If morals are not biology or magic, what is their source?

[Skeptic Ginger]

In another thread I said morality is either derived from biology or the only other option is some kind of magical source. Does morality stem from a magic sky man sprinkling pixie dust in the eyes of newborns? Do we pull it out of thin air?

It was said this is a false dichotomy. So I'd like to know what is the source of human morality?

There is evidence learning is not the key. Young children express moral choices unrelated to learning. And if you claim moral behavior is purely learned, then what motivated humans to teach it in the first place if it was not a biological/evolutionary basis?

There is evidence morality evolved. Animals express moral behavior.

There is evidence morality is associated with the physical brain because brain damage can change one's moral behavior.

I interpret this as evidence morality is biologically based. A recent study of fraternal and identical twins supports that conclusion:


Are We Programmed For Kindness?

In other words, do we have a "goodness gene" that encourages us to do the right thing?

Ruston thinks the answer is yes, although such a gene is obviously expressed differently in some persons than it is in others.

He bases that opinion on decades of analyzing data he collected through the University of London Institute of Psychiatry Adult Twin Register, the source for many studies about twins and genetics.

Ruston submitted a series of 22 questions to 174 pairs of identical twins, who share all their genes because they came from a single egg, and 148 pairs of fraternal twins, who share only half their genes because they came equally from the mother and the father. ...

... So identical twins should agree on moral issues twice as often as fraternal twins, at least if genetics has any influence on human compassion.

And, he says, that's precisely what he found.

So if I've presented a false dichotomy, magic or biology, then where do other people believe morals originate from?

 

[qayak]

A case can be made for the basis being genetic as there are about 200 universal moral principals.

Perhaps the rest is also genetic in that we search for patterns and consistency in chaos.

No sky daddy required.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Morals are the things that allow us to live with ourselves. Ethics are the things that allow us to live with others.

 

[Lord Muck oGentry]

In another thread I said morality is either derived from biology or the only other option is some kind of magical source. Does morality stem from a magic sky man sprinkling pixie dust in the eyes of newborns? Do we pull it out of thin air?

It was said this is a false dichotomy. So I'd like to know what is the source of human morality?

There is evidence learning is not the key. Young children express moral choices unrelated to learning. And if you claim moral behavior is purely learned, then what motivated humans to teach it in the first place if it was not a biological/evolutionary basis?

There is evidence morality evolved. Animals express moral behavior.

There is evidence morality is associated with the physical brain because brain damage can change one's moral behavior.

I interpret this as evidence morality is biologically based. A recent study of fraternal and identical twins supports that conclusion:


Are We Programmed For Kindness?


So if I've presented a false dichotomy, magic or biology, then where do other people believe morals originate from?

Dunno about the false dichotomy business, as I haven't read the discussion.
But it occurs to me that the question how we come by our moral opinions and the question how we justify or defend them are not just two different questions but questions of two different types.

 

[Dymanic]

My take on it is that a sense of morals emerges naturally out of the ability to imagine ourselves in another's place (the "golden rule" being an obvious consequence of that). I would therefore agree that it is derived from biology, as the ability to perform such mental gymnastics is derived from biology. I don't see the basis for calling it a false dichotomy, other than to note that biology alone neither demands moral behavior nor guarantees development of the cognitive capacity needed to support it (though, following Gawdzilla's observation, "ethics" may be another matter in social animals). I pretty much agree with David Hume on a lot of this. It's about sentiment more than reason. Moral behavior itself may or may not offer reproductive advantages, and can in fact be a distinct disadvantage in many situations -- but the cognitive infrastructure is another matter. Morals may be like piano playing or algebra: it's not the activity itself that offers a good payoff in biological currency, but simply the capacity for performing such sophisticated tricks.

 

[Gawdzilla Sama]

Just saw an episode of "Life" (the series Oprah narrated if you haven't seen it). She stated that recent studies have shown primates can be altruistic. They can be "kind". This is ethical behaviour. Social animals exhibit it to a greater or lesser degree. Severely injured animals have recovered because other animals feed them through the recuperation, we know this because of bones that were fully healed and post-injury by years before death.

Just noting the above, I'm too soggy to take it anywhere.

 

[Rufo]

First, 'morality' is a pretty broad concept. I think we must take into account that some parts of it may be derived from one source and others from another. I understand that this is a vague statement and that the dichotomy can't reasonably be questioned solely on those grounds, but I can see this being an issue once we get into specific parts of morality, so I just wanted to state it early on.

Second, I'm not sure I understand how far 'derived' applies. Morality is a behavior in living beings, and life is biological, so of course if you derive the source of morality far back enough, there is a biological cause. On the other hand, environment influences evolution and biology, so you could also say the cause is environmental. And in creatures that teach and learn, this also changes their conditions for surviving and reproducing, and thus also influnences their evolution, being yet another possible cause to derive morals from.

Am I making any sense at all here, or did I just completely miss the point of the OP? If this is originated in a evolution vs creationism debate, then it's not strange the dichotomy appeared, but I'm not sure how it's useful outside of that context.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Dunno about the false dichotomy business, as I haven't read the discussion.

There was no real discussion. The subject was off topic for the thread it was in. But I should post a link to where the discussion started in case people care to see the context.

It began here:

As for the special treatment of god beliefs, one example is the concept of faith based beliefs being separate from 'standard' evidence based beliefs. Am I wrong to think that when you consider the personal experiences you believe are evidence for gods (to the theist) you draw a different conclusion about the personal experience evidence for homeopathy the homeopathy believer bases their belief on? In other words, are you giving your theist friends a pass you would not give to someone else who drew their conclusion based on a temporal association the believer interpreted as a causal relationship?

Just as a guess, I would say morality based claims and claims that cannot empirically tested are in fact different from beliefs that can be empirically tested.

[snipped stuff not related to the morality question]

Then it went here:

Just as a guess, I would say morality based claims and claims that cannot empirically tested are in fact different from beliefs that can be empirically tested.

This requires a full thread to reply to. My view of morality is that it is a biological process, not a magical one. I'll leave it at that but elaborate on the concept further below.

[snipped stuff not related to the morality question]

And ended here:

This requires a full thread to reply to. My view of morality is that it is a biological process, not a magical one. I'll leave it at that but elaborate on the concept further below.

"magical"? I hope you didn't mean that as an der..

(You know what? Outright dismissing the claim with a convient label? Let's call that Argument to Labeling. I dunno what it actually is, but hey. And since this needs a formal writeup
[snipped a whole bunch of stuff about the "argument to labeling"]

"magical"? I hope you didn't mean that as an der..

No. It was not intended to be derogatory. It is a description that answers the question, if my morality is not derived from biology (and evidence morality evolved can easily be demonstrated), then where is it derived from? Does a magic sky man sprinkle pixie dust in the eyes of newborns? Do we pull it out of thin air?

The reason I say magical is to illustrate that it is either biology or magic. take your pick or feel free to offer some other evidence based source of morality.

The rest is getting off topic. There are other threads we've had this discussion in. In no way did I dismiss anything. I'm looking at the evidence.

As this is getting off topic, I will simply say that you could have linked to them [meaning the other threads]. And with the above false dichotomy, I will end. Not worth it.

But it occurs to me that the question how we come by our moral opinions and the question how we justify or defend them are not just two different questions but questions of two different types.

How does the means of defending one's moral choice not also rest in the underlying biological basis of morality? In other words, maybe I don't recognize the motivation for my moral decisions is biological, so if justifying a decision I might give an elaborate explanation. But the bottom line still comes down to something akin to "it feels right (or wrong)". That 'feeling' is biology.

 

[Skeptic Ginger]

Perhaps I should simplify the question here.

If one dismisses the biological basis of morality, then where does it come from? What accounts for moral feelings, decisions, beliefs?

Again, regarding the 'nurture' component if you think there is no 'nature' involved, then why did humans begin teaching any moral concepts to our offspring?

I'm not really asking about nature vs nurture. Morality would appear to be some kind of mix between the two. That is still biology unless you think something else accounts for humans teaching morality to their offspring other than biology.

I made the claim, morality is either derived from our biological make-up or you have nothing left to explain it other than magic.

If that is a false dichotomy, because one doesn't believe morality is biological and one finds the term, magic, to be insulting [or whatever], then where do morals come from?

 

[Rufo]

[...]
I'm not really asking about nature vs nurture. Morality would appear to be some kind of mix between the two. That is still biology unless you think something else accounts for humans teaching morality to their offspring other than biology.
[...]

How is a mix of nature and nurture still purely biology? Surely there are more possible reasons to have a moral opinion and to teach that opinion than biological ones - something could have happened to you or your society that made you form an opinion that leads to a moral feeling, behavior and value that you wish to pass on.

Of course, biology still determines your reaction to an event, so you could argue that even this is a biological factor. But then you've reduced it to what I stated in my previous post, that since living beings are biological, and living beings are what we observe morals in, then morals must be biological. I don't see the relevance of such a claim.

 

[brenn]

In another thread I said morality is either derived from biology or the only other option is some kind of magical source. Does morality stem from a magic sky man sprinkling pixie dust in the eyes of newborns? Do we pull it out of thin air?

Yes, we pull them out of thin air. At the most basic, morals are just decisions about conduct based on enlightened self-interest. They seem like magic because that is one of the primary ways that those who are capable of understanding them have always imposed them on those who are not.

I'm inclined to think that whoever came up with the biology/magic idea lacked even the most basic education in philosophy (not saying mine is good (it's not), but even uneducated reasoning should do better than that).

 

[Gord_in_Toronto]

This topic comes up every now and again on this Forum. And I have replied before. My server is down right now so I can't access my "Knowledge Base" on this but check out Evolutionary_game_theory^WP.

Essentially, co-operation is a survival factor.

 

[Beth]

I made the claim, morality is either derived from our biological make-up or you have nothing left to explain it other than magic.

If that is a false dichotomy, because one doesn't believe morality is biological and one finds the term, magic, to be insulting [or whatever], then where do morals come from?

Let's try that with another abstract set of ideas we humans have invented/discovered:

mathematics is either derived from our biological make-up or you have nothing left to explain it other than magic.

If that is a false dichotomy, because one doesn't believe mathematics is biological and one finds the term, magic, to be insulting [or whatever], then where do mathematics come from?

Somehow, mathematics doesn't seem biologically based to me. If you want to call it magic, you can. It comes as close as anything I've ever come across in my life.

 

[Drachasor]

Certainly some base feeling for ethics emerged evolutionarily. That doesn't mean such evolutionary instincts are good ideas though. Evolution also has us dying to disease and other factors and we regularly impose our will over it. So letting evolution dictate how we should live is silly.

Really you have to start with the purpose of ethics. As someone here said, it is about living with others, or stated from a non-first person perspective, ethics is about rules that allow people to live in some sort of harmony. Some rules are clearly better in this regard than others, but figuring out the best ones is a non-trivial task.

 

[Beerina]

Perhaps I should simplify the question here.

If one dismisses the biological basis of morality, then where does it come from? What accounts for moral feelings, decisions, beliefs?

Again, regarding the 'nurture' component if you think there is no 'nature' involved, then why did humans begin teaching any moral concepts to our offspring?

I'm not really asking about nature vs nurture. Morality would appear to be some kind of mix between the two. That is still biology unless you think something else accounts for humans teaching morality to their offspring other than biology.

I made the claim, morality is either derived from our biological make-up or you have nothing left to explain it other than magic.

If that is a false dichotomy, because one doesn't believe morality is biological and one finds the term, magic, to be insulting [or whatever], then where do morals come from?

Well, there's learning-and-thinking to figure out workable solutions that could get culturally ingrained as "morality". These would take advantage of biologically-based emotions, but otherwise could be largely in the realm of higher ideas.

Intelligence is, after all, an even faster way to evolve changing and adaptive behavior for the organism.

That ain't helpin' "magic", though.

 

[BobTheDonkey]

I think, SG, that your OP fails to recognize the "nature vs nurture" sociological discussion and resembles: "it's not this specific type of magical and it's not nature, so is it magical?"


When we discuss evolutionary advances in a biological sense, we're discussing a change that occurs and is passed on to the next generation where it cannot be altered until it is passed on to the next, ad infinitum. However, when discussing a nurtured trait, such as morality, we can see where there are overlaps between one generation and the next. As such, some morality that the previous generation has developed/learned is able to be passed on to the next generation(s).

For example, let's discuss the changing morality behind slavery.

At some point in time, thousands of years ago, one of our ancestors decided that it would be beneficial for him to own another of his/her species. This ancestor's offspring thus learned that slavery is acceptable. As the centuries passed, the details behind the who/where/why/etc of slavery adapted as the latest generation's interpretation changed, but the morality behind slavery was passed on via nurturing the next generation to accept this more. As the generations continued to pass, other morals began to seriously conflict with the slavery moral until, eventually, the conflicting mores became more valued by Society

Species do better when their clan/pack/in-group protects it's own. In this way, murder was taught to be immoral, while waging war against one's enemies was taught to be moral. And as the generations pass, we find society's position on the morality of war to be shifting.

 

[HansMustermann]

Check out: mirror neurons.

At least all mammals, but probably starting a lot lower on evolution scales, do come pre-wired for the golden rule. Anything you see someone else doing or being done to them, you essentially partially see yourself doing or being done to you.

It has obvious advantages too. For a start, it's why for example a cat or dog will "pull the punches" when fighting one of its own species, instead of going for a quick kill like it's programmed to do with anything else, and why it will stop when the other acknowledges defeat although it won't stop when fighting a rat. It also helps with learning from what you see the the others doing.

But at any rate, on one hand, it's why we really don't like killing someone. Sure, people may be conditioned to chest thump for war, but when push comes to shove, studies show that only 20% or less of soldiers actually shoot at the enemy. And a lot of PTSD comes from killing someone else, rather than threat to self.

On the other hand, it's probably why porn works

 

[Mahaha]

I agree. If by morals you mean the fact that there is a natural inclination to doing good things to others, you are almost certainly true.
I mean, a lot of mammals exhibit "altruism" in context where it is not necessary: it's an extension of the evolved behaviour of collaboration, which is essential to survival. The foremost examples are anthropomorphic primates and dolphines.

Our brains can sophisticate and make complex some pretty basic reactions. Like the instinct to accumulate resources to survive and be more attractive to wome becomes greed in humans, and generates some odd social mechanisms (like the escalation of goods with you neighbour).
The fear of being excluded from the social group (which in nature would lead to death) becomes the constant will of being aknowledged.

So "morals" (in a certain definition) arises from empathy, which is an essential mechanism of survival that evolved through time.

 

[Fiona]

That says very little about the content though. The OP uses a twin study to try to demonstrate that the content of moral systems is biological and that is a very different question.

 

[brenn]

I agree. If by morals you mean the fact that there is a natural inclination to doing good things to others, you are almost certainly true.
I mean, a lot of mammals exhibit "altruism" in context where it is not necessary: it's an extension of the evolved behaviour of collaboration, which is essential to survival. The foremost examples are anthropomorphic primates and dolphines.

This is on par with ancient aliens and psychics communicating with the dead...and somewhat below bigfoot. I realize it will not be questioned because it makes both leftr and right-wing nuts happy.