Piggy is one of the first characters we meet (as "the fat boy"), so we're predisposed to like him, even if nobody else does. Ralph may find the conch, but Piggy is the one who identifies it and tells Ralph how to use it—but doesn't use it himself. He may know what to do (blow into the shell), but he's too weak physically (because of his asthma) to do it. And that's Piggy: intellectual superiority, physical inferiority.

He's also the closest thing we have to an adult on the island, defending the conch and insisting on rules and order. He makes a big deal about learning names, "frowning to remember them" (1.179): he sees each boy as a fellow human being, and wants to give him the right and privilege of being called by his proper name. Having names matters to Piggy, because, just like the conch, it represents a system of rules and order.

It's not that Piggy benefits from his interest in names. No one calls Piggy by his rightful name (we never even learn it). But the conch does benefit him. Without rules and order, people like Piggy get squashed—literally. With the conch, everyone gets a fair chance. If he's holding the conch, it doesn't matter if he's fat and unathletic. His voice matters just as much as anyone else's. That's probably why he defends it even when he and Ralph are being attacked by Jack's gang, holding it up and demanding, "Which is better—to have rules and agree, or to hunt and kill?" Piggy wants to go to Jack and the others and insist that they give his