From: arg19@tid.es
Date: Mon, 3 Aug 98 22:03 MET DST
Subject: Social Biology (and It is genetic...)
I feel irritated by the development of this threading, first a dubious 
genetical claim is raised, then the science which studies *and negates* it 
is atacked with stupid comparisions. Would you also classify as scientific 
studies the ones of Mengele, then? It could be a good method to go 
against medicine if one is interested in, for instance, selling paramedical 
gadgets.

Martin Nowak and Karl Sigmund (Nature 11 June 1998, page 573-577) 
show that deception strategies are doomed to failure for small and middle 
sized groups. This happens in any model able to incorporate some kind of 
"image" scoring to discriminate according the reputation of each member 
of the group. 

In this number of Nature, Regis Ferriere makes a small abstract of the 
current research, and you could enjoy the references he suggest in page 
518.

Nowak and Sigmund, jointly with Robert. M May, made a very interesting 
work about the iterated prisioner dilemma, a divulgative version of it 
was published in the Scientific American in 1995, and even the section of 
computer games explaided how to program some fast simulations for a 
localized version of the model. Surely phase transitions can be found as 
the payoff table is changed.

Apart from mathematical models, direct and indirect reciprocity 
(cooperation) is claimed to be an important factor in Nature. A modern 
reference could be Alexander, "the biology of moral systems", but you 
could enjoy also classicals as Kropotkine "Mutual Aid, a factor of 
evolution", or even Darwin himself.

und as 
the payoff table is changed.

My opinion, current research seems to point to cooperation as a natural 
factor.

 Can your "memeticists" and "geneticists" quote relevant research 
on the subject, or do you only have philosophical arguments to justify 
your bet for deception?

Yours,

                                                        Alejandro Rivero