Survival of the Fittest?

Fathom

What is meant by "Survival of the Fittest?" Coined by Herbert Spencer. Erroneously attributed to Darwin. Misinterpreted by Andrew Carnegie as Spencer's Social Darwinism. Used to justify unbridled and unrepentant capitalism. Alternatively, was Spencer's "Survival of the Fittest" a variation of liberal utilitarianism? "Liberty of each, limited by the like liberty of all, is the rule in conformity with which society must be organized." There was utility in liberty. Providing the best for both the individual and society. Thoughts? Elaborations? Criticisms?

Peregrinus

In Darwinian biological terms, it refers to reproductive fitness. The individuals that are best adapted to successful reproduction will pass their traits on to the next generation more effectively that others, and over time those traits will come to dominate the species. Note that it only operates with respect to traits that confer, or are linked to, reproductive advantage. So, for example, in the human species a genetic predisposition to failing sight in later years, or to senile dementia, won't be eliminated by natural selection/survival of the fittest, because by the time these traits manifest themselves you've already done all the reproducing you are going to do. So "fitness" in this context is a jargon term for "capacity for reproduction"; it has nothing to do with general concepts of physical fitness.

Darwin called this phenomenon "natural selection". As you point out, the term "survival of the fittest" was coined by Herbert Spencer, though he did coin it specifically to refer to Darwin's mechanism of natural selection, and Darwin liked the term and later adopted and used it himself.

Spencer did, however, expand it beyond biology. He had an expansive concept of "evolution" as involving the progressive development not just of biological organisms but of the human mind, culture, societies, etc. There, I think it's fair to say, he was straying more into philosophy than natural science. At the time - the late nineteenth century - his ideas were hugely popular since they offered an optimistic view of humanity and its destiny that did not depend on religion. Faith in his ideas collapsed in the 20th century - it was difficult to believe in the inevitable perfection of the human race after seeing the trenches in Flanders, and impossible after seeing the Holocaust. Soencer's ideas also, of course, became associated with social darwinism, where "survival of the fittest" was often take or used to suggest moral fitness, racial superiority, etc, and this too has contributed to their eclipse.

In our own time there's a completely different application of Darwinian thinking to the field of the human mind in meme theory. The suggestion is that ideas exist only in people's minds, and the most "successful" ideas will be those which are best adapted to "reproduce" by communicating themselves from mind to mind. But I don't think anybody employs the "survival of the fittest" term in talking about meme theory, which perhaps is an indication of how poisoned the term has become.

Joe1919

There is a possible fallacy called 'The Appeal to nature fallacy' which arises when we infer something is good because it is natural, or something is bad because it is unnatural. So to say that 'survival of the fittest' is natural does not infer that it is good or that we 'ought' to encourage the fittest to survive etc.

This is similar to David Hume's is/ought distinction or Moore's 'naturalistic fallacy' i.e just because the fittest seem to survive does not imply that this ought to be the case when it comes to social policy, law etc.
http://lucidphilosophy.com/appeal-to-nature-fallacy/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Is%E2%80%93ought_problem

nozzferrahhtoo

Peregrinus wrote: »

Note that it only operates with respect to traits that confer, or are linked to, reproductive advantage.

Purely for the sake of extreme pedantry and little else I would add to that a little and suggest it is not "Only" those.

Some traits are neutral in that regard, and are therefore invisible to the machinations of Natural Selection..... and so manage to evolve into the species or be reproduced from generation to generation, despite conferring no reproductive advantage at all to the host.

Other times we can even select for traits NEGATIVE to reproductive advantage if in fact the trait somehow gets associated with or linked with another trait that itself is selected FOR. The traits are, let us use the word "adjacent", and the pathway to evolve out the negative trait without loss of quality of the positive trait is too complex for the random elements of Natural Selection to hit upon.

But certainly what "Survival of the Fittest" does NOT mean, which some people (no one on this thread so far) think it does is that you have to be better at things than others. Bigges, stronger, faster, more intelligent or whatever.

In fact being WORSE at some things can be more reproductively advantageous if, for example, being better at it consumes more energy in an energy limited environment........... or if the vagaries of Sexual Selection actually select for worse versions of it (the usual example given for this one is the larger and more fabulous plummage in peacocks is selected FOR by the female, but actually makes the male slower, less flexible, more energy dependent and so forth).

"survival of the fittest" is very much to be "fit" in the environment you find yourself in. It is environment dependent.

If there is a sudden change in the environment in which an organism operates..... you can suddenly flip it so the previously fittest individuals are now the least fit, and vice versa. Suddenly the biggest, fastest, strongest individual may in fact find themselves at the bottom of the list of who is "fit".

An example of that are the organisms who are now in dark cave like environments, who are evolving away from eyes or now have vestigial or no eyes where their ancestors had working eyes.

Many people might think "Seeing is better than not seeing, so therefore sight means you are always fitter". But in fact having the ability of sight where sight confers no advantage makes you LESS fit in that environment as eyes require energy, and are a vulnerability locus for injury and attack and infection and so forth. So a trait that at first glance might seem better to have, than not have, may in fact fail an evolutionary cost-benefit analysis of maintaining it.

Fathom

Does Spencer's "survival of the fittest" exhibit retrospective determinism? Coined by Henri Bergson. Fallacy: "It happened so it was bound to happen."

CerebralCortex

Joe1919 wrote: »

There is a possible fallacy called 'The Appeal to nature fallacy' which arises when we infer something is good because it is natural, or something is bad because it is unnatural. So to say that 'survival of the fittest' is natural does not infer that it is good or that we 'ought' to encourage the fittest to survive etc.

This is similar to David Hume's is/ought distinction or Moore's 'naturalistic fallacy' i.e just because the fittest seem to survive does not imply that this ought to be the case when it comes to social policy, law etc.
http://lucidphilosophy.com/appeal-to-nature-fallacy/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Is%E2%80%93ought_problem

Knowing the rules of the game doesn't mean you want to play it, that's how I'd phrase it.