On twitter the HBD community continues to debate over whether ethnic genetic interests exist.  To me there’s no debate about whether ethnic genetic interests exist, the only debate is whether behavior that advances one’s ethnic genetic interests was selected for, and if so, was it selected directly or merely as a by-product of regular kin selection (as commenter Swank suggested).

I think the problems is critics of EGI are assuming that just because something might not have been directly selected for, that therefore it’s not genetically adaptive.  But that’s a semantic argument, not a scientific one, and in my humble opinion, critics are wrong on the semantics.

For example donating volumes and volumes of sperm to a sperm bank is just as genetically adaptive as trying to have sex with women, yet few men are as obsessed with donating sperm as they are with chasing women, despite the fact that the former pays money and the latter costs money.  That’s because humans were selected to obsess over sex, and there has not been enough time for men to be selected to obsess over sperm donation.

But just because sperm donation is not an evolved impulse does not mean it’s not in our genetic interests.  Similarly, even if we don’t have an evolved impulse to favour our race or ethnicity, does not mean it’s not in our genetic interests.

Any behavior that makes life on earth more genetically similar to you is in your genetic interest, BY DEFINITION.

But just because something is in your genetic interest does NOT mean you should do it.  We’re humans, not beasts; we can and should rise beyond our primal urges, assuming this even evolved into an urge.