I never said that evolution inevitably lead to morals, nor that evolution inevitably lead to social groups. I that that the combination of evolution and social groups inevitably leads to morality.
As for how morality arises, all of the things we consider immoral - murder, rape, cheating and so on - are harmful to the cohesiveness of a social group. Individuals who have a bias against these behaviours will be able to form social groups in which people causing problems are dealt with, thus improving the group's cohesiveness by removing sources of unfairness and danger, and will thus have an advantage over a group in which individuals are free to cheat and murder at will.
Much in the same way we evolved to enjoy sex (proximate cause) in order to pass our genes on (ultimate cause), we have a sense of morality (proximate cause) in order to survive better in social groups (ultimate cause).
Coca spraying in Colombia has lead to spray-resistant strains appearing, and being spread by farmers around the country. The resistant strains also produce more cocaine per plant as well.
Evolutionary genetics isn't so relevant for higher-order, self-aware organisms like humans. Clearly, our intellects are capable of overriding any genetically built-in moral programming we may have evolved--or we wouldn't be having this discussion in the first place.
Which is why sex is something people that only ever influences peoples' conscious decision-making... or why we aren't influenced at all by our evolved sense of hunger:) We can always override our built-in instincts, but they colour everything we do, especially when we're not consciously thinking of them.
First, "simple" game theory generally requires that all players have both perfect information on the rules of the game and each other's outcome desirability metrics, which is clearly not the case in human social dynamics. Notwithstanding that, there exist games for which game theoretical analysis determines that cooperation with other actors is undesirable, and there's no reason at this point to discount the possibility that the "game of life" is such a game.
Not true, as long as you have repeated interactions... which is most definitely the case in a social group. As long as you can a) recognise the other participant and b) remember previous outcomes of games with them, then you can use the results of past interactions to determine your behaviour. So this gives a good reason why face recognition and memory were selected for in humans - because they provide an advantage when dealing with people as you can recognise someone who has cheated you in the past.
Have a read of Critical Mass by Philip Ball, which has a very good chapter or two on iterated game-theoretical models of group interaction of various levels of complexity.
You are incorrect. You are assuming that living in social groups is inevitable, which I dispute.
I did not make that assumption.
You are also making an untestable assertion which I will not accept. Evolution does not produce morals. What morals do bears have? What morals do fish have? What morals do plants have?
If you want to engage in a debate or attempt to rebut my point, attacking it rather than a strawman might help.
I never said that evolution inevitably lead to morals, nor that evolution inevitably lead to social groups. I that that the combination of evolution and social groups inevitably leads to social groups.
I'm talking about traits which cultures that differ wildly in almost every other way and have had no contact in tens of thousands of years share in common.
It would seem that incest taboos, the golden rule and reciprocity have a cultural component that is just as strong.
Because they are universal human social traits, and therefore are universally represented in human societies.
Besides genetics only influence the most rudimentary ethical system- there is no gene for utilitarianism and nothing that will shape an opinion on stem cell research, for example.
But utiltarianism is based around maximising happiness, and is therefore based on fundamental ethical principles. Yes, as technology changes things ethical debates get more rarefied, but we still base our decisions on what we decide is "best" for people.
And why can't differences in genders' ethics be evolutionarily derived? Men and women have different specialisations, it follows that these different domains might require different moral schemes to maximise their utility.
I didn't say that there wasn't any difference, just that it was small and hard to separate from cultural effects.
Yes, but Somalia as it is isn't exactly the greatest place to live in the world is it? Far too many men with guns who can impose their will on others. Although I guess that's more an issue with full anarcho-capitalism rather than libertarianism per se, as libertarians see one of the only roles of government in preventing force.
My point was that you will pay X amount of money for insurance (or your employer does, but it amounts to the same) anyway, so what difference does it make that X (well, 0.5X going by most other countries) goes to universal health care instead? From your point of view you still have coverage, with the added benefit that so does everyone else. You can always get private insurance on top of that if you really feel the need.
Because most ethical systems the world over share certain core features - a concept of cheating and lying, of reciprocal altruism, of incest taboos and that rape and murder are wrong for instance. There's plenty of research that's been done in this area, read The Blank Slate by Stephen Pinker for a very good overview of the evolutionary genetics behind it or Critical Mass by Philip Ball for a more in-depth discussion of the game-theoretical side of it (and lots of interesting new economic techniques as well). Lots of ethical systems may have arisen, but how many of them are wildly different from Hammurabi's first code of law?
As for gender differences in ethics, a quick search of Google leads me to the conclusion that the differences are slight when they are found, and hard to separate from the different cultural expectations on men and women. See for instance this (PDF I'm afraid).
Do you think any political group has a way of predicting exactly what the impact of their actions is on society and the economy?
No, not accurately.
Maybe you can explain an alternate model and show why it's superior to reasoning from the individual to the society rather than from societal goals to the individual. For bonus points, explain why, despite the existence of your model, bad decisions continue to be made.
Nice strawman. I never said that bad decisions are never made at the moment, nor did I propose any model at all.
For the record the individual and society aren't separate entities, we've evolved as (and most likely, because of being) social animals and to this date no society has evolved towards any kind of libertopia. I think the burden is on you to explain why you think that such a radical change in society would benefit it, and what exactly it is that you're basing this conclusion on.
I see arguing as not so much to change the other posters' mind, but more to provide a counterpoint to anyone reading it. Nobody ever admits they're wrong online;)
The US spends twice as much of its GDP on healthcare as any other nation (about equal shares from the government and private sector), and yet fails to provide anything like 100% coverage. Economically, universal health care would be cheaper all round.
I definitely agree on both informative and disturbing:) And on the state of political discourse on here.
Economics is slowly making progress beyond 19th century clockwork models, have a read of Critical Mass by Philip Ball or some of the stuff here. But certainly most of the current consensus is seriously lacking.
Education seems to provoke libertarian views. Whilst the pragmatic reasons for limiting and diluting liberty are freely accessible to both educated and uneducated minds- safety, societal cohesion, etc.-, the case for liberty is made by the likes of Locke, B Franklin and Orwell.
Orwell wasn't a libertarian. Nor was Adam Smith in fact. And far more educated people are non-libertarian than libertarian, especially if you look outside the US where it's a very fringe philosophy.
The ethical system of males is thought to be more greatly grounded in ethical principle and rules than the ethical system of females which is supposed to be more driven by empathy and compassion. Given that libertarianism is a set of abstract principles it might gain more resonance with men than with women.
Do you have a single shred of evidence for this? Because our ethical system arises from genetics and game-theoretical considerations due to social dynamics, and does not vary between the sexes in the way you describe.
In what cases? Somalia is about the closest to a libertarian society that exists today, and that arose because of the collapse of the rule of law, not the will of the people. Outside influences meddling in the situation doesn't help the situation there either.
I expected a few negative moderations from posting in this topic to be honest:) But to get a bit more on-topic, some reading about evolutionary genetics should be a must for someone who's espousing political ideology - The Blank Slate by Stephen Pinker changed my political views massively.
He thinks, if I change this then its going to do this. So when it comes to government policy, he does the same thing.
And this is the problem, overly-simplistic thinking. Neither society nor people are simple, and libertarian thinking doesn't take anything into account other than dubiously over-simplified economic models of "rational actors" and "perfect information".
So only somebody, who genuinely loves human beings and believes humans by and large to be capable and responsible, should be a libertarian.
Or a socialist by that definition. Of course, in both cases anybody who thinks that is living in a fantasy world and completely ignoring the problems of human nature and the disruption caused by even a small number of people playing the system.
Because libertarianism (and pure socialism as well) are both naive idealism. They're based on ridiculously simple concepts that fail to take into account any of the real world complexity of economic systems, let alone people. People aren't rational actors or perfect cooperators, and any theory which assumes that has made too many simplifying assumptions too the point where it's worthless.
Slashdot Mirror
As for how morality arises, all of the things we consider immoral - murder, rape, cheating and so on - are harmful to the cohesiveness of a social group. Individuals who have a bias against these behaviours will be able to form social groups in which people causing problems are dealt with, thus improving the group's cohesiveness by removing sources of unfairness and danger, and will thus have an advantage over a group in which individuals are free to cheat and murder at will.
Much in the same way we evolved to enjoy sex (proximate cause) in order to pass our genes on (ultimate cause), we have a sense of morality (proximate cause) in order to survive better in social groups (ultimate cause).
Coca spraying in Colombia has lead to spray-resistant strains appearing, and being spread by farmers around the country. The resistant strains also produce more cocaine per plant as well.
Evolutionary genetics isn't so relevant for higher-order, self-aware organisms like humans. Clearly, our intellects are capable of overriding any genetically built-in moral programming we may have evolved--or we wouldn't be having this discussion in the first place.
:) We can always override our built-in instincts, but they colour everything we do, especially when we're not consciously thinking of them.
Which is why sex is something people that only ever influences peoples' conscious decision-making... or why we aren't influenced at all by our evolved sense of hunger
First, "simple" game theory generally requires that all players have both perfect information on the rules of the game and each other's outcome desirability metrics, which is clearly not the case in human social dynamics. Notwithstanding that, there exist games for which game theoretical analysis determines that cooperation with other actors is undesirable, and there's no reason at this point to discount the possibility that the "game of life" is such a game.
Not true, as long as you have repeated interactions... which is most definitely the case in a social group. As long as you can a) recognise the other participant and b) remember previous outcomes of games with them, then you can use the results of past interactions to determine your behaviour. So this gives a good reason why face recognition and memory were selected for in humans - because they provide an advantage when dealing with people as you can recognise someone who has cheated you in the past.
Have a read of Critical Mass by Philip Ball, which has a very good chapter or two on iterated game-theoretical models of group interaction of various levels of complexity.
You're thinking way after the evolution of morality occurred :) For instance, apes dispay behaviour we would consider moral.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/20/science/20moral
You are incorrect. You are assuming that living in social groups is inevitable, which I dispute.
. html?ex=1332043200&en=84f902c89c5a9173&ei=5124&par tner=digg&exprod=digg
I did not make that assumption.
You are also making an untestable assertion which I will not accept. Evolution does not produce morals. What morals do bears have? What morals do fish have? What morals do plants have?
If you want to engage in a debate or attempt to rebut my point, attacking it rather than a strawman might help.
I never said that evolution inevitably lead to morals, nor that evolution inevitably lead to social groups. I that that the combination of evolution and social groups inevitably leads to social groups.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/20/science/20moral
There is NO LOGICAL REASON that we should ALL follow the SAME moral code, absent religious reasons.
Evolutionary genetics and simple game theory lead to the conclusion that morality is an inevitable consequence of living in social groups.
Adam Smith also advocated that government should run certain services for the well-being of all :)
I'm talking about traits which cultures that differ wildly in almost every other way and have had no contact in tens of thousands of years share in common.
It would seem that incest taboos, the golden rule and reciprocity have a cultural component that is just as strong.
Because they are universal human social traits, and therefore are universally represented in human societies.
Besides genetics only influence the most rudimentary ethical system- there is no gene for utilitarianism and nothing that will shape an opinion on stem cell research, for example.
But utiltarianism is based around maximising happiness, and is therefore based on fundamental ethical principles. Yes, as technology changes things ethical debates get more rarefied, but we still base our decisions on what we decide is "best" for people.
And why can't differences in genders' ethics be evolutionarily derived? Men and women have different specialisations, it follows that these different domains might require different moral schemes to maximise their utility.
I didn't say that there wasn't any difference, just that it was small and hard to separate from cultural effects.
Yes, but Somalia as it is isn't exactly the greatest place to live in the world is it? Far too many men with guns who can impose their will on others. Although I guess that's more an issue with full anarcho-capitalism rather than libertarianism per se, as libertarians see one of the only roles of government in preventing force.
My point was that you will pay X amount of money for insurance (or your employer does, but it amounts to the same) anyway, so what difference does it make that X (well, 0.5X going by most other countries) goes to universal health care instead? From your point of view you still have coverage, with the added benefit that so does everyone else. You can always get private insurance on top of that if you really feel the need.
In which case I was wrong, and freely admit it ;)
Because most ethical systems the world over share certain core features - a concept of cheating and lying, of reciprocal altruism, of incest taboos and that rape and murder are wrong for instance. There's plenty of research that's been done in this area, read The Blank Slate by Stephen Pinker for a very good overview of the evolutionary genetics behind it or Critical Mass by Philip Ball for a more in-depth discussion of the game-theoretical side of it (and lots of interesting new economic techniques as well). Lots of ethical systems may have arisen, but how many of them are wildly different from Hammurabi's first code of law?
As for gender differences in ethics, a quick search of Google leads me to the conclusion that the differences are slight when they are found, and hard to separate from the different cultural expectations on men and women. See for instance this (PDF I'm afraid).
Do you think any political group has a way of predicting exactly what the impact of their actions is on society and the economy?
No, not accurately.
Maybe you can explain an alternate model and show why it's superior to reasoning from the individual to the society rather than from societal goals to the individual. For bonus points, explain why, despite the existence of your model, bad decisions continue to be made.
Nice strawman. I never said that bad decisions are never made at the moment, nor did I propose any model at all.
For the record the individual and society aren't separate entities, we've evolved as (and most likely, because of being) social animals and to this date no society has evolved towards any kind of libertopia. I think the burden is on you to explain why you think that such a radical change in society would benefit it, and what exactly it is that you're basing this conclusion on.
I see arguing as not so much to change the other posters' mind, but more to provide a counterpoint to anyone reading it. Nobody ever admits they're wrong online ;)
The US spends twice as much of its GDP on healthcare as any other nation (about equal shares from the government and private sector), and yet fails to provide anything like 100% coverage. Economically, universal health care would be cheaper all round.
You're thinking of anarcho-capitalism, which is literally no government at all.
I definitely agree on both informative and disturbing :) And on the state of political discourse on here.
Economics is slowly making progress beyond 19th century clockwork models, have a read of Critical Mass by Philip Ball or some of the stuff here. But certainly most of the current consensus is seriously lacking.
Education seems to provoke libertarian views. Whilst the pragmatic reasons for limiting and diluting liberty are freely accessible to both educated and uneducated minds- safety, societal cohesion, etc.-, the case for liberty is made by the likes of Locke, B Franklin and Orwell.
Orwell wasn't a libertarian. Nor was Adam Smith in fact. And far more educated people are non-libertarian than libertarian, especially if you look outside the US where it's a very fringe philosophy.
The ethical system of males is thought to be more greatly grounded in ethical principle and rules than the ethical system of females which is supposed to be more driven by empathy and compassion. Given that libertarianism is a set of abstract principles it might gain more resonance with men than with women.
Do you have a single shred of evidence for this? Because our ethical system arises from genetics and game-theoretical considerations due to social dynamics, and does not vary between the sexes in the way you describe.
In what cases? Somalia is about the closest to a libertarian society that exists today, and that arose because of the collapse of the rule of law, not the will of the people. Outside influences meddling in the situation doesn't help the situation there either.
I expected a few negative moderations from posting in this topic to be honest :) But to get a bit more on-topic, some reading about evolutionary genetics should be a must for someone who's espousing political ideology - The Blank Slate by Stephen Pinker changed my political views massively.
Well, going by history, a libertarian society would almost certainly turn back into some kind of social democracy soon enough.
He thinks, if I change this then its going to do this. So when it comes to government policy, he does the same thing.
And this is the problem, overly-simplistic thinking. Neither society nor people are simple, and libertarian thinking doesn't take anything into account other than dubiously over-simplified economic models of "rational actors" and "perfect information".
So only somebody, who genuinely loves human beings and believes humans by and large to be capable and responsible, should be a libertarian.
Or a socialist by that definition. Of course, in both cases anybody who thinks that is living in a fantasy world and completely ignoring the problems of human nature and the disruption caused by even a small number of people playing the system.
The US spends twice as much of its GDP on medical care, yet fails to get even close to 100% coverage. How is this even close to an ideal situation?
Because libertarianism (and pure socialism as well) are both naive idealism. They're based on ridiculously simple concepts that fail to take into account any of the real world complexity of economic systems, let alone people. People aren't rational actors or perfect cooperators, and any theory which assumes that has made too many simplifying assumptions too the point where it's worthless.