Might As Well Cooperate

Dawkins has been constantly reinforcing the idea that selfish organisms are the only ones that will survive. That for a maximum potential of success an individual most be egotistic and not think of anyone else. Although, this general idea still rings true, as it turns out, there are certain situations where being 'nice' is actually quite beneficial. 

To clearly illustrate this idea, Dawkins provides an example of Robert Axelrod's computer stimulation of an iterated Prisoner's Dilemma game. Axelrod asked several people to submit different strategies and then played them against each other in a computer stimulation. His goal was to decipher which strategy was the most successful and why. In the game each player could use either a cooperate card or a defect card. The end result depended on what card the opponent played. If both players put forth the cooperate card then it was a mutual reward and each gained three points. If player one put a cooperate card and player two responded with a defect card then it was called sucker's payoff and player one was awarded zero points, while player two got five points for what was called temptation. If both players defected then each only got one point as punishment.  

Interestingly enough, the 'nice' strategies tended to fair much better than the more aggressive ones. "A nice strategy is defined as one that is never the first to defect."(p.212) Specifically, one certain strategy tended to constantly get positive results, this was the Tit for Tat strategy. This strategy was 'nice' as well as 'forgiving'. "A forgiving strategy is one that, although it may retaliate, has a short memory."(p.212) The main idea of the Tit for Tat strategy was that its first move was to play the cooperate card and each move thereafter was directly taken from the opponents last move. This enabled Tit for Tat to only defect as a measure of retaliation. If the opponent always played the cooperate card then the results were continuous mutual gain throughout. "So, we have identified two characteristics of winning strategies: niceness and forgivingness."(p.213)

Although Tit for Tat proved to be quite effective, a strategy's percentage of success will always be relative to the other strategies that it encounters.  Between Tit for Tat and Always Defect, "whichever stable point coms to dominate the population first will tend to stay dominant."(p.217) However, Tit for Tat will always have a definite advantage over Always Defect, this is that viscosity will play in its favor. "Viscosity means any tendency for individuals to continue living close to the place where they were born."(p.218) Tit for Tat does best when facing replicas of itself because both will have a constant, mutual gain throughout. Therefore, living in proximity helps them grow in population and what may start off as a small local population, can grow into a much larger local population. Meanwhile, the Always Defect strategy doesn't benefit from grouping together at all. This means that Tit for Tat has the ability to turn the tide in terms of population numbers. Even when Always Defect is most populous, Tit for Tat can became strong with the help of viscosity. Meanwhile, there is no such chance for the Always Defect strategy. "Tit for Tat has a built-in gift, even when rare, for crossing the knife-edge over to its own side."(p.219) "Always Defect, as we have seen, cannot benefit from clustering, and so does not enjoy this higher-order stability."(p.220)

The overall conclusion that can be made is that in some cases being 'nice' is very beneficial and taking a cooperative attitude will be rewarding for both partners. "So it is natural to ask whether his optimistic conclusions-about the success of non-envious, forgiving niceness-also apply in the world of nature. The answer is yes, of course they do."(p.229) Many times people assume that the most cunning player is the most successful. However Axelford has proved that this really isn't the case at all. Those strategies that were characterized as 'nice' seemed to stop thinking about taking down their opponent and instead focused on how to succeed in a much broader long-term way. They weren't concerned with how well or not their opponent was fairing, and even saw it as a good thing to allow mutual benefitting. In nature this rings true as well, cooperating with other fellow individuals will usually give the best results. 

Now this begs the question, what exactly does this imply? Are those who use 'nice' strategies altruistic? Or is it simply a disguised way of acting selfishly? Truly, this is just a matter of opinion, with enough evidence one could argue either side. However my stance is that cooperation is just a gentle way of pushing for ones own, selfish gain. Truly the reason why any organism cooperates is because it would like to gain as well. Sometimes it's not immediately, but some kind of repayment is implied. It is very rare for anyone or anything to be obliging, without thinking that in the long run, their apparent helpfulness will be reciprocated. Of course there are probably exceptions, however I believe that even in these, a hidden motive can be discovered that will generally lead back to a selfish purpose. The good news though, is that regardless of what drives this apparent generosity, there is room for it in this naturally selfish world.