Re: virus: RE: virus, Abortion, etc.

Billy Pilgrim (friedman@centre.edu)
Wed, 13 Mar 1996 23:00:13 -0500


John Steele wrote:

> If you consider a small, geographically close group of individuals, I
> would say that the two are the same. They are on the same "team" (re my
> soccer analogy). Here seemly selfless acts, such as giving your life to
> safe a drowning child, can be explained not only as good in a moral
> sense, but good for DNA replication.

This may be divergent from the current vein of the discussion but the above
is incorrect. Saving a single child at the expense of your own life is
_not_ in your best interest in terms of DNA replication. In terms of DNA
similarity, direct siblings and individual parents have 50% of the subject's
DNA, blood aunts and uncles and nieces and nephews have 25% of the subject's
DNA, and 1st cousins have 1/8 of the subject's DNA. So, in order to make
this a positive tradeoff in terms of genetic material, one would have to
save more than two parents or siblings at the expense of one's own life,
more than four aunts, uncles, nieces, or nephews, and more than eight first
cousins. Just wanted to clear that up. If it seems a little random, sorry.

Ben

-- 
Would you like some cake? No thank you,
My ears are too sweet now
A strange choice of words, but forensically its true
	-Little Feat
	from "Representing the Mambo"