An Introduction to Evolutionary Ethics
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Authors: Scott M. James
Tags: #Philosophy, #Ethics & Moral Philosophy, #General
This edition first published 2011
© 2011 Scott M. James
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
James, Scott M.
An introduction to evolutionary ethics / Scott M. James.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4051-9397-9 (hardcover : alk. paper) – ISBN 978-1-4051-9396-2
(pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Ethics, Evolutionary–Textbooks. I. Title.
BJ1311.J36 2011
171′.7–dc22
To M.B.
Contents
Introduction: A Philosopher and a Biologist Walk into a Bar ...
Part I From “Selfish Genes” to Moral Beings: Moral Psychology after Darwin
1 Natural Selection and Human Nature
1.2 Some Common Misunderstandings
1.4 Evolutionary Psychology and Human Nature
1.5 An Evolved Mental Tool-Box
1.6 Some (More) Common Misunderstandings
2 The (Earliest) Roots of Right
2.2 Inclusive Fitness and the “Gene's-Eye” Point of View
2.3 Love Thy Neighbor – But Love Thy Family First
2.4 False Positives and Core Systems
2.5 A Quick Note on “Altruism”
3 The Caveman's Conscience: The Evolution of Human Morality
3.1 What Makes Moral Creatures
Moral
3.3 Explaining the Nature of Moral Judgments
4.6 An Explanation for
All
of Morality?
4.7 Universal Morality or Universal Reason?
5 The Science of Virtue and Vice
5.4 Moral Innateness and the Linguistic Analogy
5.5 Switchboards, Biases, and Affective Resonances
Part II From “What Is” to “What Ought To Be”: Moral Philosophy after Darwin
6 Social Harmony: The Good, the Bad, and the Biologically Ugly
6.1 From the Great Chain of Being, to the Tree of Life, to Morality
6.2 Uprooting the Tree of Life
7.1 Deductively Valid Arguments
7.2 You Can't Get Out What You Don't Put In
7.4 Blocking the Move from Might to Right
7.5 Darwinism and Preserving the Human Species
8 Moore's Naturalistic Fallacy
8.2 Failing the Open Question Test: Desiring to Desire
8.3 Failing the Open Question Test: Spencer
8.4 Failing the Open Question Test: Wilson
9.1 Some Preliminary Doubts about the Open Question Test
9.2 What Things Mean vs. What Things Are
9.3 Implications for Social Darwinism
9.4 Forays across the Is/Ought Gap: Searle
9.5 Forays across the Is/Ought Gap: Rachels
10 Evolutionary Anti-Realism: Early Efforts
10.1 This Is Your Brain on God
10.4 The Argument from Idiosyncrasy
10.5 The Argument from Redundancy
10.6 Causation, Justification, and … a Rotting Corpse
11 Contemporary Evolutionary Anti-Realism
12 Options for the Evolutionary Realist
12.1 Option 1: Learning Right from Wrong
12.2 Option 2: Response Dependency
12.3 Option 3: Virtue Ethics Naturalized
12.4 Option 4: Moral Constructivism
Introduction: A Philosopher and a Biologist Walk into a Bar …
Any animal whatever, endowed with well-marked social instincts, the parental and filial affections being here included, would inevitably acquire a moral sense or conscience, as soon as its intellectual powers had become as well developed, or nearly as well developed, as in man.
(Charles Darwin,
The Descent of Man
) In 1975 the Harvard entomologist and father of sociobiology E.O. Wilson famously suggested that “scientists and humanists should consider together the possibility that the time has come for ethics to be removed from the hands of philosophers and biologicized” (Wilson 1975: 520). Philosophers, apparently, had had their shot – and didn't have much to show for their efforts. Now biologists, armed with a comprehensive understanding of human evolution, were standing by to explain that most human of traits: a sense of right and wrong. But in their enthusiasm, Wilson and his sympathizers had failed to articulate exactly what “biologicization” meant. For despite the impression left by Wilson's suggestion, it was immediately pointed out (by philosophers, alas) that biology could play – and has played – a
variety
of roles in moral theory, ranging from the uncontroversial to the highly contentious.
What this means, first and foremost, is that the real question is
not
: Does biology play some role in the explanation of morality? (Surely it plays
some
role.) The real question is: What
sort of role
does biology play in the explanation of morality? How, in other words, should the story of human evolution influence what we think about our moral lives – our moral judgments, our moral feelings, our moral differences, our tendency to avoid wrongdoing, our admiration of self-sacrifice, our hostility toward wrongdoers, and so on? This question, roughly stated, lies at the heart of what we think of as evolutionary ethics.
As a first step toward understanding the many ways in which biology might influence moral theory, consider the following menu of options proposed by Philip Kitcher 1985:
1
Explaining our moral psychology.
Biology might provide (at least some part of) an evolutionary account of how our species came to acquire moral concepts and make moral judgments. Biology might explain, that is, how recurrent features of our ancestral environment (for example, social or moral features) led some of our ancestors to think in moral terms.
2
Constraining or expanding our moral principles.
Biology might offer new insights into human nature that may
constrain
or
expand
the moral principles we already accept. We may learn, for example, that humans tend to value some practices that ethicists had not previously recognized; this in turn might expand the practices that ought to be morally protected.
3
Determining the metaphysical status of moral properties.
Biology might settle, once and for all, questions about morality's objectivity. For example, some have argued that evolution “fooled” us into believing that some acts
really are
wrong (where nothing
in reality
is wrong), since believing as much would have promoted cooperation, which in turn would have advanced our ancestors' biological fitness.
4
Deriving new moral principles from evolution.
Biology
alone might tell us what our moral obligations are. Social Darwinists, for example, argue that since the survival of our ancestors depended critically on promoting “social harmony,” we thus have a moral obligation to promote social harmony.
As you can see, “biologicizing” ethics can mean different things to different people. The philosophical significance of this point cannot be overstated: a commitment to one project does
not
necessarily entail a commitment to any other project. For example, one might argue that the story of human evolution explains in part how we came to have the moral psychology that we have (option 1 above), but
deny
that the nature of moral obligation is determined by this (or any other) biological fact (option 3). To see why, consider an analogy. Psychologists attempting to understand the nature of visual perception study how the body's visual system – a system whose structure was refined over thousands of generations – processes an external stimulus, such as a cat. What psychologists expect to learn (and have learned) is something about
visual processing
; what they do
not
expect to learn is something about the nature of cats. Once identified, the lesson is obvious: if you want to know what makes a cat a cat, ask a zoologist, not a psychologist. Similarly, one might argue that moral psychologists expect to learn something about the
processing
of moral and social “information”; they do not expect to learn something about the nature of morality itself. If you want to know what makes wrong acts wrong, ask a moral philosopher, not a psychologist. Or so some have argued.
To take another example, one could argue that biology indeed uncovers facts about human nature that bear on our moral obligations (option 2), but
deny
that our moral obligations are
derived from
these (or any) biological facts (option 4). Consider another analogy. Some evolutionary psychologists reason that since our early ancestors faced the recurrent problem of getting enough calories from what they ate, one adaptive solution would have been to develop an innate craving for fatty foods. (In case, being from another planet, you doubt we have such cravings, anthropologists have indeed observed this tendency across cultures.) The point, however, is this:
even if
it is true that our evolutionary past has disposed us to crave and consume fatty foods whenever available, does it seem correct to conclude that we
ought
to crave and consume fatty foods whenever available? Surely not! If the 2004 film
Super Size Me
(documenting one man's ill-fated attempt to subsist on a McDonald's-only diet) demonstrated anything, it was that we
ought to resist
our craving for and consumption of fatty foods. How is this relevant to biology's role in moral theory?