Koinophilia - The Evolution of Cooperation

The Evolution of Cooperation

Cooperation is any group behavior that benefits the individuals more than if they were to act as independent agents. There is a second corollary to cooperation: it can always be exploited by selfish individuals who benefit even more by not taking part in the group activity, yet reaping its benefits. For instance, a selfish individual who does not join the hunting pack and its incumbent dangers but nevertheless shares in the spoils has a fitness advantage over the other members of the pack. Thus, although a group of cooperative individuals is fitter than an equivalent group of selfish individuals, selfish individuals interspersed amongst a community of cooperators are always fitter than their hosts. This means they raise, on average, more offspring and grandoffspring than their hosts, and will therefore ultimately replace them.

If, however, the selfish individuals are ostracized, and rejected as mates, because of their deviant and unusual behavior, then their evolutionary advantage becomes an evolutionary liability. Cooperation in all of its very many forms then becomes evolutionarily stable. Sociability, social conventions, ritualistic behavior, the expressions of the emotions, and other forms of communication between individuals, all essential ingredients for full cooperativity, can all be similarly evolutionarily stabilized by koinophilia.