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:Analogies for Sustainable Development/Organism as multi-cellular society

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Discussion

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Wilson (2007)[1]:

“individuals are not just members of groups but groups in their own right. We call them individuals because they have solved the problems of within-group conflict so well. Yet even individuals fall short of the ideal of total harmony associated with the word “organism,” as we can see in the case of cancer.”


Wilson (2015)[2]:

“Pure organisms, whose lower-level elements work 100 percent for the common good, do not exist.”

“a multicellular organism is a highly regulated society of cells that is elaborately organized to withstand an onslaught of cheating and exploitation from within”

“A multicellular organism is literally a group of groups of groups, whose members led more fractious lives in the far distant past.”


Greene (2013)[3]:

“the tension between individual and collective interest arises not only between us but within us. As noted above, complex cells have been cooperating for about a billion years. Nevertheless, it is not uncommon for some of the cells in an animal’s body to start pulling for themselves instead of for the team, a phenomenon known as cancer.”


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References

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  1. ↑ Wilson, D. S. (2007). Evolution for Everyone: How Darwin’s Theory Can Change the Way We Think About Our Lives. Delacorte Press.
  2. ↑ Wilson, D. S. (2015). Does Altruism exist? Culture, Genes, and the Welfare of Others. New Haven, CT, USA: Yale University Press.
  3. ↑ Greene, J. (2013). Moral Tribes. Emotion, Reason and the Gap Between Us and Them. New York, NY, USA: The Penguin Press.
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