To me, the gene’s-eye view is one of the best thinking tools we have. But like with all tools, you will get the most out of it if you know what it was designed to do.
aeon.co/essays/why-t...
Arvid Ågren
tl;dr: There never was a paradox of the organism. It was just a mistake about genes. But genetic conflicts do occur and are fascinating.
This is also an invitation: if you like the selfish-gene idea, I'd love to hear why. What biological reality does the metaphor capture?
Philip Ball
I have read and enjoyed The Paradox of the Organism by @arvidagren.bsky.social and Manus Patten. I had a lot of thoughts about it, and about selfish genes. Here they are, in a long blog post.
homunculusmusic.wordpress.com/2026/05/30/i...
Philip Ball
I’m reading The Paradox of the Organism, a set of collected essays on this notion edited by Arvid Ågren and Manus M. Patten. It’s tremendously enlightening. It is also pretty consistent with the st…
