[neilk]

You're arguing against a point I didn't make. I'm not arguing for the existence of pure altruism, or denying the importance of genes. I'm saying that selfishness doesn't explain human behavior very well. It's an argument against the common model of human beings as rational economic actors. For the most part our motivations lie elsewhere, and we don't behave as homo economicus unless we are in weird and artificial situations.

I'm also making a more subtle point about the difficulty of delineating where a person ends and society begins. This is a much fuzzier concept for me, but I have a hunch that it doesn't make sense to say that a human personality is entirely contained in the body that we normally associate it with, any more than crashing waves are contained within a rocky shore. The body gives rise to this funny thing called a mind, and yet minds don't seem to be stored just in one brain.

I did not understand your point about the sociopath; it seems to be making my argument for me, that the driving forces at one level of organization tell you little about the next level up.