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The subject is cooperation and its evolutionary origins. The author concludes that Utopia is not really possible, but thinks that small groups of people stand the best chance of forming beneficial associations. Many readers apparently don't agree with his suggestion that public ownership via the government is inferior to ownership at a more local level.
He introduces the perhaps surprising idea that there are versions of the Prisoner's Dilema where slightly irrational nice people can do better than completely rational players. The value of having an owner is that someone has incentives to manage the resource correctly. Fascinating dicussion of reciprocal altruism which is illustrated with games like the Prisoner's Dilema.
The author perhaps doesn't develope this thesis well enough, although it made sense to me. The ideas continue to build, each chapter expanding the discussion outward. The final chapters dicuss such things as ecology, trade, property rights and religion.
The government is not a "someone" who reacts to incentives in the same way. It's difficult for trust to develope in large groups.
Don't pick up this book unless you want life-changing revelations about the way you view friends, family, and all other relationships. Everything is a give and take.
Why should people or animals be nice to one another. Why do so many people contribute to charitable organizations. Also worthy of mention would be the comparatively modern concept of voting.
The book does a good job of showing examples from animal and anthropological studies as well as providing theoretical arguments. He says that the ideal of self-less behavior is an illusion, yet even if this is the case it requires an explanation. The thesis of the book is that such behavior arises because it is in the mutual interest of individuals to exchange goods and services.
This is not something done by hunter-gatherers, because they do not have the required abstract concept of number, which is not something that we are born with.Despite its title the book does not really explain the origin of virtue as a concept. Along the way you will be disabused of any notions that you may have of "noble savages" and of any idyllic images of the behavior of dolphins and chimpanzees.Unfortunately the author has a dislike of large scale government, which causes him to ignore investigating the benefits not only of government but of special purpose organizations at all levels from gardening clubs to Medieval guilds to large scale charitable organizations. There are, for example, things that governments do well that simply are not possible at the individual level, like organizing poice and armies and constructing highways.
Why are we moved by the suffering of others. Why do we have a concept of justice, leading to what the author calls the "irrational" attitude of revenge, which he notes is peculiar to our own species.The book provides a good starting point for a discussion of virtue, but, as I have indicated it is certainly not the final word on the subject.
It is literally in our nature." He goes on to note that (page 5): "This is a book about human nature, and in particular the surprisingly social nature of the human animal."The volume proceeds by reviewing theories and research on cooperation, evolution, and so on, a wide ranging review of the human condition and of our evolutionary impulses. The book opens with a daring jail break. The person breaking out, of course, is Peter Kropotkin, the anarchist prince. And this leads to Ridley's thesis in this well written volume (page 5): "Society works not because we have consciously invented it, but because it is an ancient product of our evolved predispositions. Not all, of course, will be convinced of the thesis. However, it is not his philosophy so much as his work in natural history that drew Matt Ridley's attention.
He notes the importance of a game, adopting game theory, developed by political scientist Robert Axelrod, in which humans will cooperate unless double crossed, at which point individuals will respond in negative kind. The story notes that the person escaping the grim Russian prison is, in fact, a member of the nobility, one of the Czar's favorites when the escapee was much younger. He notes that our primate relatives set the stage for understanding the evolution of human cooperation. Kropotkin, on an exploration of Siberia, observed what he saw was cooperation among multitudinous animal species. He drew from that the conclusion that Huxley, who had described nature as "red in tooth and claw," was missing an important part of the evolution picture--the evolution of cooperation. But, according to some theorists, as long as individuals are willing to cooperate with one another, they will get cooperation in return.His conclusion is intriguing (page 264): "If we are to recover social harmony and virtue, if we are to build back into society the virtues that made it work for us, it is vital that we reduce the power and scope of the state." He calls for (page 265) ".social and material exchange between equals for that is the raw material of trust, and trust is the basis for virtue."All in all, an intriguing and interesting volume.
But it is a well written effort to integrate many different bodies of work to make his point.
At one point he speaks of the English medieval common. After all, it has been a defining nature of man to organize in ever larger groups for at least 10,000 years, the time of the earliest known permanent settlements. If the commons system was so successful, it is hard to understand why it almost completely collapsed. This seems to be a dichotomy. Here I am echoing the Editorial Review From Library Journal as shown here on Amazon.com.
(He arrives at other similar conclusions in other areas as well). Also, another counter-argument to his conclusions is the fact that much of the Industrial world democratically votes for things that will cost them, but are for some sort of larger good.What this book does well is demonstrate that many virtuous traits did come out of evolutionary development, rather than cultural or religious forces. Where it fails is in some of its conclusions. He points out that stinting is still an on-going practice in some regions, thus leading to the conclusion that local control and cooperation is best.
To be sure, the collapse can be partially explained to some degree by other aspects of human nature. While the frailties of human nature do not always lead these organizations to performing the best good, it is unquestionable that many people involved in these organizations are selfless. While he does provide some evidence, it is not nearly as conclusive as he seems to believe. However, this argument leaves a lot to be desired. It does a good job explaining what the base behavioral tendencies are, thus providing a basis for evaluating our institutions, finding ways to reward positive traits and to punish the negative traits that always arise.This book is an easy read.
I gave this book four stars out of five because most of the book seems to develop a sound argument for virtues and traits arising out of evolutionary development. Yet, a truly successful system should have been able to resist such corruption. Likewise, the attacks on the larger "do good" organizations seems questionable. While 10,000 years is a mere blip on the evolutionary scale, the need to organize seems pervasive, as he points out early on using the complex systems of plants and animals as examples. This lead to the enclosures. If the subject is interesting to you, purchase the book, just keep on mind some of the weaknesses. After pointing out how mankind, many times as hunter-gather tribes, has caused massive destruction and drove many species to extinction, he concludes that the best way to be environmentally friendly is through small, local cooperatives rather than large, especially state sponsored or directed, environmental organizations.
A newer book you may want to consider is Moral Minds. First, the commons system mostly broke down for a variety of reasons, one of which was cheating. This ended up leading to wealthier individuals who ended up purchasing more property and reducing his neighbors to fuedal status and eventual poor management. While these latter undoubtedly have an effect on these traits, they are not the source. Or, perhaps, read both.
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