Cairns-Smith: chemical evolution critic

One fairly prominent critic of "chemical evolution" was the late A. G. Cairns-Smith. He devoted a substantial section at the start of his book "Genetic Takeover" to explaining where proponents of chemical evolution got it wrong, arguing that the requirements for Darwinian evolution to get going were quite demanding - and most of the proposed prebiotic chemical systems didn't measure up.

This is contrary to the proposals made by proponents of Universal Darwinism, which suggest that copying with variation and selection are ubiquitous physical and chemical processes which can be used to model a wide variety of systems.

As readers may or may not be aware, I am both a proponent of Universal Darwinism and a fan of Cairns-Smith's ideas about the origin of life, so which side of this argument to support is a kind of dilemma for me.

The first thing to say is that Cairns-Smith got it wrong in detail, that simple physical and chemical systems do evolve and exhibit adaptations in much the way that he argued against. Cairns-Smith gave too much weight to the idea that simple physical and chemical systems lacked high fidelity copying - and would therefore undergo an error catastrophe, or a "mutational meltdown". We now know that with positional inheritance, high fidelity copying in prebiotic systems is ubiquitous.

Other problems besides lack of high fidelity copying mean that these systems typically do not go on to launch systems capable of open-ended evolution. One such problem is having a genome with a "low information ceiling" - and Cairns-Smith did discuss that problem. Another such problem is "local exhaustion". Dissipative systems destroy the energy gradients that they feed off. Unless they can continually find new energy sources, they will exhaust their own energy supply and die out. This happens with lightning strikes, for example. They typically do not last for very long, and the reason for that is because they run out of fuel.

It seems possible to me that prebiotic "chemical evolution" will involve adaptations that are on the pathway towards the origin of life (as Cairns-Smith argued against). However, I don't think negating Cairns-Smith's point about the relevance of ochemical evolution has all that much effect on his other arguments. Clay mineral crystals still seem like attractive candidates for the first living things, for essentially the reasons that Cairns-Smith gives in his books on the topic.

Virtue signalling: pro-social or anti-social?

In 2011, I stressed the positive side of virtue signalling, writing: "Signalling must often be costly to be effective." Costly signalling of virtuousness to an audience of sceptical cheating-detectors often involves actually being virtuous. However, since then it has become fashionable to use "virtue signalling" as a term of abuse.

In standard biological terminology, signalling can be accurate or misleading, costly or cheap, pro-social or anti-social. I recently saw one attempt to argue that virtue signalling was generally positive, and that pointing it out was usually an anti-social means of making yourself look good. The article was titled " The psychological explanation for why we sometimes hate the good guy". Here's what the authors concluded:

Critics often attack the motives of people who protect the environment, seek social justice, donate money or work too hard in organizations. Such good deeds are dismissed as naïve, hypocritical (“champagne liberals”) or as mere “virtue signalling” by those who do not perform those deeds. If left unchecked, this criticism may ultimately reduce how often people do good deeds.

Our research helps us recognize these attacks for what they are: A competitive social strategy, used by low co-operators, to bring others down and stop them from looking better than they do.

The problem with this is is that some people only appear to be virtuous, and pointing that out by saying that they are just virtue signalling can be pro-social - by encouraging more genuine forms of do-gooding.

Others have focused on the negative aspects of virtue signalling, arguing that it is a cheap subsitute for actually doing good employed by those with shallow, selfish motives. I don't think that is right either. Virtue signalling is responsible for a lot of the good that take place in the world. It often doesn't really matter if people do it for selfish motives, to impress prospective partners (or whatever) - since it still results in much good being done. Without virtue signalling the world would surely be a much worse place. Virtue signalling is mostly - but not exclusively - a positive force.