“Adaptations that make people thrive” can be interpreted in two ways: “adaptations that make people [who possess those adaptations] thrive” or “adaptations that make people [in general, including those who don’t possess the adaptation] thrive.”
As I understand it, the latter interpretation is essentially equivalent to group selection; the former is not. So it helps to be clear about what exactly you’re saying.
Your original formulation (“make society work better”) implies the latter pretty strongly. Your rewording is more ambiguous.
In any case, if you are proposing the former—that is, if you are proposing that some of our biases have evolved to make the individuals expressing that bias more successful—there’s no group selection error, and I agree that it would be pretty surprising if that weren’t the case.
Of course, as has been said several times, that doesn’t mean those biases currently make individuals expressing them more successful.
Be careful.
“Adaptations that make people thrive” can be interpreted in two ways: “adaptations that make people [who possess those adaptations] thrive” or “adaptations that make people [in general, including those who don’t possess the adaptation] thrive.”
As I understand it, the latter interpretation is essentially equivalent to group selection; the former is not. So it helps to be clear about what exactly you’re saying.
Your original formulation (“make society work better”) implies the latter pretty strongly. Your rewording is more ambiguous.
In any case, if you are proposing the former—that is, if you are proposing that some of our biases have evolved to make the individuals expressing that bias more successful—there’s no group selection error, and I agree that it would be pretty surprising if that weren’t the case.
Of course, as has been said several times, that doesn’t mean those biases currently make individuals expressing them more successful.