Selfish genes, Antinatalism and Game Theory: Why we're actually pro Climate Change

Despite repeated warnings, we continually fail to take the dramatic action required to prevent Climate Change. Why? Perhaps, on some level, we see it as a good thing.

In October 2023, Alex O’Connor, the legend formally known as Cosmic Skeptic, hosted James Skeet of Just Stop Oil (JSO) on his podcast, Within Reason. They discussed the motivations, ethics and possible consequences of Just Stop Oil’s civil disruption tactics.

People just don’t care enough about climate change, it seems, so JSO took it upon themselves to try and make people care. They brought the inconvenience closer to home, even condescending to make sacrifices on behalf of the British public by obstructing major roads, and, notably, preventing a mother seeking medical attention for her baby at a nearby hospital.

In defense of these tactics and their local consequences, Skeet responded, “we’re looking at two billion people being forced out of the conditions suitable to support human life”.

For the ever-utilitarian JSO, the calculus is simple. The possible injury or death of a single child is weighed against the greater good of finally getting the British public to care enough about Climate Change to do something drastic. Despite their efforts, however, we seem to care more about the local harms far more than those removed from us both temporally and geographically.

Clearly, we just don’t care that much about it. But why? Surely the impending collapse of civilisation and the possible destruction of the biosphere is important enough to make some real sacrifices for?

I’ve already written about our general lack of interest in distant events in my previous article, “I Don’t Care, and Neither Do you”. Here, I’ll discuss the specific reasons I think we struggle to care about supposed existential threats.

Selfish Genes

In “The Ape that Understood the Universe”, Professor Steve Stewart-Williams outlines a series of common misconceptions about evolution by natural selection. Crucially, he notes that “survival is important, but it’s not enough” and that “reproduction is the true currency of evolution”. He puts this most aptly when he writes, “Nature isn’t just a bloodbath, it’s a vast, unending orgy.”.

So, survival and reproduction are necessary. But, as it turns out, some organisms act in a way that promotes the survival and reproduction of others. Eusocial insects, for example, act for the good of a colony of close relatives. Therefore, self-sacrificial or altruistic behaviour promotes the propagation of their genes, just not the copy of those genes carried within their own bodies.

Indeed, since natural selection works almost entirely within species, the best understanding is the view that humans are the mechanism through which our genes propagate themselves, at the expense of other competing gene variants. Using an oversimplified example, we could say that the gene variant (allele) that codes for blue eyes in humans is in direct competition with the allele that codes for brown eyes.

So, rather than being focused on the propagation and survival of our species, we are driven to secure and promote the spreading of our genes over others’. This might explain our alleged lack of compassion for distant catastrophes and our clear prioritisation of people who live near us. In our ancestral environment, geographic distance and genetic relatedness would correlate negatively. We care more about those in close geographical proximity because they are more likely to be related to us, more likely to be carrying the same gene variants.

This powerful evolutionary drive might actually see a reduction of diversity in the gene pool as something to celebrate. Population collapse, especially far from our geographic location, experienced by the unwitting competitors of our selfish genes, would stand as an opportunity rather than a tragedy. Indeed, if large swathes of genetic competitors were suddenly wiped out by sea level rise, viral infections or nuclear war, our genes might have the opportunity to dominate, perhaps becoming the only gene variant around. This accolade would position a gene at the pinnacle of success.

Existential threats may, therefore, need to be on the level of entire species-level extinction for us to register an interest. I imagine the following conversation between a smug selfish gene and an equally smug JSO activist,

Activist: “ We are on the brink of ecological disaster! Sea levels are rising, millions will go without food, disease and death will be rampant!”

Selfish Gene: “When you say ‘we’, who exactly are you referring to?”

Activist: “Well, it’ll hit the developing nations first, probably those that live closest to sea level will suffer initially.”

Selfish Gene: “So, we’ll be fine?”

Activist: “Err, for now, yes. But later down the line-”

Selfish Gene: “Phew! You had me worried for a second there. But this is actually good news, thank you.”

Activist:" “Wha- huh? Good news?”

Selfish Gene: “Yeah! Great news! Quick question though, what’s causing all this lovely chaos?”

Activist: “Well, we’re burning fossil fuels-”

Selfish Gene: “Burning fossil fuels,” it mutters to itself as it writes on a tiny notepad, “what else?”

Activist: Looking confused, “W-well we’re eating too much meat-”

Selfish Gene: “Too much meat…” it says, furiously scribbling.

Activist: “Yeah, and we’re overfishing too.”

Selfish Gene: “Right, great! Thanks for your help. I’m off to Argentina for a steak!”

Ok, I’ve smashed this straw man enough, but you the get point. All of these things are actually good news from the perspective of the Selfish Gene. All of them confer an opportunity to spread into now vacant niches.

So, why don’t we really care about Climate Change? Because our innate evolutionary drive doesn’t favour the survival of our species but the propagation of our genes over those of other people. Mr Selfish Gene that codes for blue eyes would be absolutely overjoyed at the prospect of the complete eradication and annihilation of all other eye colour alleles. A nice population-level existential threat could be just the stroke of luck it needs to get ahead of its competitors.

It is worth noting that, for all the alarmism around Climate Change, very few people suggest that it would cause the extinction of the human race. Future archaeologists and anthropologists might look back on the 2100s as a significant evolutionary bottleneck where a small group of people (i.e. genes) were able to survive the catastrophe and spread unimpeded over a now vacant globe. For our selfish genes, the opportunity to be the few survivors, the founders of a new population, is too good to pass up.

We don’t care, because, at an evolutionary level, Climate Change is actually good news, a chance to form a genetic monopoly.

Game Theory

Game Theory is the branch of mathematics that focuses on assessing strategies and payoffs in competitive games. In this case, a game is just an interaction between two or more people, known as “players”.

Without getting into the mathematics of it we can still apply some basic understanding of Game Theory to everyday life. We can apply the understanding of strategies and payoffs to many common situations in an intuitive way that might explain some of the decisions we make.

Should we make personal sacrifices to slow Climate Change?

Let’s break down the game we’re playing with our fellow humans when we choose to take an international flight and use lots of carbon fuel while we’re cruising at 35,000 feet.

We, in this case, are a normal, run-of-the-mill person in the UK. We don’t have staunch opinions either way about Climate Change. We believe it’s happening and that humankind is speeding it up. What we’re a bit confused by, or ignorant of, is how fast this is happening and what the ultimate effects are going to be. We’re not convinced that species-level or even population-level collapse is likely. At least not in our lifetime.

The other “player” in this case, is everyone else. I’m sure JSO would agree, change will only occur if the majority of the population change their ways. It’s no good having a bunch of zealots deprive themselves of steak, cars, central heating and holidays if everyone else is going to carry on in their normal, despicable, sinful ways.

For the sake of simplicity, we’ll assume we only have two options: Go on holiday, Don’t go on holiday, or rather more generally: Make Personal Sacrifices to prevent Climate Change, Don’t Make Personal Sacrifices to prevent Climate Change. These are our strategies. What about our possible payoffs?

Going on holiday is great. It clears the mind, broadens the horizons and fills our lives with interesting stories. I think most would agree that travel enriches us. The other payoff in this case is the vague sense that we might be contributing to stopping Climate Change. And it is a vague sense, because even if we all made real personal sacrifices we probably wouldn’t personally see the results of our efforts and other agents may yet nullify our efforts anyway.

So, the game is played out with the following possible strategies and outcomes:

• We don’t make personal sacrifices, and neither does anyone else. We continue, business as usual. We enjoy our lives, travel, find true selves in a yoga retreat in rural India. Life is great. Yay. Sometime down the line, we may or may not be personally inconvenienced by Climate Change. But, we live in the UK. We’ll most likely be fine.

  Payoff: POSITIVE

• We make sacrifices but nobody else does (or at least, not enough to have an effect on Climate Change). In this case, we lose all of the positives of travel, and gain nothing in return. We might feel a little smug, but more likely we’ll feel aggrieved at our fellow humans, at our needless self-sacrifice and perhaps end up joining JSO and get on with making everyone else’s life a misery as well.

  Payoff: NEGATIVE

• We make sacrifices and everyone else does too. Nobody gets the benefits of travel. We all gain somewhat of a mental boost in believing that we’re doing the right thing, but, faced with the regular pain of sacrifice and the many desires left unsated, we begin to wonder whether it’s all worth it. Is Climate Change as bad as they said it would be?

  Payoff: NEUTRAL/SLIGHTLY NEGATIVE in the short term

  Obviously, there’s the possibility a large positive payoff in the long-term, contingent upon the accuracy of climate science. However, what we’d experience in this case is a maintenance of the status quo rather than some obvious positive benefit. We’d be avoiding a negative rather than gaining a positive. If we do it right, we’ll never experience Climate Change in full, never know the horrors it might have entailed, and therefore, never truly appreciate what we gained from our sacrifice.

• We don’t sacrifice, but everyone else does. Perfect! All the rewards and none of the downsides. Best of both worlds!

  Payoff: SIGNIFICANT POSITIVE in short and long-term

To use Game Theory terminology, our strategy of “Don’t Make Personal Sacrifices” strictly dominates the alternative strategy of “Make Personal Sacrifices”. Since choosing not to sacrifice gives us better outcomes regardless what everyone else does. It is the obvious strategic choice.

This analysis can be comfortably applied to other Climate Change-related situations. For example, the UK making significant sacrifices to go “net zero” while China continues to burn fossil fuels at their current rate. Here, again, not making sacrifices is the strictly dominant strategy.

• If we sacrifice and they don’t, we lose.

• If they sacrifice and we don’t, double win for us!

• If we sacrifice and they also sacrifice, it’s good, but we didn’t actually need to sacrifice if they were going to sacrifice. Our footprint is negligible compared to theirs.

• If we both don’t sacrifice, things go on as they are, and maybe something bad will happen. But to whom? Probably not us.

Antinatalism

Put simply, antinatalism is the broad view that bringing sentient beings into existence is a moral wrong. For the reader who hasn’t come across this idea before, I imagine a certain knee-jerk reaction is currently under way. How could it possibly be a moral wrong? Indeed, when I’ve mentioned this position to colleagues and friends I’m often met with incredulity over genuine interest. I’m no proponent, but the idea certainly warrants more analysis than a knee-jerk disgust response driven by our innate drive to reproduce.

For or an in-depth discussion of well-structured and compelling philosophical arguments, see David Benatar’s book, “Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming into Existence”.

Relevant to our discussion here is a branch of antinatalism known as ecological antinatalism. This view focuses on the irreversible harm that people do to the environment just by their very existence. This view has become common among those who are particularly alarmist about Climate Change. To them, bringing a human life into existence is a moral wrong because of the huge carbon footprint humans, on average, have.

I wholeheartedly disagree with this position. However, this isn’t the place to dissect that claim. Even if we accept their premise, we find ourself in a similar situation as we were when deciding whether to make personal sacrifices to stop Climate Change or not.

Indeed, here we find the intersection of Selfish Genes and Game Theory. Our selfish genes want to out compete other gene variants. Game Theory suggests that making personal sacrifices in aid of stopping Climate Change is a poor strategy. It is strictly dominated.

It is therefore both natural to allow others to make the sacrifice, and a better overall game strategy. We benefit from the sacrifices of others in that Climate Change is averted, and we also benefit from diminished genetic competition for our offspring. Win-Win.

Incidentally, it is worth noting that there is evidence that political beliefs are hereditary. In the case of antinatalism, it would seem that such a belief system, if driven by genes, would quickly select itself out of the gene pool. Such views, therefore, may not last into the next generation at all. At least, that’s if the vocal ecological antinatalists have the integrity to live by their own creed and put their money where their mouth is.

So what now?

I want to be clear, this is not an argument that we should ignore Climate Change, nor is it intended to undermine climate science or present a “climate-skeptic” view. In setting out the above, I hope to propose an explanation for our apparent apathy when it comes to Climate Change and other existential threats, to address the exasperation of JSO activists and perhaps hint that a different tack might be necessary.

At a fundamental level, we care about the propagation of our genes. Since Climate Change, as an existential threat, fails to offer us a good chance of 100% eradication of the entire species, we live with the optimistic view that it won’t affect us and that we’ll inherit the post-catastrophe world. We’ll be ok, and deep down, our selfish genes are rubbing their little hands together at the prospect of spreading over fresh new uninhabited lands.

Further, in the short term, the tangible payoffs of possible decisions drive selfish strategies, both genetic and material. Game Theory forces our hand. We feel we’re better off choosing to procreate and failing to make other personal sacrifices. We might even commend those that choose to martyr themselves, but ultimately, we think their efforts will come to nothing. We just don’t believe enough people will sacrifice to have the desired effect, and even they did, we’d make the apt strategic choice to let everyone else sacrifice for us. Until we can be sure that our sacrifice will have tangible outcomes for ourselves or our kin, I’m not sure we’ll be sufficiently motivated to act.

Are we dooming ourselves? Maybe. But it seems that’s a gamble we’re willing to take.

Thanks for reading! As ever, I’d love to hear your thoughts, be they in agreement or abject disagreement.

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