Marvin's Bookish Blog

So where does man get his morals from? Some people would say God. That assumes there is some absolute idea of virtue and morals handed to us from the almighty. Best evidence against this? The Bible. Read the first four books of the Old Testament, not just the ten commandments, and then tell me you would want to live in a society that allows you to sell your daughter into slavery and stone your spouse for adultery. Clearly our ideas of morality evolve and continues to evolve...for the better in my opinion

Perhaps the question should be not where but how do we get morality and virtues. Sociology see social values as originating to unify people and protect themselves from their own savage natures. But if this is true why do people often choose an altruistic stance even when it goes against cultural edicts. Along comes the science of evolutionary psychology which states our morality is not from societal causes but our own genes. As genes originates physical changes, they also originate behaviors that help us survive through generations. The author illustrates, not just through human examples but other mammals, how certain moral behaviors have developed to insure survival, which in the sense of natural selection means to reproduce and leave lot of descendents. Not only are we genetically predisposed to behave in certain ways but we often go out of our way to deceive ourselves about this. Bye bye freewill.

Evolutionary Psychology (EP) is the new kid on the block. While evolution is an established fact, EP is young enough that the author of this thought-provoking book is often left to speculation, and he freely admits to this. However there is a lot to digest and ponder in these pages. Much is controversial and not just to fundamentalist Christians. Some have accused EP as condoning sexism and even rape. Not so. While Wright clearly states natural selection is only interested in survival not morality, he also realizes that if we understand the reason we do what we do, the more we can use this information for our own betterment. I personally think EP is too much in its infant stage to accept wholeheartedly but I must say I'm impressed with this excellent introduction to EP. Certainly this healthy examination of morals and mankind is a better choice than blindly accepting "God-dictated" edicts that have justified persecution and suffering through the ages.