Mary Midgley is an English philosopher whose latest book, The Solitary Self [978-1-84465-253-2], develops a case she has laid out in previous books. I first read Mary Midgley in her Science and Poetry, which was so clear, readable and thought-provoking. In that book, she argued that the concept of atomism when applied equally to the parts of a person and to individuals within society didn’t make sense. She develops that argument here in a brilliantly focused attack on neo-Darwinists such as Dawkins, who, she argues, have reduced Darwin’s thought to the principle of survival of the fittest. Dawkins’ Selfish Gene being a classic example of such a world view – the world view that competition and fighting for individual advantage is the way of Nature, the way of human beings, and the way society should be run. The values they promote are the values of selfishness. She elaborates in detail, quoting from Darwin’s own writings, how humans are actually intensely social creatures.
In fact, you can’t reduce Mary Midgley’s arguments to simple sound-bites in the way the neo-Darwinists like to promote their ideas. This is because she completely accepts the complexity of life, and the inescapable conflicts at the heart of every human being.
I think this little book is terrific at putting the case for an understanding of the importance of collaboration, as much neglected in recent decades. She is also very strong on the irrationality of using reductionism to try to explain complex wholes –
One way and another, then, it emerges that, in general, the reductive thinking that theorizes about large-scale behaviour from analogy with the behaviour of small parts is not reliable or scientific.
Here’s one paragraph from her book, which I think, really does capture her most important argument.
All this later became part of a much wider campaign, conducted by thinkers such as Nietzsche and the existentialists, to exalt freedom above all other ideals, isolating modern individuals in pure and heroic independence. Like all such one-sided advice, this campaign ignores crucial aspects of our nature. It assumes that we are independent items, isolated brains, intelligent billiard balls that need no sustenance and could choose to live anywhere. But we are actually earthly organisms, framed to interact continually with the complex ecosystems of which we are a tiny part. For us, bonds, are not just awkward restraints. They are lifelines. Although we all need some solitude and some independence, total isolation is for us a desolate and meaningless state. In fact, it is about the worst thing that can happen to us.
Heroes Not Zombies 
This post misrepresents the views of Richard Dawkins. He in no way advocates selfishness in The Selfish Gene or anywhere (in fact he advocates the opposite in his works). He merely attempts to explain biology. What other people do with the exposition he gives isn’t down to him.
hmm….well I understand why you say that, Martin. Dawkins does indeed say we should strive to create collaboration and working together but he does it from the basis of a world view based on a concept of our “nature” as being individualistic, separate and driven by competition ie selfishness. Doesn’t a world view create the conditions for particular expositions? I don’t think you can say that his promulgation of the view that by nature we are selfish has got nothing to do with those who go on to actually advocate that we construct society on the basis of that understanding of our “nature”.
What Mary Midgley explores is exactly this point, but more than that, she challenges the bias that the neo-Darwinists show towards “survival of the fittest” whilst downplaying or even ignoring Darwin’s understanding of the essential social nature of human beings.
[…] reminded me of Mary Midgely‘s superb “Science and Poetry” – one of my favourite philosophy books. […]