As paradoxical as the title of this post may sound, it is actually true! Every now and then when you perform a selfless act by helping an old man cross the street, or helping a student pick up the books that he/she has just dropped, or any such thing, and come about feeling great that you have helped someone, the fact is, internally, you are actually being selfish. You just don’t know it.
To make sense of the previous paragraph, we need to go back a couple of centuries or so. Charles Darwin, a naturalist, made a revolutionary claim that we were not created by God, but we are a product of evolution. I guess every sane person accepts that we are here because of evolution, but the question about God’s existence will be debated until the physicists find the ‘Theory of Unification’. This post is not to discuss about the existence of God, but to make sense of evolution.
Evolution is a process where a living being continually adapts itself to the surrounding environment in order to survive, and the adaptation is carried on down the generation time line resulting in a whole range of organism that we see today. You and I are not special, we are just apes! Technically, Homo Sapiens are the 5th ape. We are more closely related to chimpanzees than horses are to donkeys. Whether you like being called an ape, or not, you are one. Darwin stated that the aim of the organisms is just one, survival. And only the fittest of the organisms survive. Unfortunately, during his era, nobody knew about the DNA structure or the genes that make up a DNA. When Watson and Crick proposed the double helix model of the DNA, a whole new world was opened up for us to explore.
Scientists have analyzed the gene structure of the human beings and many other animals. They describe the genes in our DNA sequence as ‘Selfish Genes’. The role of the selfish gene is to simply act selfish so that it gets to survive, and that it gets propagated down the generation time line. This is totally in conjunction with what Darwin had proposed. The genes in our body modify to each and every external stimulus so that we can survive and our life on earth can continue as long as possible. Scientists have been able to explain the sensation of fear of heights in certain individuals, the need to fight back to defend oneself, the need to groom oneself to look better, and many such attributes in human beings, as being directed by the selfish genes in our DNA sequence. Some of us are scared of heights because they don’t want to fall down and die. Such explanations can be given to most of the emotions that we exhibit. While all these traits sound logical, there has been one aspect of human behavior that the scientists found hard to explain using the concept of selfish gene; the ability of the humans to be kind to other human beings and even other non-humans.
If selfish gene is meant to help you and you alone, why do we perform acts of kindness and help the needy? Why do we even have to protect someone if we know that the race is run only by the fittest? Recently there was a breakthrough and certain scientists have been able to link this trait in humans to the selfish gene. The researchers have proposed that, the act of being kind to another living being will generate a sense of camaraderie among the two, thus helping the former to remain safe from the latter. The former being, will help the latter, hoping that the latter will not hit back on the former when survival comes into question. The latter will develop a sense of guilt and not act selfish towards itself and thus helping the former to survive. That is a whole lot of things that I have said above. Some of you might want to go back and read through the previous paragraph again.
Experiments have shown that even chimps show selfless acts towards other chimps. However, it is not as clear as it is in humans. This emotional trait has been hardwired into our brains and we perform selfless deeds even though we know that we won’t be getting anything in return. The brain has been positively reinforced by being selfless to such a degree that it no longer needs to know that it will get something in return for this act of kindness. Being selfless also shows that the individual has matured a great deal through the evolutionary process. So, the next time you act selfish and do not see why we should be helping out the needy, keep in mind that, you are nothing more than a less evolved CHIMP!
