Intergroup competition shifts populations toward self-sacrificial cooperation

Evidence

Modern evolutionary models of human cooperation support Darwin’s intuition: when the forces of intergroup competition are nonexistent or weak, self-interested behavior typically thrives. But as intergroup competition intensifies, strategies that suppress self-interest for the common good win out. Thus, the particular mixture of self-interested and self-sacrificial tendencies we find in a population partly depends on that population’s exposure to intergroup conflict. — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 462

Modern evolutionary models of human cooperation support Darwin’s intuition: when the forces of intergroup competition are nonexistent or weak, self-interested behavior typically thrives. But as intergroup competition intensifies, strategies that suppress self-interest for the common good win out. Thus, the particular mixture of self-interested and self-sacrificial tendencies we find in a population partly depends on that population’s exposure to intergroup conflict. As Scott Atran explains, seemingly irrational tendencies make for stronger groups that can outdo their more rational, self-interested rivals: It is not difficult to see why groups formed for purely rational reasons can be more vulnerable to collapse: Background conditions change, and it might make sense to abandon one group in favor of another… — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 462

Categorization

• XREF: Central mechanism for the reader’s analytical frame: costly signals and group solidarity scale with external threat — parallel to how Japanese authorities weaponized visible apostasy during persecution. — connects to: Intergroup competition selects prosocial norms that can simultaneously dehumanize outsiders. — Joseph Henrich, The Secret of Our Success: How Culture…, 558; Resource scarcity shifts evolutionary success from competition toward cooperation — Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom,…, 1048; Addressing top-bottom resource inequality can dissolve identity-based intergroup competition. — Nurit Shnabel and Johannes Ullrich, Identity Needs in Intergroup Relations:…, 139
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Norenzayan, Ara, Big gods - how religion transformed…, 462