A Working Definition of Civil Society

The recent story about rational chimps has been making the rounds among economists. The chimps played the ultimatum game attempts to test strict rationality in the laboratory. In short, the ultimatum game involves two players, one is given an endowment of cash, and they can give any amount to the other player. If the second player accepts the offer, both players get their play in the game. If the second player rejects the offer, neither gets any money. The best play (from strict rationality) is for the first player to give as small an amount as possible (economists love Greek letters and call this epsilon) while the second player should accept any offer.

The laboratory results for humans do not yield what the theory would predict. First players give amounts great than epsilon, and second players reject offers. However, while the chimps did not behave perfectly rationally, they did better than humans, both offering and accepting smaller amounts. Various behavioral explanations have been offered for the human results, like fairness, guilt, etc. I would like to offer an alternative explanation. First, a personal story.

Last year I played the dictator game in a laboratory setting (similar to ultimatum, but player 2 has to take whatever is given). I choose to give 10% instead of pocketing all the cash. At the time and since then I and others have offered possible explanations for my behavior, but none have been satisfying (even to me). This is because I really have no idea why I did what I did. I still don't.

Here is a speculative story. Human beings are the most advanced civilization because they are willing to act in ways that do not serve their own self-interest when the gains are small. The easiest example involves respecting property rights as we move through our daily lives, but I believe it is broader than this (or: respect for property rights is a symptom of this fact).

I believe this is different from "altruism" as we typically define it, but I am also hesitant to simply lump it under "rationality." Originally it may have been an evolutionary defect, but over time it allowed individuals to participate in civil society. Chimps never had this "defect," and that is why they are still chimps and not a parallel human species.

Keep in mind, again, this is highly speculative on my part, and someone else has probably already said it better. Plus I am generally skeptical of evolutionary psychology explanations. Anyway... chimps are more rational than humans, but that's why they are still chimps. And the implication is: don't go out of your way to be altruistic or make others feel guilty, just do what comes naturally.