The Selfish Gene

by Richard Dawkins

The point of comparing rebel human DNA with invading parasitic viruses is that there really isn’t any important difference between them. Viruses may well, indeed, have originated as collections of breakaway genes. If we want to erect any distinction, it should be between genes that pass from body to body via the orthodox route of sperms or eggs, and genes that pass from body to body via unorthodox, ‘sideways’ routes.

An animal’s behaviour tends to maximize the survival of the genes ‘for’ that behaviour, whether or not those genes happen to be in the body of the particular animal performing it.

We can now see that the organism and the group of organisms are true rivals for the vehicle role in the story, but neither of them is even a candidate for the replicator role. The controversy between ‘individual selection’ and ‘group selection’ is a real controversy between alternative vehicles.