Re: Is this evidence of altruism in dogs?
- From: John W Edser <edser@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 1 Jul 2008 13:36:40 -0400 (EDT)
Anthony Campbell <ac@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:-
On 2008-06-26, Cj <Cj@xxxxxxxx> wrote:
Yes. A blind dog cannot respond to the body language of other dogs.
Since pack leadership (almost equals dominance) virtually requires that
the Alpha ignore the body language of subordinates the blind dog is
automatically exhibiting the body language of a dominant (Alpha) dog.
In theory a blind dog could represent a very dominant Alpha temporarily;
this would only last until the rest of the "pack" realized that the
blind dog was responding inappropriately to other body language signals
unrelated to dominance.
This certainly sounds likely, although I seem to remember seeint a TV
programme about wolves which said that they tended to protect an injured
pack member -- but I may be misremembering.
JE:-
The main point is being missed. These dogs are not displaying fitness
altruism they are displaying fertile organism fitness mutualism as it
was selected for in the wild. The antiquated fitness
altruism/selfishness argument which has been raging within evolutionary
theory ever since Wallace proposed group selection never had a fitness
frame of reference so it was and remains to this very just (more)
irrational (misused) mathematics. The entirely unrecognized falsifiable
frame of reference which does apply to Neo Darwinism is: Total Darwinian
Fitness (TDF) as I have previously defined it here. TDF remains the only
falsifiable fitness maximand that the science of biology has.
What a pack of dogs is doing is _amazingly successfully_ hunting
together as a cooperative group such that each adult dog increases its
very own TDF BUT NOT NECESSARILY EQUALLY by doing so. Because TDF only
allows a single and therefore falsifiable fitness maximand per adult per
population, it cannot be selected to be reduced. Maximands operate,
without exception, at a maximum (by definition) e.g. c the velocity of
light in a vacuum. In water c can be less but even here it remains
maximal within that medium. Exactly the same rationale applies to TDF.
Regards
John Edser
Independent Researcher
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