Something that puzzled me about evolution?

Question

We adapted and changed due to the sole reason of survival. Why then do we have a conscious and have moral judgments? Techically we did not require these things to survive. We may have even done better in survival if we didn't have morals "nice guys finish last" in the wild in a dog eat dog world you'd imagine the most brutal, the most violent and the most powerful would defeat the nicest. Hence kindness and niceness should have been elimated from the genetic gene pool. Such as people who favored night time and heights have all died out due to dangers of the night and height. A man who lacks moral conscious would obvisiously benefit from survival more than a person who is nice and giving. Why have we evolved all other aspects for survival and yet evolve a trait that would harm us in survival? Dunno this doesn't seem to make sense

Answer 1

I think I can try to answer this. If you look at it from the perspective of the evolution of civilization as well as the evolution of humankind, it might make sense to you. Our society rewards those who are morally upstanding and possess certain character traits. These traits, therefore, are competing for survival along with the physical traits that are competing in the gene pool for survival in the species. As humans moved from being nomadic hunters and gatherers to established civilizations, this societal evolution began to exert its effects on the evolution of the species, as well.

Answer 2

Kindness and niceness were originally functions of a group dynamic. Humans are a pack animal like wolves, we do better in groups than isolation and we also tend to follow the strongest leaders and examples, our alphas. It is more rewarding to work together in a group than to not because there are more spoils from larger conquests, and the dog eat dog society you speak has much fewer rewards and survivors, even primitive primates could understand that. Morals are just what we tell ourselves are the right things to do, some people have none in their society. At least none you would find to be the same as yours. I would counter argue that the things you consider morally correct are not equally shared throughout the world which seems to cast doubt that such concepts were divinly implanted into humanity.
Beyond that your ascertation that people who prefer the night and heights died out because they were dangerous makes no sense. I favor the night as do many people, and a lot of people love working high rise construction. You meant fear of the dark, not the night, but that is becasue humans did not eveolve night sight and simply can't see, they didn't evolve long necks like a giraffe, or big ears like an elephant either. Animals evolve to their strengths, for humans it was a big brain.

Answer 3

I agree that in human history there has been some advantage to being brutal and violent and these characteristics have certainly survived. However humans also evolved as social animals. This is not at all unusual in the animal kingdom. There is safety in numbers, there is division of labour, there is the possibility of surrogate parenting should a biological parent die. Therefore, the humans that formed social bonds and stayed together as a group were also provided an advantage. Being nice, having "morals" and a conscious are ways to ensure long-term commitment to the group and therefore, individuals with these characteristics were likely to reproduce and not harmed in the quest for survival.

Answer 4

You are absolutely right, we don't have to have morals. In fact, your neighbors can suddenly throw morals out the window, break into your house, steal your furniture, kill you and your family (if you have one) and then the block can throw a celebration party with the proceeds of everything they've stolen.

Except that maybe, just maybe, the neighbors realize that doing that might give other people the same idea, and one night those people would break into their house...yada yada yada.

And, if you stop and think about it, who are the most paranoid people on this earth: your neighbors, or the guy who wants to take an axe to everyone? Most (not all) people who live by the 'dog eat dog' philosophy learn that there are always bigger dogs out there, and that the wolf today might simply be a toothless pooch tomorrow. And a wolf who thinks someone else is just a puppy can suddenly find themselves face to face with one mean, rabid, gigantic thing called Cerebus, and that philosophy of 'dog eat dog' doesn't seem so inviting all-of-a-sudden.

People who give away kindness find kindness in short supply sooner or later. Consciousness and moral judgements don't hinder our survival, but you are more than welcome to find out for yourself.

Answer 5

You are missing a key element of human evolution and that is the element of society.
Even animals live in society and recognize a hierachy. If an animal went wild and tried to kill the members of its pack, it would be hunted and killed by its own kind to preserve the pack as a whole. No animal is "Dog eat dog". They may be "Dog eat prey", but among their own kind they recognize certain rules of behavior.
Humans are the same. We live in groups, so we have to learn to interact in these groups, to do what is best for society as a whole. That's where so-called moral judgements come from.
For instance: Why is it wrong to steal? Because human instinct is to accumulate comforts and to defend what is ours. If someone tried to steal something of yours, you would fight them, kill them. That's where wars come from--fights over property. But war, killing, fighting disrupts our society. So we set up the moral law that it was wrong to steal from each other and avoided the whole mess.
This is obviously a simplistic example. As humankind has evolved we have developed a more complicated (and in some cases convoluted) sense of social morality. Some of it is fairly universal, like prohibitions about murder. Some is more regional, like prohibitions about inter-racial marriage, cannibalism, or incest. And as we have lived in societal groups the "niceties" have emerged--we follow social ettiquette now like its nature, with no idea why we do it. But that very inhibition, that if you cut someone off in traffic you are a jerk, proves what I'm saying. Its social conciousness. Its decided by the society as a whole.
The interesting thing is that, as the world gets smaller, we are starting to develop a global conciousness. The little pockets of non-Western morality are being eroded away. In another few generations we will all probably more or less believe the same things...

Answer 6

Kindness and niceness weren't eliminated from the gene pool because it was an investment.

Not an investment of the financial type. For instance, pregnancy is an investment on the mother's part. In exchange for her pain and suffering, the mother passes her genes on (as well as the genes of the guy who knocked her up) and perpetuates human existence. She paves the way for more humans to exist in the future.

Kindness, too is an investment. In exchange for time and effort, a person helps another person so that the recipient of the help is more likely to find a mate and reproduce and perpetuate the existence of humankind.

Answer 7

Moral judgments evolved along with society. They may not be helpful in the wild, but they are among other people. Take the people in jail, for example...they have less chances to send out their genes.

Answer 8

It is an oversimplification of evolution theory to say that things only evolve what they need. We don't need hair on our heads. We don't need 5 fingers-we coupld probably handle 3.

God made the world beautiful and complex, and as His creations evolve, they also evolve beauty and complexity. Conscience and morality are not individual advantages, but they might be GROUP advantages. You can't disprove evolution this way. Birds don't need colored feathers, but they have them. Rhinos don't need horns, either.

Answer 9

Morality and kindness have great evolutionary benefits. The smallest baby automatically 'roots' at any woman's breast, and the feelings of protectiveness and awe come out of almost any woman who holds one of these tiny, precious creatures.

If that's not conducive to survival of the species, I don't know what is; very few newborns are as helpless as humans!

Answer 10

You have just pointed out one of the major philosophical arguments against human evolution. Evolutionists would counter your argument by saying, "Well, things like morals, kindness, and niceness all EMERGED as our brains evolved."

I would counter this argument by saying, "But according to your biological determinism, things like morals and altruism (kindness) are not real - they are just empty words to described firing brain cells." In other words, according to evolutionists, our emotions, morals, and personal sense of self are just epiphenomena, which means that they are not real. Of course, this is just nonsense; emotions and kindness are real.