The Selfish Gene Another criticism of the book is its treatment of morality, and more particularly altruism, as existing only as a form of selfishness: The philosopher Mary Midgley has suggested this position is a variant of Hobbes' explanation of altruism as enlightened self-interest, and that Dawkins goes a step further to suggest that our genetic programming can be overcome by what amounts to an extreme version of free will. Part of Mary Midgley's concern is that Richard Dawkins' account of "The Selfish Gene" serves as a moral and ideological justification for selfishness to be adopted by modern human societies as simply following
The Selfish Genius evolutionary theory that portrays natural selection as acting at the level of the individual gene to the exclusion of group selection models which state that it could also act at the level of organisms or species. The book also claims Dawkins embraces an outdated and prescriptive conception of evolution that actually restricts debate rather than promoting it. The book has provoked controversy with some online commentary claiming it is another 'flea', a term used by Dawkins to describe people who have published books about him or his ideas. An article by Fern Elsdon-Baker in "New Scientist" of 19 July 2009