Question

Eusociality, particularly focusing on the presence of certainaltruistic sterile organisms within the social set-up createsquestions as to why would the process of natural selection havefavoured the persistence of such genes especially in hymenoptericspecies. One explanation (provided probably by Hamilton)pertains to very similar genetic constitutions of females of suchspecies (owing to haploid nature of males), which increases geneticsimilarity between the female members of the social group. Thus itwould be more "beneficial" (i.e., favourable for the persistence ofsimilar genetic builds) for a female worker to help the fellowsiblings, to which it bears greater genetic similarity, than itsown offspring to which it bears a lesser genetic similarity. Thismight in a deeper way explain altruism in case of hymenopteranswhere the male is a parthenogenetic haploid and the female isdiploid.

But why would the sterile condition of the workers in case ofalmost all eusocial groups be favoured by natural selection ongrounds that it improves the 'fitness' of the 'genetic build' ofthe workers and ultimately the sterile altruists benefit thepersistence of its genetic traits? Moreover the altruistic natureof the haploid males also goes unexplained.