Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland.
Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2020 Nov 17;117(46):28894-28898. doi: 10.1073/pnas.2013596117. Epub 2020 Nov 2.
The genetic evolution of altruism (i.e., a behavior resulting in a net reduction of the survival and/or reproduction of an actor to benefit a recipient) once perplexed biologists because it seemed paradoxical in a Darwinian world. More than half a century ago, W. D. Hamilton explained that when interacting individuals are genetically related, alleles for altruism can be favored by selection because they are carried by individuals more likely to interact with other individuals carrying the alleles for altruism than random individuals in the population ("kin selection"). In recent decades, a substantial number of supposedly alternative pathways to altruism have been published, leading to controversies surrounding explanations for the evolution of altruism. Here, we systematically review the 200 most impactful papers published on the evolution of altruism and identify 43 evolutionary models in which altruism evolves and where the authors attribute the evolution of altruism to a pathway other than kin selection and/or deny the role of relatedness. An analysis of these models reveals that in every case the life cycle assumptions entail local reproduction and local interactions, thereby leading to interacting individuals being genetically related. Thus, contrary to the authors' claims, Hamilton's relatedness drives the evolution to altruism in their models. The fact that several decades of investigating the evolution to altruism have resulted in the systematic and unwitting rediscovery of the same mechanism is testament to the fundamental importance of positive relatedness between actor and recipient for explaining the evolution of altruism.
利他主义的遗传进化（即导致行为者的生存和/或繁殖净减少以造福接受者的行为）曾令生物学家感到困惑，因为在达尔文的世界中，这似乎是自相矛盾的。半个多世纪前，W.D.汉密尔顿（W. D. Hamilton）解释说，当相互作用的个体具有遗传关系时，利他主义的等位基因可以通过选择得到青睐，因为它们携带的个体更有可能与携带利他主义等位基因的其他个体相互作用，而不是与群体中的随机个体相互作用（“亲缘选择”）。在最近几十年中，已经发表了大量据称是利他主义的替代途径，这导致了围绕利他主义进化的解释的争议。在这里，我们系统地回顾了关于利他主义进化的 200 篇最有影响力的论文，并确定了 43 个进化模型，在这些模型中，利他主义得以进化，作者将利他主义的进化归因于亲缘选择以外的途径和/或否认相关性的作用。对这些模型的分析表明，在每种情况下，生命周期假设都需要局部繁殖和局部相互作用，从而导致相互作用的个体具有遗传关系。因此，与作者的说法相反，汉密尔顿的相关性在他们的模型中驱动了利他主义的进化。几十年来，对利他主义进化的研究结果系统地、无意识地重新发现了相同的机制，这证明了行为者和接受者之间积极的相关性对于解释利他主义的进化具有至关重要的意义。
