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The Cooperation Instinct

This article explains how even though in todays world, everybody is trying to make it the top, everybody is still helping each other as an instinct that is common among other species as well. We as well as some animals are considered “eusocial” species which are those that live in highly connected structures inhabited by many generations at once. Since we are eusocial, our species tend to look after each other in various situations. Bill Hamilton mathematically calculated how likely human beings will collaborate with each other. It started a long time ago when people would kill themselves or sacrifice their lives so that their DNA or family genes will move on. This theory became known as inclusive fitness. Many scientists studied his theory and made many different observations involving the importance of collaboration. Nowak believed that cooperation was the reason for evolution of humans and was more important than collaboration. Nowak was challenged with the prisoner’s dilemma by Karl Sigmund in which he loved because this theory was a mathematical way to observe human behavior. This theory that involved the choice between cooperation and selfishness gave Nowak a way to study more on the positives and negatives of cooperation with human beings and their interaction with each other. Nowak was so fascinated by this game, he and Sigmund worked for a long time on the different possibilities of the prisoner’s dilemma. It was finally concluded after hundreds of computerized rounds that the winning strategy was called Tit for Tat. This simply means that someone will more likely do something nice for that person if they have helped them previously on something else. This is the case for humans as well as animals as well. Nowak and Sigmund went into further studying of cooperation but aimed towards evolution instead. Some scientists explained how virtual tournaments we’re not as realistic and don’t exactly replicate the cooperation and

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