"The commitment to living beyond a narrow view of our own interests makes us different from animals and creates a series of biological puzzles concerning our lack of selfishness and our willingness to condemn others.
The moral sense was once explained purely by religion. Now an evolutionary account is needed."
"According to the anthropologists Alan Fiske and Tage Rai, “When people hurt or kill someone, they usually do so because they feel . . . that it is morally right or even obligatory to be violent.”
Fiske and Rai considered every type of violence they could think of, including genocide, witch killings, lynchings, gang rapes, war rape, war killings, homicides, revenge, hazing, and suicide. Their conclusion was clear. Most violence is motivated by moral emotions. Moral behavior is guided by a sense of right and wrong."
(From: Richard Wrangham: The Goodness Paradox. How Evolution Made Us Both More and Less Violent)
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Feel free to reply to any comment by clicking the "Reply" button.Such atrocities are commented when a true, consequence based morality is replaced by blind adherence to demagogic political and;/or religious ideology.
wordywalt
Level 9
Mar 17, 2019
0
Rightness and/or wrongness is a learned value at the conscious level. We do, in my opinion come hardwired with set of imperatives that address behavior. But they are neither moral or immoral, rather amoral.
That is to say, it is a set of unconscious imperatives that act toward species fitness in an evolutionary sense. Species generally do not prey on themselves as that would be counterproductive towards evolutionary fitness and perpetuation of the species (Im sure examples of exceptions exist). Likewise, species do not go around stating cocsciously that, "I will not prey on my own kind".
Now recognizing that humans are unique in their capacity for abstract thought, we are still subject to the unconscious evolutionary imperative for species protection and perpetuation. The fact we can short circuit, override, ignore, or circumvent just suggests how unfit as a species we have become. The concept of conscious rightness/wrongness thought is just an example of the items I've listed in the previous sentence. Ultimately, the unconscious evolutionary imperatives will win out, in which we listen or become extinct.
t1nick
Level 8
Mar 17, 2019
0
@Matias Alright pause in housework, now I can answer morw thoroughly. Lol
Its not do much that the "selfish genes" care on a conscious level, but they do care of sorts. There are physical laws that regulate and more or less control what is possible and what is not posdible (and I always point to the fact that are always exceptions).
Evolution follows these physical laws and the selfish genes follow evolutionary laws. Therefore, if evolution on the larger scale acts to preserve the fittest organisms and weed out the less fit, then it follows that genes work hand-in-hand with evolutionary principles. Therefore on a genetic level they must care, not as you or I do on a conscious level, but care enough to adapt and perserve.
Of course folks don't just act randomly. They wouldn't go to the trouble of hurting people if they didn't think they had some reason. Their reasons are often very different from mine (or yours I imagine) though.
BTW... I've heard it said that there are three stages of realization many of us go through when we see others behaving badly -- hurting people.
- First we give the others the benefit of the doubt and figure they don't know they're hurting people.
- Then we still give the others the benefit and figure they don't understand that they're hurting people.
- Next we realize that the others hurt people because that's just the way they are. They act for their own purposes, whatever those purposes are.
More succinctly, the stages we see in harmful people are: 'ignorance', 'stupidity' and 'evil'(ness).
RichCC
Level 8
Mar 17, 2019
1
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