Does evolutionary biology contribute to ethics?
Biology and Philosophy 4 (3):287-301 (1989)
| Abstract | Human propensities that are the products of Darwinian evolution may combine to generate a form of social behavior that is not itself a direct result of such pressure. This possibility may provide a satisfying explanation for the origin of socially transmitted rules such as the incest taboo. Similarly, the regulatory processes of development that generated adaptations to the environment in the circumstances in which they evolved can produce surprising and sometimes maladaptive consequences for the individual in modern conditions. These combinatorial aspects of social and developmental dynamics leave a subtle but not wholly uninteresting role for evolutionary biology in explaining the origins of human morality. | |||||||||
| Keywords | No keywords specified (fix it) | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,701 |
| External links |
 |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesKevin N. Laland, John Odling-Smee, Marcus W. Feldman & Jeremy Kendal (forthcoming). Conceptual Barriers to Progress Within Evolutionary Biology. Foundations of Science.
Bart Voorzanger (1987). No Norms and No Nature — the Moral Relevance of Evolutionary Biology. Biology and Philosophy 2 (3):253-270.
Richard Machalek & Michael W. Martin (2004). Sociology and the Second Darwinian Revolution: A Metatheoretical Analysis. Sociological Theory 22 (3):455-476.
William S. Cooper (2001). The Evolution of Reason: Logic as a Branch of Biology. Cambridge University Press.
Wim J. van der Steen (2000). Methodological Problems in Evolutionary Biology. XIII. Evolution and Knowledge. Acta Biotheoretica 48 (1).
Marko Barendregt & René Van Hezewijk (2005). Adaptive and Genomic Explanations of Human Behaviour: Might Evolutionary Psychology Contribute to Behavioural Genomics? Biology and Philosophy 20 (1):57-78.
Jason Scott Robert (2002). How Developmental is Evolutionary Developmental Biology? Biology and Philosophy 17 (5).
Stephen M. Downes (2010). The Basic Components of the Human Mind Were Not Solidified During the Pleistocene Epoch. In Francisco José Ayala & Robert Arp (eds.), Contemporary Debates in Philosophy of Biology. Wiley-Blackwell Pub..
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2009-01-28Total downloads12 ( #93,408 of 549,122 )Recent downloads (6 months)2 ( #37,390 of 549,122 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
