Examining the unique system of favors and obligations in trade, religion, and warfare, the author of The Red Queen suggests that human nature is indeed selfish, but that it is selfishness that promotes cooperation and serves evolution. Human life, scientific journalist Matt Ridley suggests, is a complex balancing act: we behave with self-interest foremost in mind, but also in ways that do not harm, and sometimes even benefit, others. This behavior, in a strange way, makes us good. It also makes us unique in the animal world, where self-interest is far more pronounced. "The essential virtuousness of human beings is proved not by parallels in the animal kingdom, but by the very lack of convincing animal parallels," Ridley writes. How we got to be so virtuous over millions of years of evolution is the theme of this entertaining book of popular science, which will be of interest to any student of human nature. If nice guys always finished last when our ancestors were scrabbling around for food on the African savanna, why does morality come so naturally to us now? This is the question Matt Ridley aims to answer in The Origins of Virtue. Or, rather, he aims to provide a battery of answers. The evolution of altruism has been a topic of intense research for more than 20 years. While the biologically minded may still be a minority among social scientists, there are now enough of them to have produced a plethora of competing theories. Mr. Ridley is a distinguished British science journalist who proves an excellent guide to the current debate. Sometimes his eagerness to cover every angle means that different views are not always clearly distinguished, but he is never dull, and he illustrates the intricate logic of natural selection with many parables from ethology, anthropology and games theory. -- The New York Times Book Review, David Papineau Matt Ridley has worked as a science editor, Washington correspondent, and American editor for the Economist . A research fellow of the Institute for Economic Affairs and a Trustee of the International Centre for Life, he lives in Northumberland, England. Used Book in Good Condition