it is tribal. The individual is a more important unit in biology than race or even species. Race and species are somewhat arbitrary notions. They are descriptive categories. Neither a race nor a species is an object that has coherence, in the way that an individual body has coherence. Neither a race nor a species can act in the world, in the way that an individual can. The individual is the unit of action and the means of reproduction. Genes can only “act” in the world by their expression in individuals. The individual is the reproductive bottleneck for genes: they reproduce only if the individual reproduces. Thus, genes are selected to make individuals reproduce, not to perpetuate the race or species.

Social behavior does exist in nature, but it isn’t an expression of “shared genetic interests”, and it isn’t based on altruism. For one thing, most life forms are not social. If sociality followed directly from shared genes, then you would expect it to be more common. It is relatively rare, and it always requires some special adaptation to make it possible. Most sociality in nature consists of simple association, such as herding or flocking behaviors. Complex social behavior is very rare. Humans have the most complex social behavior of any species by far. It is a special adaptation that is built into our psychology. We evolved it because it helps us to reproduce as individuals.

The so-called “social insects” are not social. See Bees are Not Social.

Our social instincts make us form into cooperative groups that compete with other groups. You have the innate potential to be part of such a group, but you do not have an intrinsic, genetic in-group. Your perception of your “in-group” is generated by your social instincts and your social environment.

You can have multiple social identities, which are active in different contexts. You can be part of a clique of friends, an online community, a country, an ethnic group, a race, etc. None of those is your intrinsic in-group. They are just different social identities, which can plug into your social emotions.

Race and society are very different things. A race is a descriptive category, which refers to a cluster of genetic variation. A society is an organized group of individuals. A society has an internal power structure, which gives it some degree of coherence and agency. A society is a cooperative arrangement between selfish individuals. A race is not organized. It has no coherence or agency. It is not a cooperative arrangement. It is just a descriptive category. A race is not a society, and a society can be composed of people of different races.

The theory of evolution does not imply that genetic tribalism is natural or adaptive. We are not naturally ethno-centric. We are naturally self-centric and offspring-centric.

“But, but…” the ethno-nationalist protests, “What about the FACT that people self-segregate by race and vote by race, etc, etc??”

Well, all that is true, but they also kill and rape by race. People don’t act altruistically toward one another just because they belong to the same race. They might, however, create social identities and socially organize based on race, depending on the circumstances.

People self-segregate by race for two reasons. One is that there are race differences in mental abilities and preferences. Similar people tend to end up in similar situations, and similar people prefer to hang out together. However, segregation by race is a weak preference, which is easily overridden by other factors. When it is convenient to mix for economic or sexual reasons, people mix.

People can and often do form social identities based on race, and socially organize to some extent based on race. That is not because they are acting out the will of their shared genes, however. It is because people need some basis to organize into groups, and race provides such a basis, although it is not the only one. Religion, ideology or language can also be used as a basis for social organization. There is nothing special or magical about race as a basis for social identity and organization, but it does have one advantage: it is a visible signal of identity that is always present.

In the United States, blacks tend to develop social identities based on race, while whites tend to develop social identities based on ideology. This is mostly because whites are the majority race, so race wouldn’t make sense as a basis for political organization or social identity for whites, at least for now. As whites decline as a percentage of the US population, however, their social identities will be more based on race. We are seeing that happening now: racial identity is becoming more important to whites as the white majority shrinks. In essence, the importance of race as a signal of social identity depends on its information content. In the US, being black is more informative than being white, because blacks are a smaller percentage of the population. (The information content of a signal is the negative logarithm of its prior probability.)

I am not saying that race has no effect on society. I am saying that races are not competing genetic tribes. We can form social identities and divide into societies in various ways.

Society is not biology. It is another level of order on top of psychology and biology. It supervenes on those lower levels, but it cannot be descriptively reduced to them. Society is based on cooperation between selfish individuals, not on altruism or shared genetic interests. Society is a machine that we create by cooperating. It serves our individual interests.

It is hard for most people to accept the reality of evolution. They want to believe that their lives serve some great purpose, and that they are part of something big and important. The truth is that you are a reproducing machine. Your natural purpose is to reproduce, and reproduction has no higher purpose.