We don't sacrifice ourselves for the good of the species. That concept has no intrinsic value in evolutionary biology. We do it for ourselves. We are our genes and our genes will be passed on to our children. By sacrificing for our children, we are also doing something for ourselves.
.. And that's generally the way we behave. What's interesting is that even though we perceive ourselves only as us; as a living expression of a particular constellation of genes, we act in the interest of our genes future survival.
And our genes survival is our own survival, just in more modular terms. We act as if we're people made up of lego. You want the bits you're made up of to go on to make up more people in the future; like your hair colour or a particular brain chemistry or funny looking toes .. and even if your child doesn't have the trait, the gene may be passed on and will be expressed again at some point. While we live for decades, our genes are, in a sense, billions of years old.
Last edited by Guybrush; 08-16-2014 at 04:13 PM.
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