Richard Dawkins - The Selfish Gene

Books that David DeAngelo recommends and that I read and reviewed for you:




The Selfish Gene is a book on evolution by Richard Dawkins, published in 1976. It builds upon the principal theory of George C. Williams's first book Adaptation and Natural Selection.

Dawkins coined the term selfish gene as a way of expressing the gene-centred view of evolution, which holds that evolution is best viewed as acting on genes and that selection at the level of organisms or populations almost never overrides selection based on genes.



An organism is expected to evolve to maximize its inclusive fitness—the number of copies of its genes passed on globally (rather than by a particular individual). As a result, populations will tend towards an evolutionarily stable strategy.

The book also coins the term meme for a unit of human cultural evolution analogous to the gene, suggesting that such "selfish" replication may also model human culture, in a different sense. Memetics has become the subject of many studies since the publication of the book.

A crude analogy can be found in the old saying about a chicken being just an egg's way of making more eggs. In a similar inversion, Dawkins describes biological organisms as "vehicles" or survival machines, with genes as the "replicators" that create these organisms as a means of acquiring resources and copying themselves. From an organism-centric perspective, genes can be thought of as a blueprint for some feature that might benefit the organism; but from a gene-centric perspective, the sole implicit purpose is to benefit themselves. A related concept here is outlined in Dawkins' later work, The Extended Phenotype, in which the consequences of the genes to the environment outside the organism are considered.


Who is David D?


Eben W. Pagan, better known by his stage name David DeAngelo, is an American entrepreneur, author and dating consultant.

He is a member of the American Seduction community and founder of "Double Your Dating", a company providing dating advice to men and marketed primarily over the Internet that made books like "Attraction is not a Choice".

DeAngelo argues that much human social behavior is related in some way to sexual reproduction, and that human mating habits do not differ significantly from other species.

He suggests that societal conditioning has programmed many modern men to develop involuntary habits that increase the failure rate of consistently attracting women or negate the attractive qualities that were designed to make women want them.

DeAngelo set out to build his skills at meeting women through a number of avenues, including seeking the counsel of "naturals" (men who are naturally good with women) and students of women such as Hypnotica (Eric Von Sydow) Steve Piccus (Steve P), Dave Riker, Rick H, and as a protégé of Ross Jeffries.

He's featured on the book "The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists", by Neil Strauss that also features Mystery, the greatest PUA (Pick-Up Artist) of the world that has a reality show on VH1.