We humans have long preferred to associate with those who are similar to us. This makes sense, as such associations tend to be more productive, both directly due to better matched context, tools, and expectations, and indirectly due to our more closely shared associates better enforcing norms that encourage good behavior.
What about the possibility that by supporting the factions you are part of you advertise that you are a good ally thus making others see you as more valuable?
I know it's not what you mean, but all of what you name as infertile factions are fertile in the sense that they are memes that can propagate themselves. Every meme that is present in many minds must by definition be fertile - otherwise how did it get there! It must have attributes leading to its own spread.
What you're saying is that these memes may be fertile for their own spread, but that they do not promote the spread of *other* memes and genes also possessed by their hosts.
Still, I have doubts about some of these.
"A general habit of promoting your generation at the expense of future generations" is fertile in the same way selfishness is fertile. Policies that provide short-term profit for you and your immediate children, at the expense of the whole world a hundred years from now, still succeed in spreading the genes of the person benefiting in the short term from these policies. If the world is a wasteland in a hundred years, at least your selfish descendants are the ones populating that wasteland, the altruists having died out.
"You can’t promote your genes or memes by promoting your gender at the expense of the other gender." Well, it depends on what you mean by "promoting." Muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan, which are oppressive towards women, do tend to have high birth rates. The men in those countries are promoting their genes.
"So if you are an introvert, you can’t generally promote your genes or memes by promoting introverts in general. After all, successfully promoting introverts just results in their becoming more frequent, and thus losing more until equilibrium is restored." You're neglecting the possibility of a change in the equilibrium that favors more introverts. I don't see why having more introverts would lead to them losing more; rather, having more introverts would lead to greater acceptance of that style of interaction, which would only accommodate introverts more and move the equilibrium.
"Even looking only at relative frequency gains, this would only makes evolutionary sense for those who expect to be less able than others to transfer their memes or mental features to artificial minds" - but perhaps artificial minds would be completely alien from all of us in terms of memes and mental features. So in that case supporting artificial minds would not promote our memes and mental features, it would be the end of them.
Re: "this would only makes evolutionary sense for those who expect to be less able than others to transfer their memes or mental features to artificial minds" - this is a genes vs memes thing. Of course many memes would love to be copied around by superintelligent machines. Genes are much more likely to take a dimmer view of the situation - metaphorically speaking.
A more striking and obvious example would be the pro natalism vs anti natalism split, where anti natalists or those who are against cultures conducive to high fertility, do so based upon some weird habit or predisposition that is likely the product of some evolutionary generalization gone wrong. One interesting example might be the internal sense of vitriol that many people including the LDS have for groups such as the FLDS.
What about the possibility that by supporting the factions you are part of you advertise that you are a good ally thus making others see you as more valuable?
I know it's not what you mean, but all of what you name as infertile factions are fertile in the sense that they are memes that can propagate themselves. Every meme that is present in many minds must by definition be fertile - otherwise how did it get there! It must have attributes leading to its own spread.
What you're saying is that these memes may be fertile for their own spread, but that they do not promote the spread of *other* memes and genes also possessed by their hosts.
Still, I have doubts about some of these.
"A general habit of promoting your generation at the expense of future generations" is fertile in the same way selfishness is fertile. Policies that provide short-term profit for you and your immediate children, at the expense of the whole world a hundred years from now, still succeed in spreading the genes of the person benefiting in the short term from these policies. If the world is a wasteland in a hundred years, at least your selfish descendants are the ones populating that wasteland, the altruists having died out.
"You can’t promote your genes or memes by promoting your gender at the expense of the other gender." Well, it depends on what you mean by "promoting." Muslim countries such as Saudi Arabia or Afghanistan, which are oppressive towards women, do tend to have high birth rates. The men in those countries are promoting their genes.
"So if you are an introvert, you can’t generally promote your genes or memes by promoting introverts in general. After all, successfully promoting introverts just results in their becoming more frequent, and thus losing more until equilibrium is restored." You're neglecting the possibility of a change in the equilibrium that favors more introverts. I don't see why having more introverts would lead to them losing more; rather, having more introverts would lead to greater acceptance of that style of interaction, which would only accommodate introverts more and move the equilibrium.
"Even looking only at relative frequency gains, this would only makes evolutionary sense for those who expect to be less able than others to transfer their memes or mental features to artificial minds" - but perhaps artificial minds would be completely alien from all of us in terms of memes and mental features. So in that case supporting artificial minds would not promote our memes and mental features, it would be the end of them.
> At least not if we have the usual sexual reproduction based on two genders
Sexual reproduction is not based on gender at all, but on the sexes.
Re: "this would only makes evolutionary sense for those who expect to be less able than others to transfer their memes or mental features to artificial minds" - this is a genes vs memes thing. Of course many memes would love to be copied around by superintelligent machines. Genes are much more likely to take a dimmer view of the situation - metaphorically speaking.
A more striking and obvious example would be the pro natalism vs anti natalism split, where anti natalists or those who are against cultures conducive to high fertility, do so based upon some weird habit or predisposition that is likely the product of some evolutionary generalization gone wrong. One interesting example might be the internal sense of vitriol that many people including the LDS have for groups such as the FLDS.