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Perhaps morality strategies being voiced by philosophers and neuroscientists will end up maximizing either the comfort/well-being of humans, or the demise of the self illusion and everything that now matters along with it. In a recent Harper’s, Peter Singer writes about how some day, cameras might automatically capture all we do. This, he seems to fantasize, will eventually perhaps bring about a sort of absolute morality. http://harpers.org/archive/2011/08/0083544
But is it really worth continuing to refine morality trends whose roots we receive from our cultural pasts? It would seem so, but an emphasis on scientifically determining what is morally proper and what is morally reprehensible seems creepy. It looms like a warm-up to yet more violence, as groups go at it with each other as they always have. Rather than wondering aloud about ideal concepts of morality, neuroscientists would do well to devote themselves to researching empathy training and how to improve on its already successful classroom techniques.
The more understanding we gain about the social worlds that surround us, the more likely it is that empathy will prevail in any given situation. If we continue to fail to understand ourselves and others, we will continue to find ourselves depleted of empathy. Techniques have already been devised for teachers and therapists to directly assist students in gaining empathic views and behaviors. Sources of strong emotion can be uncovered and tinkered with—the cognitive. Interaction techniques involving both verbal and body languages can be addressed—the behavioral. And much else can be accomplished, except that it’s not even a field of study yet. I don’t think a person can study at university to become an empathy therapist or teacher of empathy today. What’s wrong with this picture?
We’re intellectually needy enough—all we are is animals—to require that we rely on laws, prohibitions and regulations for just about every aspect of our behavior. This is, in part, due to how we tend to misunderstand. We ignorantly blast our way into the lives of those around us, without having much if any knowledge about their states of mind. That’s the herd/pack/tribe way of assuming then interacting. Respect does get earned, but so much disrespect remains that respect is often not to be found. Disrespect feels almost as though it’s in the air we breathe. We commonly insult people without realizing it, but are quick to take offense at even a hint of it being directed at us. When we dish it out, it’s not insult but deserved retribution for a wrong. Complex contingency agreements flow around us like WD-40, with some details misunderstood and others completely forgotten about.
This is how highly social animals act, but most people don’t even seem aware of it. And at our core, no matter how our philosophies inform us, we are as creature-like as any other. No more, no less. We like to think otherwise, which seems mistaken to me. It might be a recipe for eventual disaster, though it’s taken us to this point at least.
Life remains a struggle in a variety of ways, even if you’re a member of the most elaborately able species known (to our species, anyway). We’ve accomplished much to increase our well-being, but we continue to struggle. Nature’s natures just seem to include struggle. For some critters and creatures, struggle is more or less constant. For others, such as ours, it’s a mixed bag. Some of us struggle lots and a few seem to struggle only a little. But we all struggle. I’m assuming that a priori. I’m open to correction, of course. We are outfit to struggle, and to ignore this fact is to ignore who we are. We can pretend to be who we are not, but then we’re not being ourselves.
Humanity finally has access to fundamental and profound knowledge about how people get along—or fail to get along—with others. We can finally start to end the ignorance. Instead, neuroscience’s and philosophy’s most public voices dwell on perfecting morality, continuing with things as they are, perhaps rearranging a few deck chairs in the process. Morality will never be a hard science, and probably never a soft one, either. We can pretend, of course.
So we struggle, yet our brains provide us with chemicals that allow us to feel good anyway. It’s a balancing act, as our brains tempt us into more and more risky or struggle-involving occupations and goals. This balancing act is not unique to us by any means. But it defines who we are. We can continue redefining or improving morality, generally by means of narrative that supplies heavy lifting and sprinting, but seems inadequate regarding long-term peace and prosperity. Most people don’t question what they learn, however, so change seems a distant goal.
Looking at events and behaviors as tending to be either good or evil—the current style of religious morality—would seem to rely on envisioning supernatural entities, or at least supernormal mysteries and delusions. But I’ll appreciate everyone else’s views on these matters.
I’m writing now just to let you know that I saw this, but today I don’t have time to read it as thoroughly as I want to. Tomorrow, I’ll post my reply
And thanks for the reference!
I’m writing now just to let you know that I saw this, but today I don’t have time to read it as thoroughly as I want to. Tomorrow, I’ll post my reply
And thanks for the reference!
I hope I wasn’t obscure. But in case I was, I’ll summarize my point:
We act in ways that are considered ethically or morally proper when and only when it benefits us in some way. Those of us fortunate enough to have been raised in environments that promote ethical consideration in empathic ways grow up to find ourselves with built-in mental structures that reward us when we act properly. Just as importantly, these structures punish us when we realize we’ve taken improper advantage of another person. They keep us from sleeping at night. The dialectic never ends, does it? I guess that’s because it works so well.
all of these philosophers seem so silly to me - it seems like upper class morality in the disguise of philosophy - as Elisa Doolittle’s father said to Henry Higgins in Pygmalion: i can’t afford your upper class morality - as a left leaning liberal i find their morality as ” let all of us just get along and play nice”- yes i know they use clever games theories to try to prove their points - but none of it ever takes into account human nature or a variety of human opinion - osama bin laden did not consider himself a terrorist - he considered himself a hero!! - neval chamberlain used the legion of nations approach with adoph hitler - much good that did - did hitler SEE himself as being immoral or unethical??? - the bottom line is that it all comes down to definitions!!! so only college educated liberal thinking people should get to define this new morality that we are all heading toward for the general good of all? - i thought ayn rand had thwarted that notion with the ideas that if we do well for ourselves we simply do well for others indirectly - enterprise as charity - just one new definition of morality [or ethics as you like]
We act in ways that are considered ethically or morally proper when and only when it benefits us in some way. Those of us fortunate enough to have been raised in environments that promote ethical consideration in empathic ways grow up to find ourselves with built-in mental structures that reward us when we act properly. Just as importantly, these structures punish us when we realize we’ve taken improper advantage of another person. They keep us from sleeping at night. The dialectic never ends, does it? I guess that’s because it works so well.
I was just thinking about this the other day. Morality is most effective when it’s felt, not thought. Those of us fortunate enough to have been indoctrinated early on with moral values don’t have to think about whether a certain behavior is right or wrong, we feel it. We’ve been equipped with built-in mental structures that reward us when we act properly and punish us when we act improperly. If only we were all on the same page in terms of “proper” and “improper” (that’s the catch, of course) and if only we all had the good fortune to have been effectively indoctrinated, we wouldn’t need police or Gods looking over our shoulders. Our moral compasses would be sufficient.
On the other hand, without the benefit of built-in mental structures that reward and punish us for proper and improper behavior, we only behave properly when we think we’re under surveillance (I’m guessing that was Singer’s point, although I couldn’t read the Harper’s article without a subscription.) Witness the riots in the UK: as soon as people thought they could get away with looting, they looted—out of self-interest. Had they been indoctrinated early on with built-in mental structures that punished them for looting, they wouldn’t have looted—again, out of self-interest.
Of course, in a world filled with people constrained by built-in mental structures, the unconstrained man has the advantage.
Along these same lines, there’s no such thing as altruism. Generous behavior may appear altruistic from the outside, but the reward we gain from our built-in mental structures makes it self-interest. All behavior is self-interest. By indoctrinating children with the right built-in mental structures, we can align self-interest with group-interest.
Along these same lines, there’s no such thing as altruism. Generous behavior may appear altruistic from the outside, but the reward we gain from our built-in mental structures makes it self-interest. All behavior is self-interest. By indoctrinating children with the right built-in mental structures, we can align self-interest with group-interest.
I see that it as reciprocal altruism. Do good because it is good for you Vs good for the sake of being good which is where religion fails. For example, I don’t kill people because I am good I don’t kill people because a world where we don’t kill each other is a better place to live. If not killing people didn’t make the world a better place to live then the only reason not to kill is for the sake of being good which is pointless. That’s why I don’t have a “moral” issue with capital punishment, if not killing them doesn’t make the world a better place for me to live then not killing them is pointless.
Along these same lines, there’s no such thing as altruism. Generous behavior may appear altruistic from the outside, but the reward we gain from our built-in mental structures makes it self-interest. All behavior is self-interest. By indoctrinating children with the right built-in mental structures, we can align self-interest with group-interest.
I see that it as reciprocal altruism. Do good because it is good for you Vs good for the sake of being good which is where religion fails. For example, I don’t kill people because I am good I don’t kill people because a world where we don’t kill each other is a better place to live. If not killing people didn’t make the world a better place to live then the only reason not to kill is for the sake of being good which is pointless. That’s why I don’t have a “moral” issue with capital punishment, if not killing them doesn’t make the world a better place for me to live then not killing them is pointless.
Ah, but is that really why you don’t have a moral issue with capital punishment? Or is that just a rationalization for the built-in mental structures (or lack thereof) that are the true roots of your “feelings” on the subject?
Yes, it’s true that a world where we don’t kill each other is a better place to live. But it’s also true that circumstances might arise where your own self-interest diverges with the betterment of the rest of the world: if you could personally benefit in some tangible way by killing someone and there was no perceived chance of getting caught, for example. Wouldn’t killing someone in that case be more in your self-interest than the betterment of the world?
We’ve been equipped with built-in mental structures that reward us when we act properly and punish us when we act improperly. If only we were all on the same page in terms of “proper” and “improper” (that’s the catch, of course) and if only we all had the good fortune to have been effectively indoctrinated, we wouldn’t need police or Gods looking over our shoulders. Our moral compasses would be sufficient.
I imagine people will always disagree about what is proper and what is improper. What else can be expected?
Antisocialdarwinist - 18 August 2011 02:41 PM
On the other hand, without the benefit of built-in mental structures that reward and punish us for proper and improper behavior, we only behave properly when we think we’re under surveillance (I’m guessing that was Singer’s point, although I couldn’t read the Harper’s article without a subscription.) Witness the riots in the UK: as soon as people thought they could get away with looting, they looted—out of self-interest. Had they been indoctrinated early on with built-in mental structures that punished them for looting, they wouldn’t have looted—again, out of self-interest.
Of course, in a world filled with people constrained by built-in mental structures, the unconstrained man has the advantage.
Effective empathy instruction or therapy can result in self-insight, and self-insight inevitably leads to insights about others, as we’re all in the same boat. It allows for certain kinds of psychological skills to develop. In (my) ideal world, all school-age children would be able to test out of exposure to therapies, though empathy instruction would at least passively be included in much of the classroom instruction. No one but the most intellectually needy would be over-“therapied,” in (my) ideal world. Students would be encouraged to grow into adult occupations that involve having the capacity to call on various degrees of aggression, such as what’s common among law enforcement officers, marketing executives, and military leaders. Imagine a staff of generals who agree among themselves that only real threats deserve real fire. Strong empathy does not preclude appropriate aggression. Of course, my ideal world doesn’t exist. Maybe it could.
The kind of self insight I’m referring to allows a person to decide and regulate emotional commitments to various ideas and personalities that come up for consideration. It doesn’t automatically translate to “be nice and kind and virtuous.” It translates to whatever makes sense to the person who’s achieved self insight.
Of course, there’s always the psychopath to muck things up. But sociopaths-in-the-making might have a shot at gaining a normal conscience.
Effective empathy instruction or therapy can result in self-insight, and self-insight inevitably leads to insights about others, as we’re all in the same boat. It allows for certain kinds of psychological skills to develop. In (my) ideal world, all school-age children would be able to test out of exposure to therapies, though empathy instruction would at least passively be included in much of the classroom instruction. No one but the most intellectually needy would be over-“therapied,” in (my) ideal world. Students would be encouraged to grow into adult occupations that involve having the capacity to call on various degrees of aggression, such as what’s common among law enforcement officers, marketing executives, and military leaders. Imagine a staff of generals who agree among themselves that only real threats deserve real fire. Strong empathy does not preclude appropriate aggression. Of course, my ideal world doesn’t exist. Maybe it could.
The kind of self insight I’m referring to allows a person to decide and regulate emotional commitments to various ideas and personalities that come up for consideration. It doesn’t automatically translate to “be nice and kind and virtuous.” It translates to whatever makes sense to the person who’s achieved self insight.
We could achieve the same result by establishing different mental pathways to govern behavior for different situations or groups of people. The code of Amity for Us, for example, and the code of Enmity for Them.
I think reason alone is more likely to lead to self-interest than to the kind of self insight you’re referring to. (Yes, reason leads to the conclusion that we’re all better off if we all follow the rules—but it also leads to the conclusion that I’m better off if I cheat, provided I can get away with it. Why else do we need laws?) We’re probably on the same page here—hence your call for empathy instruction, which I take as a method for establishing certain mental pathways. But I guess my point is that if the appropriate mental pathways have been established in a person, it is no longer necessary for that person to consciously decide on the appropriate emotional commitments to various ideas and personalities. It’s no longer necessary for him to reason at all in order to behave properly.
Maybe. Or maybe I’ve just watched A Clockwork Orange too many times. (Don’t the London looters remind you of Alex and his band of droogs?)
Along these same lines, there’s no such thing as altruism. Generous behavior may appear altruistic from the outside, but the reward we gain from our built-in mental structures makes it self-interest. All behavior is self-interest. By indoctrinating children with the right built-in mental structures, we can align self-interest with group-interest.
I see that it as reciprocal altruism. Do good because it is good for you Vs good for the sake of being good which is where religion fails. For example, I don’t kill people because I am good I don’t kill people because a world where we don’t kill each other is a better place to live. If not killing people didn’t make the world a better place to live then the only reason not to kill is for the sake of being good which is pointless. That’s why I don’t have a “moral” issue with capital punishment, if not killing them doesn’t make the world a better place for me to live then not killing them is pointless.
Ah, but is that really why you don’t have a moral issue with capital punishment? Or is that just a rationalization for the built-in mental structures (or lack thereof) that are the true roots of your “feelings” on the subject?
Yes, it’s true that a world where we don’t kill each other is a better place to live. But it’s also true that circumstances might arise where your own self-interest diverges with the betterment of the rest of the world: if you could personally benefit in some tangible way by killing someone and there was no perceived chance of getting caught, for example. Wouldn’t killing someone in that case be more in your self-interest than the betterment of the world?
Yes, and that is the simple rationalization that many people use to recuse themselves from personal restraint. But there is a larger context to consider, if I can kill and get away with it then by the same reasoning someone else could kill me and get away it, and by the end of the first day there would only be the last man standing.
Yes, it’s true that a world where we don’t kill each other is a better place to live. But it’s also true that circumstances might arise where your own self-interest diverges with the betterment of the rest of the world: if you could personally benefit in some tangible way by killing someone and there was no perceived chance of getting caught, for example. Wouldn’t killing someone in that case be more in your self-interest than the betterment of the world?
Yes, and that is the simple rationalization that many people use to recuse themselves from personal restraint. But there is a larger context to consider, if I can kill and get away with it then by the same reasoning someone else could kill me and get away it, and by the end of the first day there would only be the last man standing.
I think you have it backwards. If self-interest is the goal, then cheating requires no rationalization. People only rationalize cheating to justify it vis-a-vis the “larger context.”
If self-interest is the goal, then it’s the “larger context” which requires rationalization. Because while it’s true that our behavior is influenced by those around us, it’s a pretty big stretch to claim that the behavior of society at large hinges on your personal behavior. As long as you can get away with it, and as long as you don’t have the built-in mental structures to punish you for doing so, you’re better off cheating.
Yes, it’s true that a world where we don’t kill each other is a better place to live. But it’s also true that circumstances might arise where your own self-interest diverges with the betterment of the rest of the world: if you could personally benefit in some tangible way by killing someone and there was no perceived chance of getting caught, for example. Wouldn’t killing someone in that case be more in your self-interest than the betterment of the world?
Yes, and that is the simple rationalization that many people use to recuse themselves from personal restraint. But there is a larger context to consider, if I can kill and get away with it then by the same reasoning someone else could kill me and get away it, and by the end of the first day there would only be the last man standing.
I think you have it backwards. If self-interest is the goal, then cheating requires no rationalization. People only rationalize cheating to justify it vis-a-vis the “larger context.”
If self-interest is the goal, then it’s the “larger context” which requires rationalization. Because while it’s true that our behavior is influenced by those around us, it’s a pretty big stretch to claim that the behavior of society at large hinges on your personal behavior. As long as you can get away with it, and as long as you don’t have the built-in mental structures to punish you for doing so, you’re better off cheating.
Back to the OP (the digression being too complicated for my present state of incompetence):
I’ll reiterate my usual opinion that statements of traditional morality probably are optimal, in terms of what humans generally are able to understatnd and use as a guide for action. The processes of evolution (biological, social, etc.) that formed us are “smarter than we are”, at least individually and to the current extent of our knowledge and understanding. Science is just our formal name for on aspect of what Nature has been doing for eons. Also, there’s the pragmatist’s principle that the useful should never be discarded just because it doesn’t seem as rationally well-founded as we’d like.
By all means, research and study, without presuming the conclusions.
Specifically with respect to the disagreeing points of view expressed by GAD and nonverbal, this is the tip of the iceberg of perhaps the most important disagreement among secularists: Is reciprocal altruism sufficient for moral behavior and the functioning of modern and future society, or is something else (eg, empathy) needed? Is empathy only the evolutionary result of reciprocal altruism, is it a vestigial aberration from complete rationality, or is it a necessity quite apart from the benefits of reciprocal altruism? Is reciprocal altruism always indicated from a completely rational viewpoint, or are there some possible circumstances where extreme exploitation is the more rational choice (eg, an endgame scenario, overwhelming power, etc.)?
. . . The processes of evolution (biological, social, etc.) that formed us are “smarter than we are”, at least individually and to the current extent of our knowledge and understanding. Science is just our formal name for on aspect of what Nature has been doing for eons. Also, there’s the pragmatist’s principle that the useful should never be discarded just because it doesn’t seem as rationally well-founded as we’d like.
I wouldn’t recommend excluding one or the other in the great morality v. empathy debate, Poldano. My take is that morality is and always has been a fill-in-the-gaps process of trial and error. That is, it’s always accompanied by a bit of mystery. Morality comes into play when all else fails. But yes, moral ways can certainly be fine-tuned to some degree assuming that such tuning has some way of reaching people and affecting their actions or at least their thoughts.
My empathy-education approach is a partial solution to the problem of people being chronically ignorant in our dealings with others. We form odd pictures of things when we’re informed only by ignorance. I think it’s safe to assume that most human conflicts are based on misunderstanding. The smarter we become about ourselves and others, the less conflict will take place, I would expect.
Specifically with respect to the disagreeing points of view expressed by GAD and nonverbal, this is the tip of the iceberg of perhaps the most important disagreement among secularists: Is reciprocal altruism sufficient for moral behavior and the functioning of modern and future society, or is something else (eg, empathy) needed? Is empathy only the evolutionary result of reciprocal altruism, is it a vestigial aberration from complete rationality, or is it a necessity quite apart from the benefits of reciprocal altruism? Is reciprocal altruism always indicated from a completely rational viewpoint, or are there some possible circumstances where extreme exploitation is the more rational choice (eg, an endgame scenario, overwhelming power, etc.)?
I’m not so sure GAD and I have said things that conflict. It might just be a matter of word nuance.
I see humanity’s current reliance on morality as necessary to a certain extent. But I also see a focus on morality as being similar to a focus on grammar, in the sense that school teachers used to teach grammar in a very direct way, diagramming sentences on the blackboard. Then at some point during the 1970s, teachers of English decided that it made much better sense to work toward motivating students to read and write about things that interested them. Spelling and grammar would just naturally follow especially if peer review (so to speak) were in place to some degree. These teachers were relying, in part, on the social necessity of a person wanting to learn how not to appear stupid to their friends. The motivation intrinsic to this is enormous for most students. On the other hand, teaching students how to diagram complex sentences has only questionable connection to improved writing and speaking.
I see the fine-tuning of morality as being an odd place to focus. What does it accomplish? Does it tend to assist in summarizing a culture’s biases, allowing more and more international division? Or does it somehow get disseminated to actual people, affecting their ways? I’m not sure.
Finally, I have time to write down my thoughts, sorry for waiting.
Everything you wrote is interesting, and it would be unfair to just go through your OP sentence by sentence and comment on it.
So, I will briefly write what I think is the case, in hope that it will add up to your thoughts.
I think that there are two groups of moral problems. First, there are those problems that we learn how to answer. For example, we learn that it is bad to throw junk on the floor. Although, as kids, we cant rationalize why exactly it is bad, we get that bad feeling if we throw it. It is sort of a conditional reflex, that was produced by society around us, mostly our parents.
In other group, there are those which we feel by heart, and it is these ones that I would like to talk about. I think it all comes from mirror neurons. This is how I see it.
I think we can all agree that there is a kind of moral dilemmas which we just know how to answer, and don’t know why we think that way. Best example for this is that train track and the fat man story.
All these dilemmas can be explained (in my opinion) trough empathy. In the story mentioned above, we simply feel empathy towards fat man because he is in the center of the story. If we added a part to a story how one of the people on the track is a widow that has 3 children, that would lost there mother and will have to go to orphanage, than the focus of the story shifts, and with it, our empathy, so we would (in more cases) stop the train with that fat man.
To explain something through empathy, we must have a biological basis for empathy itself. I think that it can be found in mirror neurons.
Mirror neurons provide us with someone else’s emotions. If other person is feeling pain, we feel pain ourselves. So it is ourselves that we are protecting.
So, how did mirror neurons evolved? I don’t know. There are theories that it evolved to give animals the ability of social learning. It may be true, but somehow it seems to me that social learning is just another byproduct of mirror neurons, same as empathy.
Well, this is my opinion about morality. You (nonverbal) cover more of the philosophy part of it, so I hope this adds nicely
. . . The processes of evolution (biological, social, etc.) that formed us are “smarter than we are”, at least individually and to the current extent of our knowledge and understanding. Science is just our formal name for on aspect of what Nature has been doing for eons. Also, there’s the pragmatist’s principle that the useful should never be discarded just because it doesn’t seem as rationally well-founded as we’d like.
I wouldn’t recommend excluding one or the other in the great morality v. empathy debate, Poldano. My take is that morality is and always has been a fill-in-the-gaps process of trial and error. That is, it’s always accompanied by a bit of mystery. Morality comes into play when all else fails. But yes, moral ways can certainly be fine-tuned to some degree assuming that such tuning has some way of reaching people and affecting their actions or at least their thoughts.
My empathy-education approach is a partial solution to the problem of people being chronically ignorant in our dealings with others. We form odd pictures of things when we’re informed only by ignorance. I think it’s safe to assume that most human conflicts are based on misunderstanding. The smarter we become about ourselves and others, the less conflict will take place, I would expect.
I can’t really disagree with you. All I can really do is embellish around the edges. For one, I think your assumptions can be tested and validated. For another, there is some question about whether empathy is always a good thing, and that can be discussed.
I definitely agree that morality is a trial-and-error process, whether it is defined as a stated body of rules (a la moral philosophy), as the entire interactive protocol of an organism, or somewhere in between. Whatever it is, it is necessarily constrained by the cognitive capabilites of the individuals who need to practice it and, in the case of a stated body of rules, learn it, in much the same way that language is. I’m OK with your characterization of the trial-and-error process as “accompanied by a bit of mystery”, but I have to minimize the “mystery” aspect to avoid interprettions of religious bias (i.e., call it partly random instead).
Specifically with respect to the disagreeing points of view expressed by GAD and nonverbal, this is the tip of the iceberg of perhaps the most important disagreement among secularists: Is reciprocal altruism sufficient for moral behavior and the functioning of modern and future society, or is something else (eg, empathy) needed? Is empathy only the evolutionary result of reciprocal altruism, is it a vestigial aberration from complete rationality, or is it a necessity quite apart from the benefits of reciprocal altruism? Is reciprocal altruism always indicated from a completely rational viewpoint, or are there some possible circumstances where extreme exploitation is the more rational choice (eg, an endgame scenario, overwhelming power, etc.)?
I’m not so sure GAD and I have said things that conflict. It might just be a matter of word nuance.
I see humanity’s current reliance on morality as necessary to a certain extent. But I also see a focus on morality as being similar to a focus on grammar, in the sense that school teachers used to teach grammar in a very direct way, diagramming sentences on the blackboard. Then at some point during the 1970s, teachers of English decided that it made much better sense to work toward motivating students to read and write about things that interested them. Spelling and grammar would just naturally follow especially if peer review (so to speak) were in place to some degree. These teachers were relying, in part, on the social necessity of a person wanting to learn how not to appear stupid to their friends. The motivation intrinsic to this is enormous for most students. On the other hand, teaching students how to diagram complex sentences has only questionable connection to improved writing and speaking.
I see the fine-tuning of morality as being an odd place to focus. What does it accomplish? Does it tend to assist in summarizing a culture’s biases, allowing more and more international division? Or does it somehow get disseminated to actual people, affecting their ways? I’m not sure.
You and GAD are not on “identical vectors” with respect to is subject, but at the same time do not come anywhere near to having a “zero sum” result, i.e., completely opposite opinions. I’m kind of curious about whether reciprocal altruism is really sufficient to generate the same kind of moral behavior as what most of us consider moral.
I see the fine-tuning of morality as epiphenomenal to the process by which face-to-face, empathy-bounded moral behavior was extended to make larger groups of people viable. This is the phenomenon of Jaspers’ “Great Transformation”. Empathy is (or starts with) a neurological phenomenon based on sensori-motor mimicry of other people’s expressions. In order to make it useful in the larger domain of non-face-to-face interactions, which became necessary with urbanization, it had to be codified as sets enumerable of rules. The moral philosophy is in this sense the process to reduce the rules to the minimum set of axioms necessary to generate acceptable actions in all situations.
Specifically with respect to the disagreeing points of view expressed by GAD and nonverbal, this is the tip of the iceberg of perhaps the most important disagreement among secularists: Is reciprocal altruism sufficient for moral behavior and the functioning of modern and future society, or is something else (eg, empathy) needed? Is empathy only the evolutionary result of reciprocal altruism, is it a vestigial aberration from complete rationality, or is it a necessity quite apart from the benefits of reciprocal altruism? Is reciprocal altruism always indicated from a completely rational viewpoint, or are there some possible circumstances where extreme exploitation is the more rational choice (eg, an endgame scenario, overwhelming power, etc.)?
I’m not so sure GAD and I have said things that conflict. It might just be a matter of word nuance.
I see humanity’s current reliance on morality as necessary to a certain extent. But I also see a focus on morality as being similar to a focus on grammar, in the sense that school teachers used to teach grammar in a very direct way, diagramming sentences on the blackboard. Then at some point during the 1970s, teachers of English decided that it made much better sense to work toward motivating students to read and write about things that interested them. Spelling and grammar would just naturally follow especially if peer review (so to speak) were in place to some degree. These teachers were relying, in part, on the social necessity of a person wanting to learn how not to appear stupid to their friends. The motivation intrinsic to this is enormous for most students. On the other hand, teaching students how to diagram complex sentences has only questionable connection to improved writing and speaking.
I see the fine-tuning of morality as being an odd place to focus. What does it accomplish? Does it tend to assist in summarizing a culture’s biases, allowing more and more international division? Or does it somehow get disseminated to actual people, affecting their ways? I’m not sure.
You and GAD are not on “identical vectors” with respect to is subject, but at the same time do not come anywhere near to having a “zero sum” result, i.e., completely opposite opinions. I’m kind of curious about whether reciprocal altruism is really sufficient to generate the same kind of moral behavior as what most of us consider moral.
I see the fine-tuning of morality as epiphenomenal to the process by which face-to-face, empathy-bounded moral behavior was extended to make larger groups of people viable. This is the phenomenon of Jaspers’ “Great Transformation”. Empathy is (or starts with) a neurological phenomenon based on sensori-motor mimicry of other people’s expressions. In order to make it useful in the larger domain of non-face-to-face interactions, which became necessary with urbanization, it had to be codified as sets enumerable of rules. The moral philosophy is in this sense the process to reduce the rules to the minimum set of axioms necessary to generate acceptable actions in all situations.
I define Morality = the consensus of personal preferences of a group = moral relativism.
I think reciprocal altruism is a prime factor of those preferences.
I define Morality = the consensus of personal preferences of a group = moral relativism.
I think reciprocal altruism is a prime factor of those preferences.
Thanks, I appreciate the very specific statements.
I see more clearly why you have such problems with TML. Sam chose to assert the existence of an absolute morality as, effectively, an axiom. I think the same (i.e., equally sufficient) rhetorical position can be obtained by deriving it from a position of moral relativism, but it takes more work. That work was part of what I was expecting from the book. So, IMO, we figuratively got a Fiat in a kit instead of a fully-assembled and road-tested Lamborghini. Such is life.
I used to think quite highly of the reciprocal altruism principle, but I’ve developed some uncertainties about it. For one thing, it doesn’t work well when there are vast disparities of power and capability among the participants. For another, it’s a philosophical maxim of sorts, arrived at by some evolutionary means; I think we need to understand those means much better, and in detail.
. . . [T]here is some question about whether empathy is always a good thing, and that can be discussed.
Especially since children currently receiving empathy therapy remain as an exclusive and small group (mainly those who can be described as being somewhere on the autism spectrum), I agree that discussion of empathy is in order.
Here’s Simon Baron-Cohen’s (2003) definition of empathy: “Empathy is about spontaneously and naturally tuning into the other person’s thoughts and feelings, whatever these might be [...]There are two major elements to empathy. The first is the cognitive component: Understanding the others feelings and the ability to take their perspective [...] the second element to empathy is the affective component. This is an observer’s appropriate emotional response to another person’s emotional state.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empathy
I think it’s natural to apply more to empathy and its therapies than is actually there. I’ve spoken to 3 or 4 teachers who make use of empathy therapy in the classroom, and I’ve also observed what goes on in empathy therapy for autistic kids. Of course, observing and talking to people does not make me an expert by any means. But the field is in its infancy, assuming it continues to grow in scope and numbers of practitioners. So eventually it may be that several sub-fields will emerge from within the field of empathy therapy, each one perhaps emphasizing certain things.
Nothing about legitimate empathy therapy is prescriptive. It doesn’t seek to indoctrinate. Nothing about it relies on subjective instructions to be nice and kind and forgiving to others. In fact, the way I’ve seen it taught actually includes a need for not trusting others in many contexts. Empathy therapy amounts to reality therapy for people who lack understanding about how other people think, feel and act. People who have been through extensive empathy therapy can remain as flawed and dishonest as anyone else. It promotes understanding only. It need not arrive with any behavioral prescriptions whatsoever.
Antisocialdarwinist - 19 August 2011 08:18 AM
We could achieve the same result by establishing different mental pathways to govern behavior for different situations or groups of people. The code of Amity for Us, for example, and the code of Enmity for Them.
I’m not so much proposing that teachers and therapists attempt to change or defang our children, as to educate them appropriately. If appropriate empathy seems lacking in a student, then a proper education, it seems obvious to me, includes providing that student with whatever educational/therapeutic tools he needs in order to fit in with a class. Kids would retain their personalities, each of them entirely able and in fact encouraged to take responsibility for whatever traits they might express. A society rich in empathy amounts to a group of people who understand themselves. They could be anything, ideologically, morally, politically.
About 15 years ago, a friend of mine, Roylene, had recently earned her teaching credential for special-ed but needed to work in a program serving intellectually disabled adults until she found a school position. She picked up some very specific skills working with autistic and other adults, including a focus on empathy training for those who seem to lack a certain competency. After a couple of years of this work, Roylene got a job teaching in a public school. She applied some tricks she’d manage to pick up working with retarded adults, including an emphasis on empathy skill building, and by the end of her first school term, veteran teachers earning twice her salary were begging for advice on classroom control and other issues. She won awards. Talking to her about this experience has stayed with me over the years. I was once a classroom teacher, as well (secondary English), and know firsthand what a valuable approach Roylene has.
Sorry—I misstated things. Roylene had earned a teaching certificate in elementary ed, not special ed. The public school position she found was for general students, not special ed. That was why it stuck in my head for this long (though obviously disintegrating around the edges a bit). Her class of normal students benefited tremendously from empathy techniques she’d used with severely autistic and other mentally difficult people. My apologies.
Yes, it’s true that a world where we don’t kill each other is a better place to live. But it’s also true that circumstances might arise where your own self-interest diverges with the betterment of the rest of the world: if you could personally benefit in some tangible way by killing someone and there was no perceived chance of getting caught, for example. Wouldn’t killing someone in that case be more in your self-interest than the betterment of the world?
Yes, and that is the simple rationalization that many people use to recuse themselves from personal restraint. But there is a larger context to consider, if I can kill and get away with it then by the same reasoning someone else could kill me and get away it, and by the end of the first day there would only be the last man standing.
I think you have it backwards. If self-interest is the goal, then cheating requires no rationalization. People only rationalize cheating to justify it vis-a-vis the “larger context.”
If self-interest is the goal, then it’s the “larger context” which requires rationalization. Because while it’s true that our behavior is influenced by those around us, it’s a pretty big stretch to claim that the behavior of society at large hinges on your personal behavior. As long as you can get away with it, and as long as you don’t have the built-in mental structures to punish you for doing so, you’re better off cheating.
I have to disagree with that.
As I see it, we’re comparing two separate consequences of cheating.
The direct benefit of cheating has a positive impact on the cheater’s well-being (assuming the cheater neither gets caught nor feels remorse). If I steal something, my well-being is directly increased by the value of the thing I’m stealing.
The indirect costs of cheating have a negative impact on the cheater’s well-being. If I steal something, it creates an environment (the “larger context”) in which other people are presumably encouraged to cheat, too. This indirectly decreases my well-being because now I’m at a greater risk of having my stuff stolen, I have to pay more for the things I buy (to cover the sellers’ losses to theft and increased cost of security), etc.
If you’re right, then the indirect costs exceed the direct benefit. If I’m right, the direct benefit exceeds the indirect costs.
Do you think there’s an objectively right answer, or is it strictly a matter of opinion?
If there’s an objectively right answer, how would we determine it?
If it’s strictly a matter of opinion, then you can’t really rely on people using only this line of reasoning as a deterrent to cheating. Can you?
The direct benefit of cheating has a positive impact on the cheater’s well-being (assuming the cheater neither gets caught nor feels remorse). If I steal something, my well-being is directly increased by the value of the thing I’m stealing.
It’s a minor point, but are you stretching the use of well-being here? I’m not sure. It would seem to depend on what is being stolen or cheated on as well as certain of the attributes of the cheater or thief. If a stolen item ends up being destructive in some way to oneself or close associates, then it might better be called perceived well-being, or short-term feelings of well-being. Cheating can also often end up biting oneself in the ass in the long run, wouldn’t you say? Maybe well-being is too vague a term without being sub-categorized.
The direct benefit of cheating has a positive impact on the cheater’s well-being (assuming the cheater neither gets caught nor feels remorse). If I steal something, my well-being is directly increased by the value of the thing I’m stealing.
It’s a minor point, but are you stretching the use of well-being here? I’m not sure. It would seem to depend on what is being stolen or cheated on as well as certain of the attributes of the cheater or thief. If a stolen item ends up being destructive in some way to oneself or close associates, then it might better be called perceived well-being, or short-term feelings of well-being. Cheating can also often end up biting oneself in the ass in the long run, wouldn’t you say? Maybe well-being is too vague a term without being sub-categorized.
Fair enough. Perceived well-being it is. I don’t think that changes my argument. The same could be said of something which is bought and paid for, that it could end up being destructive in some way.
Yes, it’s true that a world where we don’t kill each other is a better place to live. But it’s also true that circumstances might arise where your own self-interest diverges with the betterment of the rest of the world: if you could personally benefit in some tangible way by killing someone and there was no perceived chance of getting caught, for example. Wouldn’t killing someone in that case be more in your self-interest than the betterment of the world?
Yes, and that is the simple rationalization that many people use to recuse themselves from personal restraint. But there is a larger context to consider, if I can kill and get away with it then by the same reasoning someone else could kill me and get away it, and by the end of the first day there would only be the last man standing.
I think you have it backwards. If self-interest is the goal, then cheating requires no rationalization. People only rationalize cheating to justify it vis-a-vis the “larger context.”
If self-interest is the goal, then it’s the “larger context” which requires rationalization. Because while it’s true that our behavior is influenced by those around us, it’s a pretty big stretch to claim that the behavior of society at large hinges on your personal behavior. As long as you can get away with it, and as long as you don’t have the built-in mental structures to punish you for doing so, you’re better off cheating.
I have to disagree with that.
As I see it, we’re comparing two separate consequences of cheating.
The direct benefit of cheating has a positive impact on the cheater’s well-being (assuming the cheater neither gets caught nor feels remorse). If I steal something, my well-being is directly increased by the value of the thing I’m stealing.
The indirect costs of cheating have a negative impact on the cheater’s well-being. If I steal something, it creates an environment (the “larger context”) in which other people are presumably encouraged to cheat, too. This indirectly decreases my well-being because now I’m at a greater risk of having my stuff stolen, I have to pay more for the things I buy (to cover the sellers’ losses to theft and increased cost of security), etc.
If you’re right, then the indirect costs exceed the direct benefit. If I’m right, the direct benefit exceeds the indirect costs.
Do you think there’s an objectively right answer, or is it strictly a matter of opinion?
If there’s an objectively right answer, how would we determine it?
If it’s strictly a matter of opinion, then you can’t really rely on people using only this line of reasoning as a deterrent to cheating. Can you?
Well, we are not dealing with absolutes so there is subjectivity but I would point to the universal consensus (as far as I know) of laws against stealing across all cultures going back as far in human society as we can see. I would think that game theory would support it as well.
