Following the publication of Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene (1976), two papers appeared in Nature (1980) taking up the "selfish" theme: Orgel and Crick, "Selfish DNA: the ultimate parasite," Nature, 284 (1980), 604-7, and Doolittle and Sapienza, "Selfish genes, the phenotype paradigm and genome evolution," Nature, 284 (1980), 601-3.

Responses (from T Cavalier-Smith, Gabriel Dover, Temple F Smith and R A Reid) to these two papers appeared in Nature, 285 (26 June, 1980), 617-20. Subsequently, in Nature, 288 (18/25 December, 1980, 645-6), further contributions to the discussion were published under the rubric "Selfish DNA": a letter from Orgel, Crick and Sapienza, and Dover and Doolittle, "Modes of genome evolution," and Jain, "Incidental DNA."

Files PP/CRI/H/6/13/1-6 comprise Crick and Orgel's drafts and proofs for the initial paper and the subsequent joint letter with Sapienza, together with other papers from the discussion and some related correspondence, maintained together as a group of files. Files PP/CRI/H/6/13/7-8 were found in accession 1107 and added later.