Re: Coy males and insatiable females.
- From: William Morse <wdmorse@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 23 Feb 2006 01:16:57 -0500 (EST)
"Perplexed in Peoria" <jimmenegay@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in
news:dt5615$1bgf$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx:
Science 17 February 2006:
Vol. 311. no. 5763, pp. 965 - 969
Review
Reproductive Social Behavior: Cooperative Games to Replace Sexual
Selection Joan Roughgarden, Meeko Oishi, Erol Akçay
Theories about sexual selection can be traced back to Darwin in 1871.
He proposed that males fertilize as many females as possible with
inexpensive sperm, whereas females, with a limited supply of large
eggs, select the genetically highest quality males to endow their
offspring with superior capabilities. Since its proposal, problems
with this narrative have continued to accumulate, and it is our view
that sexual selection theory needs to be replaced. We suggest an
approach that relies on the exchange of direct ecological benefits
among cooperating animals without reference to genetic benefits.
This approach can be expressed mathematically in a branch of game
theory that pertains to bargaining and side payments.
--------------------------------
PiP comment: Sounds interesting. Joan (formerly Jonathan)
Roughgarden has a unique perspective on how our own gender identity
colors our thinking about sexual selection.
It is interesting. Especially with your background in economics, you
would probably find this article more worth a trip to the library than
the bum steer I gave you on the deepwater shotgunning article. Or you
could just break down and shell out the 140 bucks for a subscription to
Science :-)
I will start out by noting that Roughgarden et. al. fail to mention
Trivers in their discussion of sexual selection theory. This is an error
comparable to failing to mention Maynard Smith in their discussion of
evolutionary game theory - in fact of course they do reference Maynard
Smith. But Trivers' explanation of different gender roles in terms of
reproductive success and parental investment goes a long way to answering
many of the "fundamental problems" with sexual selection theory.
Having said that, I like their use of cooperative game theory to explain
gender interactions. Trivers' explanation is essentially ex post facto:
if we know that the male invests more than the female, we expect
polyandry, if the female invests more than the male, we expect polygyny.
But it doesn't help explain what about the niche would lead males to
invest more than females. While Roughgarden et. al. don't attempt to
extend their cooperative game theory to such explanations, it seems like
a promising approach.
My second criticism of their paper is that, while they briefly tip a hat
to Hamilton, they don't include kin selection in their theory or even
really acknowledge that kin effects would need to be included in the
payoff matrix in order to properly understand the dynamics of cooperative
game behavior. For instance, in their discussion of Eurasian
oystercatcher threesomes, I would dearly love to know whether anyone has
compared the relatedness of females in agressive vs. cooperative
threesomes.
Yours,
Bill Morse
.
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- Coy males and insatiable females.
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