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"Self-sacrifice and altruism might be mere byproducts of mirroring and not themselves adaptive in a way selected for by evolution."
Man! Am I tired of reading that altruism and self-sacrifice are either factually non-existent (replaced in the literature with something called reciprocal altruism) or some kind of evolutionary hiccup! It's as if science can't manage to face the proposition that competition as a means of genetic transfer might just be outmoded and could very well be in the process of being replaced.
Why is there so much research being done to prove humans are spirit-less creatures with no better motive to live than to pass on our genes? Is that myopic, or what?
Why isn't there more research being done to better understand the advantages of self-sacrifice and true altruism?
My guess is that altruism means religion to these guys, and as far as they're concerned, religion must be stamped out. No one wants to denigrate scientific advancement, but does everything we understand to be human have to be denied or relegated to mere biological function in order to serve that purpose?
