Suckers, Cheaters and Grudgers

            Throughout chapter 12 Dawkins carefully explains and analyzes a game called Prisoner’s dilemma. The game consists on having to options: either choosing to cooperate or to defect with your opponent/partner, none of the players may see the action chosen beforehand and therefore they must wait until the turn ends. If both cooperate then each receives an equal reward, if both defect each receives a lesser reward or even a punishment. However if one defects and the other chooses to cooperate, the one who defected earns a greater reward than if both cooperated and the one who foolishly cooperated gets the worst reward or punishment. Through this game Dawkins analyzed human behavior and selfishness using various scenarios. For instance, let’s take the prisoner’s one: if two men have been accused of murder but not enough evidence has been collected all the authorities may rely on is that both suspects tell on each other. Before they can make any agreement each is brought to the interrogation room separately,  as the interrogation develops both men betray each other and present substantial evidence that gets them both heavily convicted. This would be an example of a double defection in the game. Had the two men chosen to cooperated with each other the sentence would have been a much more lenient one. Yet, as explained by the selfish gene theory we instinctively think of our wellbeing alone and how we might get betrayed. Not only is this the natural reaction because we might be saving ourselves by blaming everything on the other guy, but because if we cooperate and he defects, he will be saved and I the one who cooperated will get the worst conviction.

            We played this game in class after reading the chapter. Although not as intense as manipulating a conviction, we took to another level by putting our own grade at risk. We would be given five rounds to play, if one cooperated and the other defected the “traitor” got a .5 bump, if both cooperated each earned a .3 bump and if both defected a .1 deduction would take place. When the preliminaries begun, since our grade was not at risk we did not betray each other and played more freely and my partner and I were loyal to each other. Nonetheless, when the finals took place things changed completely. Logically, the best option would have been to cooperate on all the five rounds so each would get a significant increase, but our selfishness came into play. None of the finals round proceeded without one defect. In fact, the first round were five straight double defections, the following two had one player who betrayed the other on the fourth or fifth round. Just like in the scenario we had no way of making an agreement to ensure we wouldn’t naively be cheated through defection, so most of us fell to temptation.

            This game impeccably portrays society and the way many partnerships end up breaking up due to mistrust. Ideally, both parties could equally benefit from the agreement and end up as winners. But we always want more, or in some cases to do less. If we somehow may manage to do less work and earn equal recognition we will do it, or less work and more rewards we will do it as well. Simple selfish gene theory. This where being a sucker, grudger and a cheaters comes into play. A person who would constantly choose to cooperate regardless of being cheated continuously, will unequivocally be exploited and never benefit. Cheaters would lose their partners’ trust as soon as they cheat them once, the grudger effect will finish them off and neither will receive the benefits. Either option will result in detrimentally for at least one party involved. Rationally, the best option would be to cooperate as much as possible, but society simple does not work that way and cheaters end up winning all the time. Even grudgers who know they might get cheated again, may trust a cheater repeatedly to save an enterprise or an important investment. This game accurately simulates conflictive decision making and how temptation may overpower goodwill, even at a “friend’s” expense.

Altruism, Magnanimity, Selflessness, They Are All Not Happening

In this Chapter Dawkins proposes several theories on the evolution of species and how animals such as ants and birds have developed as societies. In every example of the animal kingdom Dawkins cleverly proved his point and defended his selfish gene theory. For instance, when certain organism give alarm calls to the rest of the group, the theory states “genes have to come up with a convincing advantage of giving alarm calls which is big enough to counteract this danger (of being spotted and eaten by the predator)” (169). In every case presented the theory was proven right and apparently nature has no space for self-sacrificing beings, at least not if they intend to transmit their genetic information. After all what would a survival machine be for if it willingly sacrifices itself for the benefit of another.

            As the chapter develops Dawkins presents a complex situation that may serve as a starting point for our capacities to deceive. In Dawkins scenario, a population is composed a species that behaves in three distinct patters: indiscriminant helpers, those who get help but don’t help back and those who help everyone except those who denied them help. The first are called Suckers, the latter Cheaters and the last Grudgers. It is very easy to compare these behaviors with our daily life where we meet many people who get our help, but do not help us when we need it or not as much as we expected they would. In fact, it relates very closely to our society where very commonly partnerships do not work, since one partner may be doing everything while the other does nothing. In the real world that can be a problem if it gets known you “cheat” on those who help you, or you simply never work. It is the hard workers who know who to work and avoid being “cheated”, who ideally should succeed the most. At least, that is how it works in nature or how it did with the Suckers, the Cheaters and the Grudges. The first died exploited by the Cheaters who never paid their favors, yet when the Cheaters no longer had their naïve relatives around Grudgers refused to help and eventually Cheaters got extinct as well. Ultimately, in nature it is no use being indiscriminately altruistic, or indiscriminately selfish. Because the Grudges are selfish nonetheless, as they feel the necessity to remove a poisonous parasite in the future, in Dawkins specific scenario, is more important than the energy they waste helping a “partner” who has it at the present time. It is all a cost versus gain relationship. The genes will always thrive for the most gain at the least expense to propagate themselves. That’s what all “the selfish gene theory” is about.

     Moreover, Dawkins defines the relationship employed by Grudgers, and other organisms such as cleaner fish with other big fish as symbiosis. A relationship where two species or two organisms from the same species benefit mutually, or reciprocal altruism as explained in the above paragraph. Dawkins explains that possibly our brains’ complexity revolves around the idea of symbiotic relationships. That feelings like “envy, gratitude, guilt, sympathy” came from natural selection to avoid being cheated, cheat more effectively or not to be confused with a cheat (188). This hypothesis implies many things, one of the most impacting ones is that ultimately our brain’s great processing is: without being cheated, to cheat as much as possible and without being caught cheating. So as cheaters got more effective, so did Grudgers at recognizing them; hence slowly each organism got more sophisticated at getting the most out of reciprocal altruism. This hypothesis contradicts the “ideal society” proposal or that of a good community, where everyone knows that may help everyone without getting cheated. However, someone always takes advantage of what will be called today “Suckers”, yet if no altruism exists inevitably our societies will collapse. If trust cannot be developed in things as sensitive as representation then a country may not function well, if reciprocal altruism does not exist then the whole structure on which we live cannot function properly. For instance, a President has the responsibility to meet his country’s needs if he takes advantage of his power to enrich himself then the country won’t progress. Resulting in the overall detriment of the community; altruism or at least reciprocal altruism are essential to the survival of our species. 

Selfishness, Immortality, Genes and Senility

Dawkins defines a good gene as a “replicator” with the characteristics of longevity, fecundity and copying fidelity. If the genes possess these traits then it is likely to attain immortality through its copies or the replicas it has made during its existence in its survival machine. By having favorable or effective cooperation with its environment then the gene may live for hundreds of millions of years, the nearest as it gets to immortality. Dawkins also adds to these set of necessary traits the idea of being selfish; you do not worry for the other genes’ survival but your own. The alleles which also inhabit the survival machines are the “mortal rivals” and a gene cannot afford to be altruistic and sacrifice itself for the benefit of others; hence a good gene that will live long enough is a selfish one. These immortal coils can only become so if the set of factors for their survival machine is correctly developed, if not enough food is present or if one is unlucky enough to be “strike by a lighting” then the process of replication will not be completed. The trait of selfishness, implies a “gene is the basic unit of selfishness”; an indispensable trait if survival is intended. I was amazed by this explanation, since we have always been taught to help others whenever we can expecting nothing in return, yet as explained by Dawkins it goes against our most basic form of self.

            I founded fascinating how Dawkins explained that our mortality at a certain age occurs because off spring were conceived before lethal genes came into action. So by the time we are eighty or so they activate themselves and ultimately we die of old age. Senility occurs because we inherited the lethal genes that triggered it from our ancestors who had children before the gene actually killed him. Dawkins uses Sir Peter Medawar’s definition to explain and catalog genes that kill us at out “old age” as semi-lethal and lethal genes that act not at our youth, but in most cases after we have reproduced and thus passed them onto our children.  

            These hypothesis leaves space for a much vast and longer human existence if it were correct. Dawkins gives us two ways that we may achieve it. First, one must understand we die at a certain age because late action genes take effect at that moment, had we not inherit them from our parents then we would live longer. If we could eliminate those genes from a population’s gene pool then slowly the average life expectancy would increase. But in order to do so a minimal age for sexual reproduction must be established, so that the people who are going to die before forty do so and do not pass their late genes into the next generation. Dawkins explains that if we follow this “minimum age limit” the life span of humanity may last centuries.

            The other way follows a more complex chemical process and not a social system. In this case doctors would have to identify the properties that young bodies have and institute them in older bodies, so that the late semi lethal and lethal genes are not activated. Overall avoiding death. But as explained in the book, this process would be incredibly complicated as substance “S” might simply come from lettuce, yet if it accumulates over time and triggers a “late-acting deleterious gene” doctors might classify it as a mortal substance. So it is not as easy as it may seem creating a more lasting human species. Plus it will take a couple centuries changing the life span so that the late lethal action genes disappear from the gene pool our species use. However, perhaps one day we may use the second form and reinvigorate the old bodies into more youthful ones.

             

Reflections and Reflections

The Great Khan stops sending Marco Polo on missions, and now the two listen to each other as the merchant develops new cities through chess pieces. Marco Polo adeptly teaches the conqueror details are essential and that only by looking at wood many things may be learned. In one occasion, Marco Polo quickly identifies traces in the wood used for the chessboard as indications of severe winters or droughts. He also finds the techniques used to cut the trees down, with these observations Kublai Khan slowly learns the importance of details. A value many of us do not appreciate correctly.

            One day, after many games were played Kublai states he lost the purpose of the game and could no longer understand why they still played them. Through this games he arrived to what he calls “the definitive conquest”, this conclusion argued his “empire’s multiform treasures were only illusory envelopes…nothingness” (123). Kublai has come to accept the fact that knowledge is above any material possession. That the richness he holds as the Khan of the largest empire at the time, is not within the treasures he receives from ambassadors, but at the details of each new place. Additionally, he seems to understand Kings and Empires would come and go, and just like in chess when a King falls nothing remains. That is what his Empire is: nothingness.

            As the end approaches Marco Polo declares a very important truth: “It is not the voice that commands the story: it is the ear” (135). Meaning that, it is not the person who tells the story who controls it, but the individual hearing it, since he is the one who interprets it and learns it through his own perspective. Humans tend to neglect the truth they hear for their personal convenience; as a result a story that may originate from the same source may have dozens of different sides to it. Ideally, details should be kept intact, so that way the truth does so as well. Which leads Marco Polo to declare it is does differences that enable someone to entirely comprehend a city and hence life itself. It is “that assortment of qualities which are like the letters in a name” that ensure one has gotten the true meaning of a place (137). Moreover, this quality allows the atlas to predict the form of future cities and its successors, like New Amsterdam that will later become New York and shapeless cities like Kyoto-Osaka, also find their place in the atlas.

            In the final pages the merchant and the conqueror discuss their final question, what to do next? Marco Polo wants to create the perfect city through recompilations of other ones until equilibrium is attained. However, Kublai Khan wanders if they are all going to hell, since that seems to be the way they are getting to: “the infernal city” (165). But Marco Polo tells him that there can only be one inferno for the living, “the inferno where we live in”, an inferno that seems inescapable to most (165). For most live a life of complacency and embrace the hell they dwell. Others, very few and who work very hard not to be part of hell, are the ones who must “endure and be given space”, these are not part of the inferno and face very difficult tasks not to be so (165).  

Wait, What?

As the story develops the talks become more intriguing and ambiguous. It seems as if the two men never existed and they not only talk of cities that resemble only one: Venice, but also how their whole discussions cannot be true. Calvino slowly provides the reader with constant conversations where the conqueror and the merchant doubt everything they’ve discussed and how their whole existence is but a mere illusion. Marco Polo evaluates the impossibility of his feats as Kublai Khan tells him its not possible for one man to have traveled so much. Marco Polo replies “everything I see and do assumes meaning in a mental space…when I concentrate and reflect I find myself in this garden” basically not only has he dreamed every single visit, but he made them up based on one city (103). At this point nothing that has occurred actually makes sense, and I feel irritated by how poor did Marco Polo back up his stories. These even state that their “garden of thought” only exists in their minds and that each never stopped “from raising dust on the fields of battle; and I, from bargaining for sacks of pepper in distant bazaars” (103). The conversations have deteriorated to such a state both talkers hallucinate about their state of none reality. Further on Kublai Khan states: “we have proved that if we were here, we would not be”, Calvino has narrated many dubious events, but how does this conflictive conclusion helps the reader understand the book’s theme I do not know (118). I can only hope to read on and find more facts.

Dreams on Cities on Dreams

Once one understands the origins of all the cities, little by little I could decipher the magic behind each. The invisible cities Marco Polo describes depict a dream or some sort of fantastical location that could only be found in someone’s imagination.  For instance, the city of Zobeide was founded upon a dream. All the men who come do so because they all dreamed the same thing. Who has not dreamed of a place which reunites people that have suffered similar occurrences, and then shape the city according to what they share in common. Since a lady escaped their grasp in the dream they built “an ugly city, a trap”, so that whenever the girl will appear she will have nowhere to go (46). Zobeide shows how significant dreams are to our reality and how influential they may become if everyone shares them. Zobeide develops, grows, and lives because of a dream some men had in common.

            Hypatia is a city where the meaning of words was mixed and hence its purposes as well. Marco Polo narrates how he was trapped by the common meaning of words and could not find the proper signs to meet his desires. Although desires are what he searches for, the city falls into the category of signs and cities, since the signs are what leads him to what he wants. He seems to be lost until a philosopher states “sings form a language, but not the one you think you know”, that Marco Polo realizes he must “free himself from the images…in the past” only that way he would understand the images in Hypatia (48). This city reflects the mixture of language and its meanings. Perhaps, either Kublai Khan or Marco Polo dreamed of a place where everything was not what it appeared to be. This city plays with reality and how signs may completely deviate one from its objective if not interpreted correctly. Something I like to do, picturing what would happen if bathroom meant auditorium instead of bathroom.

            The city of Armilla follows a more mythical environment where nothing ordinary exits but “water pipes that rise vertically where the houses should be and spread out horizontally where the floors should be” (49). This city was not designed for humans but for nymphs who “in the morning you hear them singing”, happy because of the watery gifts the architects of Armilla gave them. Just like the previous cities either the Venetian or the conqueror imagined themselves visiting a city not inhabited by humanity, but by a different species and therefore Armilla was created. Yet, out of all the other cities mentioned above, this one was the one that helped me the most understand how Calvino forms each one. For very few people would deny Armilla’s magnificence and the incredibly relationship its citizens share with it. It all seems as if were part of a dream.

            At first, I was very confused with the way Calvino presents his cities, however it was a matter of using a more symbolical perspective to understand the city’s themes. Using my own dreams helped me connect the dots when figuring out how cities like Armillam Hypatia and Zobeide came to be. 

A Talk with No Words

            Marco Polo’s descriptions and private talks with Kublai Khan are but creations of his mind. Each of them develop their ideas throughout dreams and pondering what will the other or himself think if he were asked a certain question. Calvino’s complex creation is exposed in chapter two while “Marco Polo could explain or imagine explaining or be imagined explaining or succeed finally in explaining to himself”, it seems every response or description somehow originates from the mind and stays within it (28). This sentence explains how very different the memoirs written in this book are, since both men form them through their imagination. They even “imagine themselves being interrupted” for the sake of the conversation.  At first, I found this relationship quite absurd, since it implied all descriptions originated in some kind of made up discussion. However, as I read on I understood the purpose of each of the cities. In one of the imaginary talks Marco Polo declares “cities like dreams, are made of desires and fears” and “everything imaginable can be dreamed” (44). So apparently what these two men have been doing is sharing their long forgotten dreams or they most covered up fears through the creation of sometimes imaginary conversations and most importantly the cities they envision in them. These truths explain the existence of cities such as Fedora where all its alternative existences are replicated in small crystal balls. Who would not like to see the future version of the city he lives in recorded in a crystal ball forever to be admired, these types of cities represent the dreams these two great men have created in theirs travels. Additionally, Marco Polo argues that the beauty of a city is not its wonders but the “answers it gives” or the “questions it asks” (44). Marco Polo slowly teaches the Great Khan to appreciate a city not by its physical aspects, but by the emotional reactions it creates, that is a city’s inner purpose.

            

             Moreover, if it were not enough with having imaginary conversations based on somewhat fictitious cities Calvino makes these talks wordless. Even when the venetian merchant learns the Tartars languages, he only gives the Khan “the fundamental information” in words, while transmitting everything else through “objects…gestures, leaps, cries… or animal sounds” (39). It would not make sense to have this envoy as the only source of intelligence regarding a certain area, but the inaccuracy of the messages was what the Khan loved about them. The Khan later explains one “could wander through them in though, become lost, stop and enjoy the cool air, or run off”: the ambiguousness of Marco Polo’s cities allows them to travel the past, and their lost futures (38).   

A conqueror, a merchant and some other cities

Invisible cities are the distinct stories a stranger brings to a great conqueror who knows nothing about his empire. Apparently, he has grown fond of this man who seems to capture the essence of each of the cities he visits. Marco Polo, the Venetian merchant, breaks each city in rather symbolic ways where a city may be “a honeycomb in whose cells each of us can place the things he wants to remember” or where “gods live in buckets that rise” (15)(20). Accompanied by the descriptions, complications are also numbered. On the first, since everything is used to successfully remember everything the city has “disappeared”. Because it needed to stay the same so it could be remembered, Zora, the city that reminds you of everything was forgotten. How ironic is that. Additionally, Marco Polo tells of a city that when you get on a camel it reminds of a boat, and when you get on a boat it reminds you of a camel. Here, he portrays the contrasting perspectives visitors may have regarding the same city. Each of them desired the opposite. Each “see Despina, a border city between two deserts” may it be water or sand you travel, you will desire what the other brings. Clearly, he wants to redefine the concept of what a city truly is through a number of categories. The city falls into one category based on the reactions it evokes on the traveler or the most quintessential characteristics it holds. For instance, Calvino defines Zirma as a city of repeated signs, so that at least one will create an impact. He then concludes “memory is redundant” because it repeats the city signs so that the city truly exists (19). Just as the previous descriptions of cities, Zirma forces Calvino to expose a paradoxical truth where “the city is redundant”, because it repeats itself to be remembered (19). These remarks make no sense, but that is the purpose: force the reader to evaluate the complexity of cities and the different relations we share with them. Since one man may view the same sign over and over in the city, while another might simply be seeing the same sign over and over again in his mind.

Marco Polo’s descriptions of the cities are immensely varied and not very straightforward. However he always ends with some solid insight regarding the nature of the city or the most probable reaction it will bring on its visitors. Calvino demands a lot of thinking from his reader, although I have not truly made a conclusion about the descriptions he makes. I will dare say he wants the reader to understand the impact engineering has on the human mind and how the human mind plays with the surroundings as well.

            Marco Polo’s relation to The Great Khan is no less complicated. His descriptions are transmitted through physical movements or animal sounds, for he does not speak Tartar. Yet, Marco Polo became his favorite ambassador, he illustrates cities in ways his other diplomats had never tried to. Where the others saw “famine, extortion, conspiracies…” Marco Polo portrays “the gaze of a man meditating, lost in thought” (27). He argues that even if the Khan rides through all of his empire, if he keeps the orthodox mind of an ambassador he will only see the same things. Marco Polo thinks he comprehends the origins and functions of cities. On the other hand, The Great Khan seems lost in the insurmountable territory his controls. He truly wishes to understand it, but he knows it might be impossible to do so. Calvino takes us into the mind of a traveler discussing with a conqueror, who seeks the knowledge to correctly control his empire. 

A Philosophical Ending

“We must go and work in the garden” those are the final words of our hero Candide, and with that phrase Voltaire concludes his satirical piece. I would say he finishes off taking practice of the philosophy that finally granted happiness to his characters: not worrying too much and focusing one’s life in one and only one activity and improving one’s skills for it. In this case he did not give the reader an ultimate maxim to live their life and defy society, but gave them an ambiguous one where the characters are happy, or at least seem to be. However, the recovery of each from the previous state of extreme boredom and lethargy to extreme work does not take all the evil from the world away. I would say that Voltaire suggests that one cannot live ignoring the calamities others experience, even if one is already happy. Candide’s well being is a temporary situation that will soon change when he decides to make the difference and actually make his world the best of all possible words. Not through naïve endeavors, not through stupid actions, not by hoping for the best, but actually making the best happen. I would say Voltaire’s final message is not that we are eternally condemned to suffer from our evil nature or that to avoid harm we shall work incessantly and never question the ways things occur, but to confront our reality and do our best to change it. For it is immensely ironic for a thinker such as Voltaire to say work and think about nothing and you shall be happy, I’d say he meant the exact opposite. Hence, after relentlessly attacking his current society there is no way he would let them go that easily, I would say Voltaire invites his reader to reflect and act upon the great problems of life instead of ignoring them. 

From Happinnes to Tragedy, From Riches to Paris and Innocence Just Along the Way

            In a previous post I made myself the question of whether or not Candide would learn the lesson of thinking before acting and not blindly trusting everyone. Unfortunately, for Candide he did not. He kept on making the same senseless mistakes throughout the story, just like when he bargains the price of a trip to Europe with the Dutch Captain who continuously keeps raising the price to huge amounts. Eventually they agreed on thirty thousand piastres no idea of what currency that is, but it sure does sounds as a large amount. Candide then leaves the source of his riches at the hands of the Captain, as the Dutch “watched his opportunity” so “He set his sails, raised anchor, and the wind favored him” robbing Candide of his last two sheep and their respective riches (88-89). Desperate Candide then turns to a Judge for justice and all he does is charging for knocking on his door and then listening to the hearings. Obviously, Voltaire is trying to expose the hard and unfair world humanity has created and how the most innocent and good of individuals are the ones who suffer the most. When Candide talks with Martin his new scholar friend he argues the world has fallen to some “mischievous power” as Martin states he has seen “a million regimented assassins surge from one end of Europe to the other committing murder and brigandage in strictest discipline” (92). Voltaire through Martin’s words shows the reader the state of eternal conflict humans embrace, how we somehow let evil take over us and let the poor suffer from it.

           

            I just like Candide have many times felt I was used and in some way tricked, however I’ve learned from my mistakes and have become more suspicious of “friendly” strangers. Not only because in many cases they just seek to exploit you, but because they always end up gaining your trust and then betraying you. I believe Voltaire’s point in these episodes is that humans must learn to either be good and fair with everyone, or to be smart enough not to trust everyone you encounter.

            Furthermore, when Candide arrives in Paris and then suddenly becomes sick Martin expresses a great truth when he states “I remember being ill myself during my first visit to Paris. I was very poor. But I had no friends, no ladies, and no doctors, so I soon recovered” (97). Like Candide I too have suffered the consequences of being in bad company, in many cases it is better to be alone than with those who pretend to be nice with you for their own benefit. In this case since Martin was poor no one came to his aid when he was ill, on the other hand there was Candide who is now rich and pestered by false friendships. Society’s hypocrisy is now being attacked. Even as Candide recovers he is surprised that when betting with his friends “he never held an ace in his hand, but Martin was not surprised”, clearly Martin knew the evils of Parisians as he himself had experienced it once (98). Nonetheless, Voltaire’s attack of the French society does not stop there as Martin then explains the double faced nature of the people of Paris how “every possible contradiction and inconsistency would be found in the government, the law courts, the churches, and in the whole life of this absurd nation” (100). An accurate description of what used to be France before the Revolution came or any other nation ruled by autocratic regimes. How everyone in power would do everything to stay in it or acquire some more, in any case it was the common man or the naïve ones such as Candide who faced the problems of that kind of system.  

We Call Them Words

Precipice: A cliff with a vertical, nearly vertical, or overhanging face.

Brigands: A bandit, especially one of a band of robbers in mountain or forest regions.

Skewered: Long pin of wood or metal for inserting through meat or other food to hold or bind it in cooking.

Brocade: Fabric woven with an elaborate design, especially one having a raised overall pattern.

Garnish: To provide or supply with something ornamental; adorn; decorate.

Parakeets: Any of numerous small, slender parrots, usually having a long, pointed, graduated tail, often kept as pets and noted for theability to mimic speech: several species are endangered.

Luscious: Richly satisfying to the senses or the mind.

Vie: To strive in competition or rivalry with another; contend for superiority.

Equerry: An officer of a royal or similar household, charged with the care of the horses.

Indefatigable: Incapable of being tired out; not yielding to fatigue; untiring.

Garments: An outer covering or outward appearance.

Lavish: Expended, bestowed, or occurring in profusion.

Hoisting: To raise or lift, especially by some mechanical appliance.