franz kiekeben
  • Home
  • Blog
  • Philosophy
  • Publications
  • Contact

IS EVOLUTIONARY ETHICS SELFISH?

2/8/2017

0 Comments

 
Nonbelievers often appeal to evolutionary explanations to account for the existence of moral behavior. For example, we human beings care for our relatives because those who are related to us share much of the same genetic material; we are usually nice to others because then they will be nice to us; and so on.

Such explanations make good sense, even if they are not always quite this simple and straightforward, and even if there are areas where uncertainty remains. But unfortunately, some critics continue to misunderstand the basic idea behind them.

Consider the following criticism of Dawkins by one of the many authors who wrote responses to the new atheists a few years back:


“...Dawkins fails to recognize that none of [his] examples of 'morality' represent classical selfless altruism. In each case, the altruist has a vested self-interest in the action, a self-serving motive... the atheist version of morality implies that we only do good when there is something 'in it for us'.” (R. C. Metcalf, Letter to a Christian Nation: Counter Point, p. 9)

This author is not alone. I've come across the above criticism several other times, both in print and on the internet. And yet the objection completely misses the point.

According to these critics, the evolutionary account of moral behavior fails to explain altruism because it claims that the underlying reason for it is self-interested. Thus, they say, on the Darwinian view, those who are helpful to their neighbors aren't really being selfless: they only do it so that the neighbors will in turn help them.

That, however, is a misrepresentation of the view. What these critics don't understand is that the evolutionary account is an explanation of why we have feelings of empathy. The underlying reasons for our behavior that the view refers to are not the reasons we give to ourselves for acting. Rather, they are the reasons why we are naturally predisposed to act in the ways that we do.

To see how ridiculous their criticism is, imagine what they would say regarding a mother who goes hungry so that her child can have enough to eat. On their misunderstanding of the Darwinian account, this mother is not really being selfless. Instead, she has the self-interested desire that the genes she has passed along to her offspring flourish. But of course the Darwinian view does not claim that we make conscious calculations of what's in the best interest of our genes!


Similarly, it isn't that we are nice to a neighbor because we think that they might in turn be nice to us. We have evolved to be nice – to have the altruistic feelings that we have – because it is to our benefit to have those feelings. Thus, we do not perform selfless acts only when we realize there is “something in it for us.” We perform them when we have the altruistic motivation to do so – a motivation that, as it turns out, is usually good for us to have.
​

0 Comments

    Archives

    April 2022
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014

    Categories

    All
    Atheism
    Creationism
    Determinism And Free Will
    Ethics
    Infinity
    Politics And Religion
    Presuppositionalism

    RSS Feed

Link to my author's page on Amazon