The Selfish Gene: 40th Anniversary edition (Oxford Landmark Science) — 7. Family Planning

1. 1. Dawkins distinguishes child-bearing (bringing new individuals into the world) from child-caring (caring for existing individuals), which are two different strategic decisions for survival machines.
2. 2. A pure caring strategy cannot be evolutionarily stable because a population that only cares for existing children would be invaded by mutants that specialize in bearing.
3. 3. Wynne-Edwards proposed that animals altruistically reduce their birth rates for the good of the group, a view that relies on group selection.
4. 4. David Lack's alternative theory holds that each selfish individual optimizes clutch size to maximize the number of surviving offspring, not for group benefit.
5. 5. Population growth depends not only on the number of children per couple but also on the timing of reproduction; delaying childbearing slows the annual growth rate.
6. 6. Unchecked population growth mathematically leads to famine, plague, or war unless birth control is adopted, as food production cannot keep pace indefinitely.
7. 7. Wynne-Edwards's concept of epideictic behavior—animals gathering in crowds to estimate population density—can be reinterpreted under selfish gene theory as individuals signaling to manipulate rivals' clutch sizes.
8. 8. Overcrowding reduces birth rates in mice even with abundant food, but this is explained by selfish gene theory as an adaptive response to predict future famine, not group altruism.
9. 9. Non-breeding outcasts in territorial species, such as red grouse, are not altruistically accepting a role for the group; they are biding their time for a chance to inherit a territory.
10. 10. The welfare state is an unnatural altruistic system that allows individuals to have more children than they can support, making artificial birth control necessary to avoid misery.