On Mon, 29 Nov 2004, Luke Weiger wrote:
> If altruistic behavior wasn't at least occasionally in the "interest" of our
> genes at some point in the past, we wouldn't see any altruistic behavior.
> That much we should all be able to agree on, and if we can't, some of us
> must not understand evolution.
>
> -- Luke
I gotta spank Luke on this one: this is naive sociobiology. Not even Darwin argues that all traits in a species are inevitably the result of natural selection! Check out Gould's spandrel analogy (discussed at some length in The Structure of Evolutionary Theory). It is absolutely incorrect to assume that all behaviors observed in humans today must have occasionally contributed to reproductive success at some point in human history. (To be a little snarky, only someone who doesn't understand Darwin's concept of evolution would make Luke's claim above.)
Miles