Allchin, Douglas. "Morality Sans Fitness: Aesthetics and Reframing the Evolutionary Problem of Ethics." [presented at International Society for the History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Biology, 1997 (Seattle).]

 

Morality Sans Fitness:
Aesthetics and Reframing the Evolutionary Problem of Ethics

Douglas Allchin
University of Texas at El Paso
Evolutionary approaches to ethics have been severely crippled due to preoccupation with individual fitness and the corresponding pseudoparadox of altruism. A more productive approach addresses instead the fundamental cognitive problem of assigning value, the underappreciated relationship between ethics and aesthetics, and the valuation of behavior in a social context. Ultimately, I hope to rescue evolutionary ethics from its implicit sociobiological shackles and to show how evolutionary accounts complement without replacing the great traditions in ethical philosophy.

1. Introduction.

In conventional evolutionary interpretations of morality, altruism is a profound paradox. Any "unselfish" trait (or gene) that tends to decrease fitness must ultimately be eliminated from the population. Indeed, the existence of altruism—or apparent altruism—is so puzzling that nearly all naturalistic approaches to ethics are built around it—either equating morality with altruism (even defining it as such), or treating altruism as the only or primary moral behavior that needs explaining. But such accounts, centered on organismal or even group fitness, I contend have grossly misframed the evolutionary problem of ethics.

Biologically—as much as philosophically—ethics may characterized in several ways (§2). Fundamental to all approaches (at least for humans), however, is the ability of the individual organism to value (§3). Fuller consideration of the cognitive system that produces value leads one to recognize the strong links between ethics and aesthetics (and learning) (§4). Ultimately, we may view morality fully in its cognitive and social contexts—sans fitness, sans genes, sans altruism (§5). In so doing, we may reclaim the role of the great traditions of moral philosophy in justifying and guiding moral behavior in a naturalistic ethics (§6).

2. Interpreting Ethics Biologically.

Biologists risk interpreting or defining ethics at great peril. After all, even philosophers cannot agree. Consequentialist and deontological traditions, for example, cast ethics in virtually incommensurable ways, though both may share a handful of individual moral behaviors as common touchstones.

The first problem that plagues the current literature on evolutionary ethics, then, is the failure to recognize and clearly differentiate the meaning of ethics in different explanatory contexts within evolutionary biology. Here, I distinguish between: (1) moral behavior, (2) moral cognition (feelings and intentions that motivate and guide behavior), and (3) moral systems. Moral philosophers may well see these perspectives as relating (crudely!) to the more familiar traditions in consequentialism/ utilitarianism, deontology, and social contract theory.

First, morality is most obviously or plainly a form of behavior. Early sociobiological treatments of ethics (e.g., Wilson 1975; 1978), drawing on traditions in ethology, thus perceived the need to explain moral behavior. From their evolutionary perspective, most salient were behaviors that appeared to decrease individual fitness while increasing the fitness of other organisms. Such behaviors, labeled "altruistic," are anomalous given the "norms" of natural selection. Hence, sociobiologists transformed the problem of morality into the evolutionary problem of "altruism." Within this framework, it is individual behaviors that are characterized as moral or not moral and that pose explanatory problems for the theory of natural selection. The ethological approach thus resonates strongly with the philosophical tradition of consequentialism (more narrowly, act utilitarianism, perhaps), where morality is measured by the act, or behavior. Such a framework has indeed been extraordinarily fruitful for biologists (in models of kin selection, for example), most notably where behaviors can be closely linked to individual genes. Biologists have begun to solve the problem of morality, where morality is framed as certain behaviors.

Alternatively, one may view morality in the biological context of motivation, intent or feelings. Darwin himself, like many of his contemporaries, was primarily concerned with this dimension of morality—what Darwin called the 'moral sense' (Darwin 1871; Richards 1988). From this cognitive perspective (for want of a better term), the problem is not so much why organisms perform certain acts as how they evolved to possess certain functional motivational or intentional states or, subjectively, feelings. The evolutionary problem of morality is thus to explain sympathy, conscience (or guilt), etc. Here, the biological problem relates more closely to deontological approaches in philosophy. Primatologist Frans de Waal (1996) has recently surveyed behaviors that reflect or indicate many such cognitive features among a wide variety of our primate cousins (also see Masserman et al 1964). These may well reflect the precursors of human morality, where morality is framed in cognitive terms.

While the cognitive framework potentially opens the scope of the evolutionary problem of morality significantly, most recent approaches of this type nonetheless limit themselves by adopting certain conventions of the earlier sociobiologists. Hence, the problem of altruism remains central: altruistic behavior has been recast simply as altruistic motives, with genes being assigned to cognitive impulses rather than to behaviors themselves (e.g., Richards 1986; Ruse 1986). Advocates of the cognitive perspective still largely endeavor to explain morality as an adaptation, and frame morality as a discrete heritable character that contributes positively to the fitness of the individual organism (or group of organisms). They ask, essentially: how could (did) genes for moral sense evolve? In framing the cognitive problem in this way, evolutionary thinkers bypass the more fundamental questions about the origin of neural systems and motivations in general. It is not clear whether there is any biological evidence or warrant for their critical assumption that we should frame the cognitive problem of morality directly in terms of genetics.

Another major dimension of moral cognition that has escaped the attention of most biologists—though central to most philosophical traditions—is the ability to reason morally. Likewise, few evolutionary approaches consider the potential roles of moral education or of learned behavior in shaping moral judgments. A complete evolutionary account, however, will likely need to address these features as well, and interpret morality in the context of other rational mental processes. A broader view thus situates the problem of morality in the more general evolutionary problems of mind, brain, learning, and rationality.

Finally, a third important biological perspective characterizes morality in terms of societies and moral systems. The problem may be not just that individuals act morally, or that many moral individuals act collectively in a society, but that a group of organisms has social structures or institutions that allow some behaviors (or motives or intentions) to be rewarded while others are sanctioned (Bischof 1978; de Waal 1996). Namely, how could (did) animal societies evolve an organization to negotiate and enforce moral norms? Within philosophy, the tradition of the social dimension of ethics is perhaps not as richly developed, but it certainly has deep roots in concepts of the social contract. Moreover, the central role of justification in all traditions implicitly implicates a social component, construed as mutual review and acceptance by peers. Social perspectives have led to considerable debate among evolutionists about the efficacy of group selection, in particular. However, one may not need to appeal to such indirect or awkward mechanisms, as demonstrated, for example, by social deterrence of deception in a colony of Rhesus monkeys (Hauser 1992), social approval of reconciliation in chimps (de Waal 1996), and egalitarian norms among small hunting-gathering societies (Boehm 1997). In these cases, the problem of morality is solved by showing how social interactions dictate and lead to moral behavior.

The biological problem of morality is thus manifold. For the sake of this paper, I adopt a multi- layered view similar to de Waal's (1996): that is, moral behavior is a cognitive act, explained predominantly at a cognitive level, though also shaped by social interactions and tempered by a context of genetic, or kin, relationships. Crudely, the view is reciprocal altruism. However, unqualified altruistic motives under many conditions are unstable in game theoretic terms, as suggested by Skyrms (1996). With respect to "the social instincts," therefore, one would be ill- advised to be as charitable as Darwin was to human motivations. So let us assume, or recognize, instead that individuals are also significantly constrained to act "morally" by the demands of other individuals in a society (see Hauser 1992; Boehm 1997). Socially mediated sanctions or rewards lead to what one may label, perhaps somewhat cynically, as 'mutually enforced reciprocal altruism' (Clutton-Brock and Parker 1995). To borrow Hardin's phrase, morality can emerge from "mutual coercion," even when not "mutually agreed upon." The social contract is a framework for morality, though participation need not be wholly voluntary or result from individual good will. Individuals may not achieve morality alone, rather only as a society: hence—to upend Niebuhr's (1932) classic title thesis—I would contrast immoral man with moral society. So, I will view moral behavior as guided by individual decision-making, in a social system of mutually enforced reciprocal altruism—a view that I think ultimately will resonate comfortably with the great traditions in philosophy.

3. Framing Morality as a Problem of Value.

Let me launch my central analysis with an observation: ethical organisms must be able to value behaviors. As Darwin stated twice in Descent (1871), describing what he saw as "the greatest of all distinctions between [man] and the lower animals"—namely, the framework for a conscience:

A moral being is one who is capable of comparing his past and future actions and motives,—of approving of some and disapproving of others. (II, 391-92; also I, 88)
To exhibit moral behavior, an organism must be able to characterize its own possible (projected) behaviors as appropriate or inappropriate. It must judge its own actions as "right" or "wrong"—regardless, for the moment, of how exactly one defines "right" and "wrong." Likewise, in the social dimension of morality that I've profiled, individuals will be keen to evaluate the behavior of other organisms as favorable or unfavorable to themselves—as "right" or "wrong." Valuing of behavior is central to morality (also see Povinelli and Godfrey 1993, 287-90, 311).

This underscores an element of morality often missing from biological accounts. In investigating the natural history of morality among humans, at least, the primary concern must be moral choice (Midgely 1994). Valuing, here, is a cognitive act. Moral behavioral responses are specific to the lifetimes and environmental circumstances of individual organisms. They fall within the open behavioral programs that are learned, not elicited by strict instinct or closed, innate programs. A biological account that does not do justice to the dimension of choice or deliberation or even interorganismal discourse in human morality—or that tries to reduce morality to a single inborn or evolved, biologically "justified" principle—simply overlooks the complexity of human ethics and sidesteps the central challenge of explaining morality (also see Richards 1986; Gewirth 1993). How else can we make sense of centuries of discourse among moral philosophers, who have focused on moral choice? Evolutionary accounts should complement or at least give a richer context to the great philosophical traditions (both Western and non-Western).

The simple observation about valuing leads to my central question: how does an organism value? How does it characterize one possible response as worth pursuing, while other alternatives are suppressed or not followed? —And how does this inform our understanding of the historical origins of morality? Note that the question is virtually equivalent to asking how an organism learns: how does it structure (or restructure) its neural networks to favor certain responses (from among those possible or projected) that might, ultimately, foster its survival and reproduction? Framing the problem in this way, of course, begins to dissolve the uniqueness of moral behavior as a special category of behavior. It is but one form of establishing what one "ought" to do given certain stimuli. In the case of morality the stimulus—as well as the potential response—may merely involve other conspecifics. Morality is essentially how we value behavior, typically in a social context. This then leads to my central claim: we should (re)frame the biological problem of morality as the problem of valuing more generally. We should reorient from studying moral behaviors, or even conscience exclusively, to studying the deeper cognitive processes whereby organisms establish value.

This perspective suggests many potentially fruitful avenues of thinking and further perspectives to consider. I will pursue one: the perhaps nonintuitive (and certainly underappreciated) link between ethics and aesthetics.

4. Linking Ethics and Evolutionary Aesthetics.

In highlighting the concept of value, I want to underscore the close relationship of ethics to aesthetics, and ultimately to epistemics or epistemology (thus unifying the three major branches of our philosophical heritage—reflections concerning the good, the true and the beautiful). The question of value is inseparable biologically, I contend, from discussions of aesthetics in their broadest sense. We should therefore pursue the cognitive resonances in valuing objects or performances and in valuing behaviors.

Traditional approaches to aesthetics have focused on the arts, or the fine arts—if not exclusively, then at least as paradigms. This narrow focus poses an especially engaging question that has escaped most evolutionary discussions1: given that the environment of early humans and their immediate primate ancestors did not include opera houses or art museums, what do the powerfully emotional aesthetic responses represent ancestrally? When and how did the ability to respond—physiologically, psychologically—to a Mozart symphony or a Monet painting evolve? Is it an adaptive response at some level? If so, to what? If not, how does it reflect a contingent by-product of some other cognitive process? Australopithecines were not concert-goers or patrons of the arts—so far as we know—so what, if anything, is homologous to our contemporary aesthetic response, either among our immediate ancestors or in other dimensions of our own current behavior?2

Darwin posed the problem somewhat more broadly. He considered whether an animal "would be capable of admiring such scenes as the heavens at night, a beautiful landscape, or refined music" (1871, I, p. 64). Indeed, the aesthetic response ranges broadly, from enjoying favorite pop tunes on the radio or certain architectural spaces to appreciating the subtleties of athletic movement, from gymnastics to basketball. Indeed, we might well ask whether a scientist's appreciation of the "beauty" of a theory or the "elegance" of an experimental design is fundamentally aesthetic, in the same sense as more familiar artistic experiences. Dewey (1934) certainly recognized the great breadth of aesthetics, casting "art as experience." A broader conception of aesthetics can facilitate the evolutionist's search for origins and earlier behavioral capabilities. Darwin, for example, suggested that our admiration of "beauty" is similar to (homologous to), for example, a female bird's attention to the colorful, patterned plumage or ornamentation of a potential male mate, or a cricket's enamoration of a "musical" mating call. I question Darwin's specific hypothesis (also see Cronin 1991; Diamond 1992), but I fully agree that there is a significant and still largely unanswered question here. There is a rich field of evolutionary aesthetics to explore in addition to, but closely related to, evolutionary ethics.

By posing these questions about evolution and aesthetics, I hope to convey their relevance to the problem of valuing that also permeates ethics. Both ethics and aesthetics involve cognitive processes of valuing. Note that Darwin (1871) himself coupled the two topics in his account of the descent of man. We may construe morality, crudely, as the aesthetics of individual behavior or behavior in society, and view moral acts as forms of art (also see Johnson 1993, 207-15). Aesthetic notions, when applied to the individual in society, can enrich our understanding of ethical concepts. For example, the emotional resonance of aesthetic experience parallels empathy; harmony (of color, shape, rhythm, etc.) pairs with social "harmony"; the principle of unity within diversity evokes the balance of individual liberties and social responsibilities; and the centrality of creativity helps us to recognize the role of imagination in resolving moral dilemmas (see Johnson 1993). How can we maintain that at the level of cognitive mechanisms, the process of aesthetic valuing is qualitatively distinct from ethical valuing?

I will venture further to suggest that the aesthetic response is linked historically to learning, thereby embedding the process of valuing in a behavior well understood as adaptive. The neural system is a well developed device for organismal memory, learning and problem-solving that is adaptive in shaping (sometimes complex) stimulus-response patterns. Curiosity and unsolved problems are important motivators. Correspondingly, the positive feelings of discovery and insight are important in establishing the value of certain responses in relation to certain stimuli. Functionally, the nervous system helps organisms negotiate in their individual environments and thrive. I am noting further that the success of this process—especially the emotions or feelings associated with stimulus- response closure—is fundamental to understanding how the brain values certain behaviors. Learning, in my view, is thus not too distant from aesthetics and ethics. The familiar "aha" experience of insight in problem-solving, I contend, is the primitive or prototype aesthetic response and a precursor to personal moral reward. Ultimately, aesthetics and ethics may be special cases, or branches, of learning theory.3

Philosophers and evolutionary biologists have fussed for quite some time now over the problems of altruism and value in morality. At the same time they have given scant attention to the problems of value in aesthetics. I claim that deeper study of the connections between the two—and with learning—will offer a more effective context for interpreting morality—multiply as a form of behavior, as a cognitive process, and as a social system (§2).4

5. Relating Value, Fitness, Genes and Altruism.

Viewing ethics as a subspecies of valuing behavior akin to aesthetics and learning leads to several interesting consequences or corollaries. Ultimately, we must disconnect, or decouple, the concept of ethics from fitness (narrowly construed), genes (again, narrowly construed) and altruism (as the central puzzle). I would happily endorse any modest revolution in evolutionary ethics that these (re)conceptions might encourage.

5.1. Morality Sans Fitness. First, consider the dynamics of selection where moral behavior is not a distinct property of organisms, but instead emerges from a general neural valuing system that generates a broad spectrum of behaviors, of which morality is only one. These is no clear selective organismal context whereby discrete moral behaviors or even moral behavior as a distinct type can be discriminated against alternatives. Rather, organismal selection operates here through the neural system as a whole, its abilities and the collected behavioral products, moral and non-moral both. One cannot speak selectively of an organism's "altruistic behavior" or "moral behavior" because they are not properties of the organism that can be selected for (sensu Sober, 1984) in isolation against a background of explicit alternatives (also see Sober 1993). To apply the concept "fitness" to morality, therefore, is a category mistake. Indeed, the error reflects the very misconception of morality that I want to expose and purge from evolutionary discourse—hence, my title.

Selection of behavior, including moral behavior, surely does occur. Learned, valuing behavior does contribute overall to the fitness of an organism. But in this instance, selection occurs at the level of the entire behavioral system and all its gene-derived components, thereby lumping moral behavior with other forms of valuing behavior (and learning). Moral behavior may be a salient feature of such cognitive valuing systems and greatly enhance overall fitness. For example, the ability to respond to threats of punishment by acting "morally" may significantly enhance survival and reproduction in some social environments (Clutton-Brock and Parker 1995). In these instances, moral behavior would contribute significantly to the selection of the valuing systems: this remains an open empirical question. On the other hand, moral behavior may very well decrease individual fitness. Even so, it may persist in the population if the other features of the very same valuing system contribute significantly (in other ways) to survival and reproduction. At an extreme, morality per se may not be adaptive. Rather, it may be a pleiotropic vestige of the valuing system. The Panglossian paradigm has blinded evolutionary thinkers, leading them to assume that one of the traits that humans treasure most must be beneficial in an evolutionary context if it is to exist at all. But this need not be so. Viewing morality as a part of a broader cognitive valuing system leaves the question open.

Further, selection of specific moral behaviors surely also occurs. But in this instance, the selection occurs at the level of the individual neural system, not the genes in a population. That is, the brain serves as a vicarious selector (sensu Campbell, 1972). The cognitive system does the selecting (see Holland 1985; Plotkin 1994; consider also the vast literature on neural selectionism); relative survival and reproduction of organisms does not significantly shape how each particular judgment occurs.5 Again, moral behaviors are not isolatable contributors to organismal fitness. Morality is decoupled from fitness.

5.2. Morality Sans Genes. For many of the same reasons, it is improper to consider direct or meaningful links between specific genes and specific moral behaviors. The sociobiological aim to study the "genetics" of morality is thoroughly misguided. Surely we can provide evolutionary accounts of moral behavior and society. Surely we can identify physiological bases for the cognitive processes that underlie or contribute to this behavior and to the social interactions that further shape them. And surely we can identify genes that contribute to the functioning of neural systems. But this says nothing informative about gene-morality links. Such connections will be diffuse, non-linear and non-reductionistic (in its narrow sense), with functions at each level screening off the lower levels. Morality is screened off causally from genes by the mediating system—the neurophysiology of valuing. It is thus misleading to talk about morality in terms of genes, though moral behavior—like all behavior itself—would obviously—trivially—be impossible without genes of some sort acting at some level.

5.3. Morality Sans Altruism. Sociobiologists have teased our thinking about morality by identifying many behaviors among organisms, such as ants, that appear to be self-sacrificing, at least in an evolutionary sense. Their accounts of kin selection, etc., have illuminated our understanding of the genetic basis for such cases. Many critics have noted the important distinction, though, between such cases of genetic or "evolutionary altruism" and cases of conscious or intentional altruism (found among humans, at least; see §2). Genes do not explain deliberate motivations. Still, the notion that organisms can apparently perform "unselfish" behavior or have "unselfish" motives puzzles many evolutionists.

Viewing morality as part of a cognitive valuing system can help dissolve the apparent paradox of altruism. Most important, altruistic behavior must be viewed in the context of all behaviors generated by the system. Altruism can persist if the system that generates, on occasions, fitness-decreasing acts also, on average, greatly enhances survival and reproduction on other occasions. The potential error, as noted above, is in interpreting altruism as an independent trait (or gene) on which selection can act (also see Povinelli and Godfrey 1993, 310-14).

Moreover, as suggested in the view of the social dimensions of "mutually enforced reciprocal altruism," altruism may well be behavior elicited by other organisms. Here, altruism would result from an individual's flexible, open behavioral program that allowed but perhaps did not necessarily mandate altruistic acts. Altruism would be tied to social organization, rather than paradoxically to the "selfish" behavior of genes or organisms. (Of course, altruism would also persist where it increased fitness in a social context, as in potential cases of 'reciprocal altruism'.)

Evolutionary accounts of ethics have suffered, I maintain, due to preoccupation with the altruism pseudoparadox. Evolutionists have, typically, mistakenly imagined that altruism was all there was to explain about morality. Most important in viewing ethics in the context of a cognitive valuing system, then, is that we can open evolutionary discussion of ethics to a broad array of moral behaviors that may be relevant—and that do not entail altruism. Here are three prospective examples of "morality sans altruism":

Case #1: The Pareto Moral Individual. — An individual organism can benefit another at no ostensible cost to its own fitness (akin to the Pareto principle in values theory, where here the benefit is accrued by a different organism, not the agent). For example, an organism might lead another organism to a source of food that is rich enough and short-lived enough that the first organism loses nothing by "sharing." Such behavior will actually be promoted in the social system described above.

Case #2: The Foresighted Individual. — Consider an organism that forgoes a current benefit for later increased benefit. Suppose that it may even resist a strong "temptation" in doing so. Perhaps foregoing the current opportunity is mere prudence, in the deeper consideration of the organism's full lifetime. But it is also a value judgment with potential moral overtones. Human morality sometimes dictates that an individual ought not to endanger his or her future opportunities (employment, admission to college, "self-fulfillment," etc.) by a rash or impulsive act because a principle of respect for oneself as a person demands it. The moral calculus here does involve a cognitive valuing system, though no sacrifice for others. The sacrifice—if any—concerns the individual in the short-term.

Case #3: The Prospective Suicide. — For many, suicide is a moral issue—and not just because it may involve a cost or benefit to other persons. Here, the exact moral status of actively ending one's own life is not important: it is a moral (or potentially moral) question that clearly involves an individual's valuing system, without necessarily posing any problems about benefit or detriment to others (see Darwin 1871, I, 94, 172). Suicide is also challenging because it shows how a cognitive system may construct a value that ostensibly conflicts with organic survival, thus demonstrating that it functions partly decoupled from organismal selection. When one highlights the act of valuing, it is clear that moral behavior need not involve altruism.

6. Reclaiming Moral Justification. Because there are aspects to human morality that do not hinge on altruism, and because there are many ways to contextualize apparently non-selfish behavior, altruism is a pseudoparadox. As such, it should not preoccupy evolutionary thinkers, especially to the exclusion of other powerful evolutionary puzzles about morality. Sociobiology in the tradition of Wilson (1978), with its emphasis on organismal fitness, has led evolutionary thinkers astray. We are ready to reframe the problems of ethics and evolution at a deeper level, where aesthetics and cognitive processes of valuing occur.

An evolutionary perspective of ethics along these lines offers both solace and challenges to ethics. It offers solace for two reasons. First, it reconciles our commitment to ethics with our naturalistic understanding of humans as evolved creatures. This is critical to accepting even the possibility of human evolution (Toumey 1996, pp. 112-27). As such, it deserves prominence in how we teach evolution in biology classrooms. Second, the social fabric of ethics and moral norms offers a touchstone for moral objectivity—or moral intersubjectivity. While neither evolutionary history (as documented) nor evolutionary theory can dictate moral principles, it at least suggests a framework within which such norms are established. The challenge, of course, is constructing those very norms in a way that satisfies us as "objective"—or that passes the test of everyone's individual selfishness. As Mark Sagoff (1988) reminds us, our values as an individual (a consumer in the economy, for example) and as a member of a community (a citizen in a democracy) may very well conflict with one another. Such is the dynamic of social interaction. And it is from such social interaction that one may view ethics and their evolution. Evolution does not tell us what moral norms to follow, but it does, in a sense, compel us to reason with one another about what those norms are or should be. The challenge, then, must hardly come as surprising, yet may still lend us some confidence that we are on the right track: we must understand the ethical dialogue that has engaged philosophers and their kin for the past several thousand years—and continue it.

Ultimately, we would be wisely skeptical of an evolutionary account of morality that betrayed our intuitions about morality, especially as articulated in the great philosophical writings. Fortunately, the account above resonates with these longstanding efforts to characterize and justify moral, ethical and metaethical principles. Evolutionary explanations cannot dictate or justify a specific set of principles that organisms, namely humans, are compelled to follow "by their nature." (see Holcomb 1993, 58-64). Neither can they liberate us from the straightjacket of ethical norms and deliver us to relativistic freedom. Evolutionary accounts ideally explain how morality and moral deliberation and discourse originated. It is precisely the individual and collective judgement and, in a rational society, rational discourse, that must decide what moral principles the society will uphold. We can explain immoral behavior, therefore, without necessarily endorsing it. At the same time, evolutionary explanations do not secure an easy morality. While they can rescue us from nihilistic relativism, they cannot rescue us from the challenge of analyzing and debating our individual and collective values. By highlighting the challenge more clearly, though, the evolutionary perspective does perhaps give impetus to ethical discourse.

In closing, I would like to highlight another paradox. Evolutionary thinkers are often careful to acknowledge that one cannot derive an "ought" from an "is," that moral norms cannot be justified merely by the processes of nature—what we frequently (even if mistakenly) refer to as the "naturalistic fallacy." Yet the human nervous system as a product of evolution seems to violate this very principle. Our brains do value things and produce moral "oughts," both for ourselves and for others. From where do these "oughts" emerge, except a history of events in the physical universe that, under most interpretations of natural selection, have no identifiable final purpose or inherent value themselves? Adaptations are the products of blind contingent history, not a value-driven process. Why, then, do humans, along with other animals, produce value? I suspect that one may resolve this paradox effectively in many ways. But any approach, I contend, will need to confront first and foremost how the human cognitive system can produce values and, in so doing, appreciate the links between ethics, aesthetics and learning.

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FOOTNOTES

*This paper was first presented at the meetings of the International Society for the History, Philosophy and Social Studies of Biology, Seattle WA, July 20, 1997. My appreciation to Paul Farber, Dan McShea and others who offered comments on the paper.

  1. For an important exception, see Cronin (1991).
  2. Here, I draw a sharp distinction between the cognitive response to art (or to other experiences) and the active behavior of making art. The later is richly developed by Dissanayake (1992, 1994), who combines anthropological, cross-cultural and psychological analysis (but critically omits, in my view, rigorous evolutionary analysis).
  3. Learning involves open behavior, once again situating the problem of morality at the level of individual cognition, not at the level of genes for specific "hard-wired" responses.
  4. An account of ethics based solely on aesthetics will, of course, be incomplete. One must articulate how the individual system of valuing also functions within the social dynamics or politics of a group, whereby certain behaviors become favored. This is a further investigation to pursue. Morality, especially as a system, depends on several converging factors: see de Waal (1996) for a fuller account.
  5. One may also claim that selection of moral behavior occurs at the social or cultural level, as described in §2: moral principles are largely the product of cultural evolution. Here, too, individual fitness is not central to the moral judgment.

Douglas Allchin Publications