[Serious] Literal and Not Literal

[GrandizerII]

Heard of kin selection?

Of course, that's why I'm saying the continuity of it doesn't make sense. You have to enter an abstract realm where, say, sequence ATT is considered "my gene" regardless of where and why in the universe it appears. Otherwise there's no continuity between my genes and my sister surviving; they may as well be competing against each other.

I keep rereading this comment to try to understand what exactly you're saying about the whole abstract realm bit, but I'm just not getting it, so I'll address the last sentence of this quote and hope this addresses the first sentences.

There's no continuity between your genes and your sister's, but there is some continuity between your genes and your parents' genes, which also happen to be somewhat continuous with your sister's genes.

I won't pretend to know the exact mechanisms that come with kin selection. There are experts instead you can ask about that.

My clone isn't me, in other words, and for all I know he may be trying to kill me, or take my girlfriend.

Yes, that's possible, but kin selection need not completely and constantly overrule the individual need for survival. It all depends on the various factors at play, what instructions your particular gene-set has encoded (in terms of structure and function).

Which isn't far fetched either. I think there are bacteria that produce toxins against members of their own kind, a genetic free for all.

Well, it is known that bacteria share genes with one another "horizontally" (via plasmids).