Trivers met Huey P. Newton , Chairman of the Black Panther Party , in 1978 when Newton applied while in prison to do a reading course with Trivers as part of a graduate degree in History of Consciousness at UC Santa Cruz . Trivers and Newton became close friends : Newton was godfather to one of Trivers 's daughters . Trivers joined the Black Panther Party in 1979 . Trivers and Newton published an analysis of the role of self-deception by the flight crew in the crash of Air Florida Flight 90 . Trivers was " ex-communicated " from the Panthers by Newton in 1982 for " his own good . " Trivers wrote the original foreword to Richard Dawkins ' book '' The Selfish Gene '' , in which Trivers first proposed his adaptive theory of self-deception
Air Florida Flight 90
Air Florida Flight 90
Robert Trivers