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Old 11-19-2005, 02:01 AM
Lestat Lestat is offline
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Default Morality and Evolution

There's been a lot of talk on here about morality, what is moral, and so on. I'm curious what role people think morality played in the evolutionary development of human beings?

Let's face it... Nature is cruel and merciless. Witness a pride of lions attacking a single over size prey. Or a black widow spider that eats its mate. How about that insect which paralyzes a catipillar and lays its eggs inside the body so the larvae will eat their way out devouring the catipillar alive for nourishment.

Morality seems to have no place for any other species but man. Why is that?

My personal belief is that man is best suited for survival in large numbers. The most intelligent man will struggle if left alone. So man is a serious pack animal and must have morals so as not to alienate too large a part of the pack at any one time.

Heh... I'm not a scientist, philosopher, or anyone degreed to talk about such things. But I like to ponder them in my own ignorant ways. I'd appreciate if anyone with more knowledge on this could enlighten me. Thanks.
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Old 11-19-2005, 02:17 AM
hmkpoker hmkpoker is offline
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Default Re: Morality and Evolution

Morality makes sense to me only if it describes a course of actions that, through their benefit to others, benefit the user.

For example, let's say an optimal lifestyle requires tax dollars. The most benefit is reaped for all if all supply their fair share. However, were someone to cheat and not pay, he would reap benefit at other's expense, but overall it would be bad. A system must be instituted to protect what is in the best interest for all (and, indirectly, one), and hence morality.

(I apologize gravely for the weak example, I'm very tired [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img])
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Old 11-19-2005, 04:04 AM
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Default Re: Morality and Evolution

Man seems to me to be a social animal. After all, we are closely related to monkeys.

We can work together to make a better life for a greater number of people. This is done because we realize it's the best thing for ourselves.

Morality is a useful tool for universalizing self-benefit, and this is why it evolved, in my non-expert opinion.
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Old 11-19-2005, 06:15 AM
atrifix atrifix is offline
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Default Re: Morality and Evolution

[ QUOTE ]
There's been a lot of talk on here about morality, what is moral, and so on. I'm curious what role people think morality played in the evolutionary development of human beings?

[/ QUOTE ]

Personally I think the interesting question is not whether morality is inconsistent with evolution, but rather whether evolution can explain morality (or rather, our perceptions thereof) as developing naturally and being beneficial to a species.

[ QUOTE ]
Let's face it... Nature is cruel and merciless. Witness a pride of lions attacking a single over size prey. Or a black widow spider that eats its mate. How about that insect which paralyzes a catipillar and lays its eggs inside the body so the larvae will eat their way out devouring the catipillar alive for nourishment.

[/ QUOTE ]

Humans do some pretty cruel and merciless things, too. Consider that millions of cows are held on industrial farms and essentially converted directly into food. Extinctions have gone up exponentially since the speciation of humans. But we don't usually seem to consider these things to be amoral--only when they get to a point where they begin to threaten the ecosystem as a whole or our own survival do we consider something to be wrong.

[ QUOTE ]
Morality seems to have no place for any other species but man. Why is that?

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm not sure how you determined that. Did you interview other species for their thoughts on morality?

[ QUOTE ]
My personal belief is that man is best suited for survival in large numbers. The most intelligent man will struggle if left alone. So man is a serious pack animal and must have morals so as not to alienate too large a part of the pack at any one time.

[/ QUOTE ]

This seems to me the most plausible explanation, but I am not terribly knowledgeable about the subject either. Suppose, though, that we have three people, one strong and two weak, and the weaker two can collectively overtake the stronger, at cost to themselves. It would seem from an evolutionary game-theoretic point of view that the optimal thing to do is for everyone to cooperate, although this would be pretty difficult to show.
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Old 11-19-2005, 06:25 AM
chezlaw chezlaw is offline
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Default Re: Morality and Evolution

It seems intuitively obvious that cooperation with those who carry the same genes is to the advantage of the gene and so we have evolved to cooperate. I think its true for other animals as well (plants anyone?) but they may not have awareness like we do and so may not know that they get feelings of pleasure/pain when they do things they feel to be right/wrong to others.

chez
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Old 11-19-2005, 06:55 AM
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Default Re: Morality and Evolution

I am not sure about this post. Evolution, afaik, has to do with speciation, not with behavioural patterns. There may be an evolution of behavioural patterns but lets not confuse that with the theory of evolution. Enough garbage has been thrown at it, trying to muddy the waters.

In response to your question, I am not sure, but what I am certain of, is that civilsations have evolved and come and go. It may be more interesting to ask questions in relation to civilisations rather tahn species. Also in this way we are not neccesarily bringing in a teleological perspective (no objective or tendency to perfection or an end), don't perceive evolution as being at it's peak (ie current somehow "better" than the past ones), but as an on-going process where every differentiation that is succesful, in turn is replaced by another (maybe even regressive) that is better adapted to the condition of that particular time.

I am fairly certain that morality has a lot more to do with civilisation than species. It is after all an intellectual justification or code of conduct. A baby or early infant does not display any morality, on the contrary.
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Old 11-19-2005, 07:06 AM
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Default Re: Morality and Evolution

I think that morality is something we all aspire to in an attempt to rationalise our more selfless actions, perhaps so that others may act in a similar way when they are engaging with us. In essence, it might be considered a form of preferred actions that we subjectively impose on society/humanity. However, the key words are "we", "subjectively" and "impose" - morality is not constant.

For example, there are psychological papers that relate the narratives of criminals who stole to feed their family, as society had "forced" them to commit crimes in order to survive. In their instances, the commission of crime is "moral". Likewise, soldiers.

Personally, I subscribe to the view that life is intrinsically personal and subjective - it is what we make it. Therefore, our morality is based entirely on what we want it to be. And then I lapse into A.J.Ayer: "Anything interesting about Ethical Philosophy can be written on the back of a postcard"
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Old 11-19-2005, 10:25 AM
Lestat Lestat is offline
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Default Re: Morality and Evolution

<font color="blue">Evolution, afaik, has to do with speciation, not with behavioural patterns. </font>

I thought behavioral patterns indeed played a part in our evolutionary process as a whole. But you are saying that behavorial patterns evolve independently of the theory of evolution? You may be right. I honestly don't know. It seems to me that behavior is very much brain related. The brain as an organ is very dependent on Darwin's evolutionary theory.

Your point about civilizations is interesting. I wonder how closely civilization can be equated to race? I can see how we might be genetically disposed to advance one's own race or ethnicity through discrimmination, wars, and religion. In fact, these atrocities may be nothing more than an effort to advance our own race and/or beliefs to the top.
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  #9  
Old 11-19-2005, 10:29 AM
Lestat Lestat is offline
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Default Re: Morality and Evolution

<font color="blue"> Personally, I subscribe to the view that life is intrinsically personal and subjective - </font>

I followed you up to here. Evolution (or the scheme of life), is anything but personal. To YOU it may be. But evolution couldn't care less about you as an individual.
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  #10  
Old 11-19-2005, 03:18 PM
NotReady NotReady is offline
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Default Re: Morality and Evolution

[ QUOTE ]

Morality seems to have no place for any other species but man. Why is that?


[/ QUOTE ]

Non-theistic morality will always come down to pragmatism, and that will always result in the reductio that might makes right. This has been discussed several times on the forum and no one has been able to counter this argument. I've often cited one of the more prominent atheists of the day, Michael Martin, who has written at least one book on atheistic morality. In the end, he had to admit he couldn't justify morality.
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