Does our moral sense have a Darwinian origin?

Answer 1

If it is true then you have no right to say anything such as rape or murder is truly wrong. Because it could be argued that those who do such actions are the result of evolution and cannot be faulted for the way they evolved. And there is no proof that we will not evolve tomorrow to say what is wrong today will be right tomorrow.

Answer 2

I am not quite sure what you mean by Darwinian but I think our moral sense has evolved as an aid to early humans living in groups. Groups need to co-operate within the group and therefore some codes of conduct are necessary and think it is this basic need that has lead to the establishment of moral codes. There are of course examples of this tendency for having and using moral standards or rules to be corrupted by some people to establish or maintain some sort of power

Answer 3

If that is all that there is to our moral sense, then it has no moral authority over us. Why would anyone obey a sense that was developed under circumstances millions of years ago that are quite unlike what we encounter today? We would put our moral sense to the test of logic and if we do that, why bother with a moral sense at all?

Answer 4

Natural Selection vs Divine Inspiration;

How many origanal thoughts does a person have? Ideas come from somewhere, but I haven't had very many ideas that I can really call my own. If this is true for others, then I suspect that a sense of morallity originated outside the human mind, and then evolved.

Natural Selection assumes that Nature has a mind, and capable of origanal thought. That is very similar to to deity. It's not a new thought at all, the ancient Greeks had a god like that...not a real god of course.

Answer 5

In a review to be published in the May 18 issue of the journal Science, Jonathan Haidt, associate professor of psychology at the University of Virginia, discusses a new consensus scientists are reaching on the origins and mechanisms of morality. Haidt shows how evolutionary, neurological and social-psychological insights are being synthesized in support of three principles:

1. Intuitive primacy, which says that human emotions and gut feelings generally drive our moral judgments.
2. Moral thinking if for social doing, which says that we engage in moral reasoning not to figure out the truth, but to persuade other people of our virtue or to influence them to support us.
3. Morality binds and builds, which says that morality and gossip were crucial for the evolution of human ultrasociality, which allows humans -- but no other primates -- to live in large and highly cooperative groups.

"Putting these three principles together forces us to re-evaluate many of our most cherished notions about ourselves," says Haidt, whose own research demonstrates that people generally follow their gut feelings and make up moral reasons afterwards.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0517142545.htm

Answer 6

I certainly think that our moral sense is, to a great extent, the product of evolution. Other aspects of it come from life experience or are cultural, but the foundation is almost certainly evolved.

Dragon Dog, what on earth do you mean by "Natural Selection assumes that Nature has a mind, and capable of origanal thought"!? That's ridiculous. I think you need to read about natural selection.

Answer 7

possibly

Answer 8

could be