TY - BOOK ID - 77929679 TI - Explaining altruism PY - 2008 VL - Bd. 11 SN - 3110327570 9783110327571 3868380078 9783868380071 3110327309 9783110327304 9783868380071 9783110327304 PB - Frankfurt Ontos Verlag DB - UniCat KW - Altruism KW - Cooperativeness KW - Cooperation (Psychology) KW - Social psychology KW - Altruistic behavior KW - Unselfishness KW - Conduct of life KW - Helping behavior KW - Computer simulation. KW - Theory of knowledge KW - General ethics UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:77929679 AB - Employing computer simulations for the study of the evolution of altruism has been popular since Axelrod's book „The Evolution of Cooperation“. But have the myriads of simulation studies that followed in Axelrod's footsteps really increased our knowledge about the evolution of altruism or cooperation? This book examines in detail the working mechanisms of simulation based evolutionary explanations of altruism. It shows that the „theoretical insights“ that can be derived from simulation studies are often quite arbitrary and of little use for the empirical research. In the final chapter of the book, therefore, a set of epistemological requirements for computer simulations is proposed and recommendations for the proper research design of simulation studies are made. ER -