« March 2005 | Main

Individual-I

individual-i.jpg

Posted 04/19/2005 09:39 by Fritz | Comments (0)

The Moral Animal

I had planned when I started this whole blog thing to occasionally "review" books I'd read. Well, I haven't actually gotten around to doing so, but I came close in an exchange with Dad the other day, so I figured I'd save it.

A little background: Once in a while, I'll stop by Gray's Bookstore, the local competitor to the UNCC bookstore, just to see what they've got. I stumbled across a neat book, The Moral Animal: Why We Are the Way We Are: The New Science of Evolutionary Psychology. I found it to be a surprisingly good read, despite the mildly humorous conflation of psychology and "science".

In looking up the link to The Moral Animal, I found that Matt Ridley—author of Genome and The Red Queen, which I also enjoyed—has also addressed the subject in The Origins of Virtue: Human Instincts and the Evolution of Cooperation, which has been added to my Amazon wishlist.

Enough babble. Follow the Continue reading... link for the actual "review".

> I am nearly finished with the "Moral Animal" book and am more and more
> convinced that it is psychobabble. Even if it isn't, survival of the
> species
> requires that it be treated as such.

Nah. Survival of the species only requires that our genes carry forward. :-) For what it's worth, the book does take a few nihilistic dips before it pulls itself out in the end.

Don't get too hung up on the life-of-Darwin examples. They become less useful as the book advances, and since psychology isn't really a science (yet?), there's more stretching to make the case study fit. The abstract arguments are stronger than his example. Here's what I came away from it with:

a)Evolution happens, and we can plainly see it in simple organs. Further, if one views the evolutionary process as the advancement of the gene rather than the host organism, the weaknesses in Darwin's theory are replaced with more robust ideas. (All of this is largely a restatement of Dawkins' work, but it becomes critical to the family, group, and societal ideas later on. Dawkins' favorite demonstration--or thought experiment, really, although he's supported it with mathematical models--shows how in far fewer generations than you might think, an organism can move from a light-detecting cell to an eagle's eye.)

b)Given a), it is mutually beneficial to be reciprocally nice to your child, and by extension (although to a decreasing degree) your brother, cousin, tribe member, countryman, and fellow human being. (This probably also explains why we're generally fonder of monkeys and dogs than cockroaches and fish).

c)Given a), it would be foolish (naive?, disingenuous?) to assume that evolution didn't also drive the brain.

d)We don't know all the details yet, but all mental action including perception, thoughts, and emotions are the result of biochemical reactions in the brain.

e)The human brain is hugely complex and extraordinarily adaptable, which is why there is so much more significant variance in personalities than in, say, lungs. "Dials and knobs."

f)The genetically driven stuff is far below the conscious level: Just because a man invests time and resources in the support of his children--even largely indirectly by supporting their mother--because of "love" doesn't mean that the whole "love" thing isn't just another adaptation, nor is it less "real" just because we know it's the result of biochemical reactions in the brain. But genes don't "care" about love or physical comfort--or even life--as long as they can propagate.

g)Let's define "morality" as a system to maximize overall happiness. (That one's not his either: I think I first encountered while reading some Bertrand Russell, but I don't know that he had an original claim on it either. I like it, though.) Happiness is pretty vague, but from a genetic view, it certainly includes having the physical and sexual resources availble to pass on the genes.

h)Our brains are complex and powerful enough that sacrificing our own potential for reproduction can make sense in crisis situations (risking your life to save a stranger's drowning baby) and over the long term (celibate priests).

i)Given the genetic benefits of mututal altruism, it is not necessary to assume divine inspiration or other metaphysical bases for "right" and "wrong," and morality--which is largely similar throughout all known human societies--is simply a natural evolution. (This idea is further supported by examining non-human "societies," particularly among our cousins the primates.)

The author does get a little vague in the move from helping your fellow man's genes advance to the Golden Rule philosophy. I suspect he had hampered himself with his case study by then, and that when he was writing it he probably had a feedback loop between abstract and example that ultimately didn't pan out as well as he'd hoped. Writer's empathy there: I could be way off.

For my part, a lot of what he said made sense to me. I took it more as a "how we might have got here" than "here's how you work." Philosophically, it filled in some nihilistic gaps left by Dawkins' book.

Dawkins said no divine inspiration was necessary for complexity and intelligence to evolve, but he doesn't answer (or raise?) the question of why we should be "good" if there's no God to punish or reward us. "Because it's natural" is a more satisfying answer to me than "because you're better off and/or happier if you are." That other "answer" doesn't address "other than not getting my ass kicked or ending up on death row, why am I happier?" Sure, being good is usally the path of least resistance, but genetic propagation offers an explanation about that came to be the case.

The Moral Animal also proposes answers to a few "why?" questions to which I had answered "it doesn't matter" before: Why do I love my kids, parents, fiancee, friends, etc.? And some where the answer was "probably just social conditioning:" Why don't I choose to steal in a situation where the risk is small? "Social conditioning" doesn't stand up well by itself, but when you think of it as a natural extension of the drive to pass on human genes--stealing a random CD from an unlocked car may reduce the "resources" available for the owner to woo and propagate and at particular benefit to myself--it makes more sense.

That still doesn't answer the question "I could figure out how to get away with it and they'd never notice it missing, so why don't I choose to pilfer from Wal-Mart?" but it's a step closer.

There were also a few side-trips that made sense to me. For example, gangs and black-on-black violence make little sense from my cubicle, but if you look at it as competition for reproductive resources in a hunter-gatherer (although urban) society, it clicks: The folks in seedy neighborhoods simply aren't competing for the same resources we are (money, nice homes, and education necessary to snag the right girl); rather, they're competing for the resources in their environment (bling, turf, and reputation necessary to snag the right girl).

Yes, our environments intersect so it's possible to move from one to the other, but it's not particularly natural to expect it, nor is it particularly easy to do so. Given that view--recognizing that there is a self-reinforcing system--what other approaches might we take to the issue? Since what we're doing (or not) today isn't working--I'm happy to share the water fountain, but I disagree with discrimination even when you call it "affirmative action" or "diversity"--don't we have a moral obligation to ask? A random black boy born today has considerably less likelihood than a white one to get a college degree or own a house. In the meritocracy in which we imagine we live, and tossing out the Old Testament idea that a child should suffer for his parents' sins, doesn't that go against what we think of as "right?" If it doesn't, how do our mores differ from those that triggered the Holocaust other than in degree?

Another example: How does the concept of "justice" mesh with the Golden (or Platinum) Rule? Yes, there is some deterrant in the knowledge that capture means punishment, but that has limits. We've been locking up prostitutes and potheads forever, so it obviously isn't working as deterrance. What benefit, then, does society gain from this "justice?" If we're trying to maximize happiness, let's save our energy: We can't stop them (so our happiness remains unchanged) and their happiness goes up when we get off their backs. Don't we then have a "moral" requirement to redirect those societal resources into areas with solvable problems such as hunger, homelessness, and education?

Heh. Probably way more than you wanted as a response. I just found the whole thing fascinating.

Posted 04/18/2005 09:22 by Fritz | Comments (0)

Butt Fire Investigators Have Not Released a Cause

I sent a message to these folks a couple of weeks ago because of an article that was so badly written, I had to speak out. This one is so much worse I'm just not going to bother, although I may pass it on to Doug Robarchek at the Observer because I can't help but feel he can do something with it.

Linkrot warning: The article is quoted in its entirety because WBTV doesn't keep an archive, so the story link is going to change, then expire.

Two Alarm Fire Ruled Accidental
Monday, April 11, 2005
A two-alarm fire at the Farington Apartments have been ruled accidental, butt fire investigators have not released a cause.
More than 50 firefighters responded to the late afternoon fire near Fairview and Colony Roads.
Four apartment units were damaged by the fire, six others by water.
The American Red Cross assisted 24 people.
No one was injured.
Damage is estimaged at more a million dollars.

Posted 04/12/2005 13:33 by Fritz | Comments (0)