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Religious obsessed by Atheism
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antiskeptic wrote: »If you could explain how the religion-free system of morality/ethics is supposed to find it's root other than in the inner convictions of men then I'm all ears.
Because if you can't then it would appear the root of both religious and non-religious morality/ethics system are both going to lie in inner convictions of men.
I mean, you can't prove killing immoral.
Morality doesn't have to rely on inner conviction. It can rely on logic and reason. Let's take a few examples from the Bible as an example.
One of the biblical moral prohibitions which came to the fore recently is the command against homosexuality outlined in Leviticus 18:22, 20:13 and the NT.
However, is homosexuality actually immoral? What basis do we have for considering it to be so? Well, firstly it does no harm so it cannot be considered immoral on that basis. Secondly, as we know it is not the subject of free choice so homosexual actions are as much a part of a person's character as their skin colour. We have no reason to consider homosexuality immoral on a rational basis and certainly no grounds to consider execution a suitable punishment. The only moral basis that Christians seemed to be able to muster during the marriage referendum debate is the "God says it, I believe it, that settles it" argument, which is hardly a solid foundation for anything.
Or what about the instruction in Isaiah 14:21 moral? Why should children be punished with death for the actions of their parents? Why should anyone be punished for a crime which they did not commit? Clearly being punished for not having done anything is clearly immoral and we don't have to rely on inner convictions to tell us this.
Morality can be based on logically sound non-arbitrary principles over and above the inner convictions you talk about. In fact, QualiaSoup has a series of videos dedicated to exactly this question which I urge you to watch:antiskeptic wrote: »The "purpose" of evolution isn't to preserve anything. Rather, the upshot of the circumstances life happens to find itself in means that some genetic material survives and some doesn't. That some life mutates so as to better deal with circumstances, so as to preserve genetic material isn't purpose, it's happy accident.
There is no getting being done. What survives survives: some genetic material being preserved by it's survivability under the circumstances at the time .. and some not. With nobody or thing caring/acting/directing things one way or the other.
OK, before we get to talking about the intersection of morality and evolution let's just sort your misunderstandings of what evolution actually is because what you just posted above is bordering on JC levels of stupidity.
Evolution isn't random, it's deterministic. The mutation in a gene maybe random but the effect that that mutation has on its parent organism is what drives evolution, a process which is not random. This works in two ways.
Firstly, the mutation can confer benefits or disadvantages on its parent organism. This in turn can manifest in one of two ways, a survival advantage or an attractiveness advantage. So, for example, the mutation could increase the number of fast twitch muscle fibres in a cheetah. This means that the cheetah is faster and therefore able to catch more prey. This means that they are better fed and live longer, thus leaving more descendants, most of which will have this mutation. These will, in turn have more descendants and the mutation will spread throughout the population. Alternatively, the mutation could confer a survival advantage, say the level of colour intensity in a bird's plumage. This means that the bird will attract more mates and leave more descendants, thus spreading the mutation. So that is how evolution works on the level of the individual.
Secondly, we can look at the effect of mutation at a species level. If there were no mutations at all then there would be no variation between individual members of a species. Therefore, from a sexual selection standpoint, there is nothing to drive evolution forward. Mutations, whether they confer advantages or disadvantages on their parent organism create variation on which selection occurs. This is one of the fundamental factors in driving complexity at a biological level. This paper deals with the issue in more detail:
Evolution of biological complexity
Secondly with regard to your getting comment, of course there is getting being done. Anything which confers a survival or attractiveness advantage will be selected for. It is evident in a mechanism known in biology as The Red Queen (after the character in Alice in Wonderland). Take, polar bears for example. When polar bears first migrated or found themselves located in the North due to geological changes, the seals who had already been living there had no natural predators. As such, they were docile and unfearful animals. Consequently, the newly arrived polar bears killed as many as they pleased. Therefore, the seals that survived are the ones which were slightly more cautious and fearful than the others. Eventually this trait spread throughout the population and all the seals became cautious, resetting the balance. Then over time, polar bears developed a change in their fur colour (they were originally light brown like Kodiak bears). Basically, a polar bear with a form of albinism was better able to sneak up on the seals undetected which meant they fed better and lived longer as explained above. So the balance shifted in favour of the polar bears again. Finally, the seals began to develop a communal sense of caution. Those seals who watched each others backs and looked out for the group (think prairie dogs or meerkats) lived longer than those who didn't and the balance was once again restored. The point of this is that it is not only physical attributes which can confer a survival advantage nor is it solely confined to an individual level attribute. Reciprocal altruism or social behaviour can and does lead to survival benefits. This is the basis on which morality and evolution intersect.
Because we are social animals, individual selection and kin selection are inextricably linked. How we act affects the group and the ability of the group to survive affects our own survival. Thus there is a biological need for a set of principles which guide the relationship between the individual and the group. Obviously the most basic of these is a prohibition on killing, if the survival of the group is important then weakening the group weakens the survival prospects of every member. So individual members secure their own survival by putting in place rules which ensure the survival of the group. Now at the basic hunter gatherer level this is somewhat important, but as a society progresses and becomes more complex the rules need to become similarly complex as well as more stringent. Let's take the example of six survivors stranded on a desert island. Let's say after a few months they discover a stranded but salvageable trawler which they can use to get home. At the beginning of the journey all six have no particular expertise so if one of them dies it will have a small but measurable impact on the group's prospects of getting home. Since none of them can run the ship entirely on their own, they must take responsibility for different aspects of the ship's operation, cooking, engine room, navigation etc. Therefore as the journey progresses each will become more specialised at his/her task. So, the longer the journey the greater a loss each member will pose to the group's overall survival. So the rules for the group's behaviour need to become more codified and more complex. So it is with society, our moral rules and laws have become more complex and codified as our society has developed.
This post is long enough already with my rambling (apologies) and I don't have the time to explain group selection and reciprocal altruism in more detail but hopefully these links will cover the topic of morality and evolution in more detail (even though you didn't reply or acknowledge them the last time I posted these for your benefit two years ago)
Books
The Origins of Virtue
Adaptation and Natural Selection
The Moral Landscape
Research
The evolution of reciprocal altruism
Fairness vs. reason in the ultimatum game
Five rules for the evolution of cooperation
The evolution of the golden rule
Volunteering as Red Queen mechanism in public goods games0 -
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Morality doesn't have to rely on inner conviction. It can rely on logic and reason.
It can rely on picking morality out of a hat if you like
However, is homosexuality actually immoral?
That would depend on the basis by which you measure. If picking out of a hat and "homosexuality is fine" is picked out of a hat then no.What basis do we have for considering it to be so? Well, firstly it does no harm so it cannot be considered immoral on that basis.
That would depend on what you call harm which is a function of your worldview. If, for instance you worldview includes God's law and consequences follow for threading over God's law then it is both illogical and unreasonable to suppose homosexual acts non-harmful.Secondly, as we know it is not the subject of free choice so homosexual actions are as much a part of a person's character as their skin colour.
That would be the subject of discussion. The development of sexuality in an environment where homosexuality is normalised might well differ from sexual development in an environment where it's not. "We know" is a problematic statement.We have no reason to consider homosexuality immoral on a rational basis and certainly no grounds to consider execution a suitable punishment. The only moral basis that Christians seemed to be able to muster during the marriage referendum debate is the "God says it, I believe it, that settles it" argument, which is hardly a solid foundation for anything.
Seeing as your worldview sits at the root of your position, this is a bit kettle/pot/black
-Evolution isn't random, it's deterministic. The mutation in a gene maybe random but the effect that that mutation has on its parent organism is what drives evolution, a process which is not random. This works in two ways.
Let's have a lookFirstly, the mutation can confer benefits or disadvantages on its parent organism. This in turn can manifest in one of two ways, a survival advantage or an attractiveness advantage. So, for example, the mutation could increase the number of fast twitch muscle fibres in a cheetah. This means that the cheetah is faster and therefore able to catch more prey. This means that they are better fed and live longer, thus leaving more descendants, most of which will have this mutation.
UnderstoodThese will, in turn have more descendants and the mutation will spread throughout the population. Alternatively, the mutation could confer a survival advantage, say the level of colour intensity in a bird's plumage. This means that the bird will attract more mates and leave more descendants, thus spreading the mutation. So that is how evolution works on the level of the individual.
Understood.Secondly, we can look at the effect of mutation at a species level. If there were no mutations at all then there would be no variation between individual members of a species. Therefore, from a sexual selection standpoint, there is nothing to drive evolution forward. Mutations, whether they confer advantages or disadvantages on their parent organism create variation on which selection occurs. This is one of the fundamental factors in driving complexity at a biological level.
Understood. Random mutations with some resulting in the preservation of some genes (due to advantage) and the elimination of others.
However, survival itself is random since survivability is related to environment the lifeform finds itself, which itself is the product of random occurrences. For example, the random occurrences which produce a faster cheetah and a slower antelope also become a constituent part of the environment both lifeforms experience. The cheetah flourishing and the antelope not flourishing is the result of the environment they find themselves in - an environment constructed competely of random mutations.
There isn't a single part, either in the mutation producing variation or in the environment in which that mutation is sifted which isn't the product of randomness. So when you suggest the process isn't utterly random I'm left wondering what how something non-random can be built of components consisting of nothing else?Reciprocal altruism or social behaviour can and does lead to survival benefits.
I wasn't saying otherwise. I was objecting to the implication that evolution had this in mind, figuring altruism useful to it's aims. You've put it more mechanically/mindlessly, which is appropriate.This is the basis on which morality and evolution intersect.
I'm not sure intersect is the right word. Naturalistic morality is merely a product of evolution, just like nose hair.Because we are social animals, individual selection and kin selection are inextricably linked. How we act affects the group and the ability of the group to survive affects our own survival. Thus there is a biological need for a set of principles which guide the relationship between the individual and the group.
Not all in the group. The murderer is as much a product of evolution as is the social animal. It's success is as attributable to evolution as any other successful group.Obviously the most basic of these is a prohibition on killing, if the survival of the group is important then weakening the group weakens the survival prospects of every member. So individual members secure their own survival by putting in place rules which ensure the survival of the group. Now at the basic hunter gatherer level this is somewhat important, but as a society progresses and becomes more complex the rules need to become similarly complex as well as more stringent. Let's take the example of six survivors stranded on a desert island. Let's say after a few months they discover a stranded but salvageable trawler which they can use to get home. At the beginning of the journey all six have no particular expertise so if one of them dies it will have a small but measurable impact on the group's prospects of getting home. Since none of them can run the ship entirely on their own, they must take responsibility for different aspects of the ship's operation, cooking, engine room, navigation etc. Therefore as the journey progresses each will become more specialised at his/her task. So, the longer the journey the greater a loss each member will pose to the group's overall survival. So the rules for the group's behaviour need to become more codified and more complex. So it is with society, our moral rules and laws have become more complex and codified as our society has developed.
Well elucidated.
This is post-hoc reasoning however. Firstly you have the success of a group evolving to a particular point. Then you look back and say that success was centred on socialability. That maybe so (even if post-hoc) but that success is but a momentary point in evolution, the sociability leading to the kind of complex structure that is capable, in our case, of utterly wiping itself off the map. A less sociable society would be less able to build up that ability and might well survive for longer than we can.
It's as if your suggesting that because sociability has enabled our advance that we should conform to a morality that enhances sociability - stepping off the evolutionary train (whereever that might lead us) but taking the "best" we post-hoc conclude it's given us.
A couple of questions:
What about a morality based on the view that fragmentation of society would lead to the long term survivability of the species/own genes?
Would such a morality be as much a product of evolution as the sociability one?
If all moralities are as valid as each other (all being the direct product either of evolution, or if deciding to take over from evolution and self-directing*) then aren't we left with but a might-is-right kind of morality (the decision of the herd)?
* I'm not sure how one can say they've stepped away from being led by evolution since we are still in the process of evolution (e.g. our being driven to a degree by the random mutations that makes us sociable)This post is long enough already with my rambling (apologies)
I'm under time pressure too. So hopefully you'll deal with the points as I've raised them above.0 -
antiskeptic wrote: »It can rely on picking morality out of a hat if you like
Yes, of course it could if you wanted to. However, your original post presented a false dilemma, either morality was given/imposed by an external lawgiver like a god or it rests on inner convictions. My point is that those are not the only two options. We can base our morality on non-arbitrary principles other than our own personal tastes. Of course, had you watched Qualia's videos explaining this you would realise this.antiskeptic wrote: »That would depend on the basis by which you measure. If picking out of a hat and "homosexuality is fine" is picked out of a hat then no.
That's not answering my question. I asked you on what basis can homosexuality be considered immoral. Now, either you can say that homosexuality is immoral solely because God says so or you can appeal to some other logical principle. Now the God says it I believe it argument has no utility because it just pushes the question back a step i.e. why is it immmoral just because God says so? So, otherwise you need some kind of rational basis for considering homosexuality immoral. So what is it?antiskeptic wrote: »That would depend on what you call harm which is a function of your worldview. If, for instance you worldview includes God's law and consequences follow for threading over God's law then it is both illogical and unreasonable to suppose homosexual acts non-harmful.
Well, no it doesn't depend on your worldview. Harm in the sense of the punishment you will receive for breaking the moral code is a fallacious argument, specifically faulty cause and effect. As the old scientific axiom goes, you can't find your hypothesis in your results. You can't appeal to the punishment as the basis for the moral code in the first place.antiskeptic wrote: »That would be the subject of discussion. The development of sexuality in an environment where homosexuality is normalised might well differ from sexual development in an environment where it's not. "We know" is a problematic statement.
"We know" is not a problematic statement. While the research on the causes of homosexuality has shown evidence for multiple possible causes including epigenetic, developmental and otherwise biological causes, there has been little consensus on the degree to which any or all of these factors are relevant on an individual basis. However, the one thing that the research has demonstrated is that there is no evidence to suggest that free choice is any kind of factor.antiskeptic wrote: »Seeing as your worldview sits at the root of your position, this is a bit kettle/pot/black
No it's not pot/kettle/black at all. If you want I can elucidate my moral position on any topic you choose. I can also defend said position with logical arguments. This is entirely different from adopting a moral position just because it's in your holy text. That is the antithesis of a logical argument, the ultimate appeal to authority.antiskeptic wrote: »Understood. Random mutations with some resulting in the preservation of some genes (due to advantage) and the elimination of others.
However, survival itself is random since survivability is related to environment the lifeform finds itself, which itself is the product of random occurrences. For example, the random occurrences which produce a faster cheetah and a slower antelope also become a constituent part of the environment both lifeforms experience. The cheetah flourishing and the antelope not flourishing is the result of the environment they find themselves in - an environment constructed competely of random mutations.
There isn't a single part, either in the mutation producing variation or in the environment in which that mutation is sifted which isn't the product of randomness. So when you suggest the process isn't utterly random I'm left wondering what how something non-random can be built of components consisting of nothing else?
Firstly, a beneficial mutation is not a guarantee of survival nor is it intended to be viewed as such. A beneficial mutation is something which increases an organism's chances of survival without regard for confounding factors. For example, a woman who has a mutation such that she will always have twins when she gets pregnant is likely to leave more descendants than someone without that gene. However, that's no guarantee that she will end up having any children either through choice, a random occurrence or some other mutation.
Secondly, I highlighted a portion of your response above because it shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how evolution works. A cheetah is not competing for survival against an antelope. To use the old joke, there are two friends out in the woods when they stumble across a grizzly bear. One of the friends starts running. The other one calls after him and says "It's pointless running you'll never outrun the bear". The first one calls back "I don't have to outrun the bear, I only have to outrun you." The cheetah is competing against other cheetahs. So even if nothing happens to the antelope, the cheetah will still be better at survival than the other cheetahs. Similarly, if an antelope receives a mutation which makes it slower then it's more likely that said antelope will be easier to pick off and thus leave less descendants than the other antelope.
Finally, to answer your question, the process isn't entirely random because as I already pointed out it's deterministic. Let's look at some maths. For the purposes of this exercise we will assume that all children receive the beneficial mutation from their parents. Let's take two people with an average lifespan of 40 years and an average number of children of 4. Now Person 1 will remain unchanged while Person 2 will receive a lifespan mutation. The effect of this mutation is that Person 2 lives an extra 10 years. So in the first generation, Person 1 leaves 4 descendants and Person 2 leaves five descendants. In the second generation, the four descendants of person 1 leave 4 more descendants each making 20 people in Tribe 1. In tribe 2, the five descendants leave five more each, making 30
people in Tribe 2. This trend continues until the mutation in Tribe 2 becomes omnipresent in the population. This isn't a random result but the result of population mechanics.antiskeptic wrote: »I'm not sure intersect is the right word. Naturalistic morality is merely a product of evolution, just like nose hair.
Sorry perhaps a poor choice of words. I was building to the idea that a set of moral guidelines and a naturalistic process like evolution can be related.antiskeptic wrote: »Well elucidated.
This is post-hoc reasoning however. Firstly you have the success of a group evolving to a particular point. Then you look back and say that success was centred on socialability. That maybe so (even if post-hoc) but that success is but a momentary point in evolution, the sociability leading to the kind of complex structure that is capable, in our case, of utterly wiping itself off the map. A less sociable society would be less able to build up that ability and might well survive for longer than we can.
It's as if your suggesting that because sociability has enabled our advance that we should conform to a morality that enhances sociability - stepping off the evolutionary train (whereever that might lead us) but taking the "best" we post-hoc conclude it's given us.
OK, one minor point to begin with. Using a train as a paradigm for evolution is a bad idea since it implies a destination. Like I've said before evolution is not a ladder, more a treadmill. It simply favours those organisms which are well adapted to their environment. There is no goal or objective involved.
I've highlighted the relevant part of your post above so that I can demonstrate that it is not post-hoc reasoning. You see, our degree of sociability is determined, to a degree, by our biology.
Humans, thanks to their evolutionary history have non-precocious offspring i.e. human infants are not able to fend for themselves, unlike, say, horses. This means that mothers have to spend an inordinate amount of time caring for their offspring, placing an increased burden on them. The consequence of this is that human females developed a concealed oestrus, meaning that the males would no longer be able to tell when the female is in season. This means that the male has to stick around to have any guarantee of paternity. Thus the male is around for longer to help the female with food gathering and child rearing. This changes the dynamic of male-female relationships and thus the rules which we came up with.
Similarly, humans began as apes which gradually spread out from a tree-dwelling existence into the African savannah. This lead to biological changes as human individuals adapted to life in a changing environment. However, group selection also played a part int the changing environment. In an environment where game was less densely populated, those that survived did so because they hunted collaboratively. The males hunted big game in groups while the women cared for the children collaboratively, gathering whatever other foods were required (e.g. nuts, seeds, fruit etc.) The tribal nature of humans evolved as a response to adaptation to a changing environment. The moral rules concering our society evolved as a response to our adaptation to living in groups. It's not post-hoc reasoning at all. The causal mechanisms can and have been clearly demonstrated. The link that I posted the last time to the book Adaptation and Natural Selection has a very detailed treatment of the issue. For a more pop-sci approach, I would recommend the Red Queen by Matt Ridley.antiskeptic wrote: »A couple of questions:
What about a morality based on the view that fragmentation of society would lead to the long term survivability of the species/own genes?
OK, firstly, while there is still some debate about the relative importance of kin selection vs. group selection vs. individual selection, survivability of the species is not something which evolution impacts on/cares about. It's nowhere near that broad. Species is just a line in the sand that we can use to group organisms together and tell them apart.
I don't know exactly what would happen in that kind of hypothetical but it seems unlikely to last. I assume you're talking about an Ayn Rand type individualist society, something like Bioshock. As I've posted above, our history and our biology have made us social animals. We have been shaped by our evolutionary journey to be specialised individuals, both physically and psychologically. It's unlikely that a moral framework such as that, as out of sync as it would be with our biology, would last very long.
Jared Diamond has a very good treatment of the hows and whys of societies collapsing here:
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeedantiskeptic wrote: »Would such a morality be as much a product of evolution as the sociability one?
That's a tough one. One of the more curious aspects of our evolution is that we have evolved to the point of choosing not to adhere to basic biological instincts i.e. people choosing not to have children. So whether this individual trait or a similar trait on a group level could be said to have evolved is debatable. Maybe as we unravel epigenetics further, we might get some answers. The short answer is I don't know.antiskeptic wrote: »If all moralities are as valid as each other (all being the direct product either of evolution, or if deciding to take over from evolution and self-directing*) then aren't we left with but a might-is-right kind of morality (the decision of the herd)?
Well I wouldn't accept that all moralities are as valid as each other for a start. For example, the biblical moral code contains clear examples of unjust laws and so I would consider it to be mostly useless/invalid as a morality.
Secondly, we're not left with an argumentum ad populum kind of morality. At least, we're not required to be. Like I've said already, this is something that Qualia explains in depths in the first two videos. Perhaps you should watch them again, they should certainly answer this last question.0 -
Yes, of course it could if you wanted to. However, your original post presented a false dilemma, either morality was given/imposed by an external lawgiver like a god or it rests on inner convictions.
What, aside from inner convictions causes a person to:
"base (their) morality on non-arbitrary principles other than (their) own personal tastes"
I mean, a person deciding to adhere to non-arbitrary principles or not is the matter of personal taste. If I want to give someone a smack but decide against it on the non-arbitrary principle indicating I do otherwise then that becomes my personal taste (at least at that moment).Of course, had you watched Qualia's videos explaining this you would realise this.
I've no sound on this computer. Does he sign it?That's not answering my question. I asked you on what basis can homosexuality be considered immoral. Now, either you can say that homosexuality is immoral solely because God says so or you can appeal to some other logical principle. Now the God says it I believe it argument has no utility because it just pushes the question back a step i.e. why is it immmoral just because God says so? So, otherwise you need some kind of rational basis for considering homosexuality immoral. So what is it?
It's a worldview that supposes utility need be involved. When morality is defined as that which God condones (or that which is in alignment with his will) then you're at the end of the line. The Euthypro Dilemma is resolved similarly: good is merely defined as that which reflects God's character (thus selflessness is good (because that his character) and selfishness bad (because that's not his character))
Now, there is an underlying rationale to God condoning some things and not others. It has to with the order he intended for mankind which would lead to optimal conditions for mans enjoyment of both the rest of mankind and God. This order is currently out of sync in any number of ways: homosexual activity being an an example of same.
God is in a better position to know best how to construct a world order to the betterment of man than we are. He know effects of all actions in butterfly-flaps-it's-wings fashion. We, on our own, can't view the total effect and can only argue from the position of partial knowledge (e.g. by utilizing the current understanding of the picture given by Science). We, in our micro-understanding look at a particular behaviour, figure it won't do any harm and decide all should be allowed to live and let live on the matter to hand.Well, no it doesn't depend on your worldview. Harm in the sense of the punishment you will receive for breaking the moral code is a fallacious argument, specifically faulty cause and effect. As the old scientific axiom goes, you can't find your hypothesis in your results. You can't appeal to the punishment as the basis for the moral code in the first place.
It's not so much punishment as harm (although punishment has it's place too). Consequences follow actions and when those actions are out of step with God's order then harm follows. We might think we can spanner on a factory-built Audi engine: "hey it now goes faster - utility says this is good" But Audi have taken all into consideration when designing the engine: performance, fuel economy, reliability, emissions. Audi isn't punishing you when your engine throws a con rod because you've souped it up. It's merely a consequence of upsetting the designers order."We know" is not a problematic statement. While the research on the causes of homosexuality has shown evidence for multiple possible causes including epigenetic, developmental and otherwise biological causes, there has been little consensus on the degree to which any or all of these factors are relevant on an individual basis. However, the one thing that the research has demonstrated is that there is no evidence to suggest that free choice is any kind of factor.
I'd point you to the principle above. Once you've concluded God exists, has to total overview in hand, you trust his judgements over the partial knowledge (how partial we do not know - we could be throwing our hands up in the air in a hundred years time over the current conclusions of Science - much as we do about bloodletting as a cure for all ills now)No it's not pot/kettle/black at all. If you want I can elucidate my moral position on any topic you choose. I can also defend said position with logical arguments. This is entirely different from adopting a moral position just because it's in your holy text. That is the antithesis of a logical argument, the ultimate appeal to authority.
There are reasons behind "the Bible says it, I believe it, that settles it". There is nothing illogical about paying attention to what God says once you've concluded God exists.
Your worldview does sit behind your position: empiricism and rationalism are philosophies which themselves aren't provable. Faith finds it's place where proofs fear to thread.Firstly, a beneficial mutation is not a guarantee of survival nor is it intended to be viewed as such. A beneficial mutation is something which increases an organism's chances of survival without regard for confounding factors. For example, a woman who has a mutation such that she will always have twins when she gets pregnant is likely to leave more descendants than someone without that gene. However, that's no guarantee that she will end up having any children either through choice, a random occurrence or some other mutation.
Hmm. Is it not the case that the environments treatment of the mutation decides whether the mutation is beneficial? In other words, the advantage is deemed to have arisen only when the mutation meets environment and increased survivability results (in the aggregate of those particular mutations experiencing increased survival rather than the singular case - an individual experiencing what transpires to be beneficial mutation might still run under a bus and not obtain the chance to express the advantage).
I mean, a mutation always producing twins in an environment which can't sustain twins means both offspring suffer increased risk of death - which is reduced survivability.
Deciding a particular mutation beneficial (because it would appear on face value to confer advantage) before the environment has it's say would be a curious thing to decide.
Remember: my concluding point in this section was:There isn't a single part, either in the mutation producing variation or in the environment in which that mutation is sifted which isn't the product of randomness. So when you suggest the process isn't utterly random I'm left wondering what how something non-random can be built of components consisting of nothing else?
If advantage is only conferred once the environment deems that so (by way of increased survivability) and the environment is the product of random events then my point above stands. Does it not?Secondly, I highlighted a portion of your response above because it shows a fundamental misunderstanding of how evolution works. A cheetah is not competing for survival against an antelope. To use the old joke, there are two friends out in the woods when they stumble across a grizzly bear. One of the friends starts running. The other one calls after him and says "It's pointless running you'll never outrun the bear". The first one calls back "I don't have to outrun the bear, I only have to outrun you." The cheetah is competing against other cheetahs. So even if nothing happens to the antelope, the cheetah will still be better at survival than the other cheetahs. Similarly, if an antelope receives a mutation which makes it slower then it's more likely that said antelope will be easier to pick off and thus leave less descendants than the other antelope.
This doesn't alter the conclusion I was making (above). The environment (of which all cheetahs and their mutations are but components) is a product of random mutation/chance.inally, to answer your question, the process isn't entirely random because as I already pointed out it's deterministic. Let's look at some maths. For the purposes of this exercise we will assume that all children receive the beneficial mutation from their parents. Let's take two people with an average lifespan of 40 years and an average number of children of 4. Now Person 1 will remain unchanged while Person 2 will receive a lifespan mutation. The effect of this mutation is that Person 2 lives an extra 10 years. So in the first generation, Person 1 leaves 4 descendants and Person 2 leaves five descendants. In the second generation, the four descendants of person 1 leave 4 more descendants each making 20 people in Tribe 1. In tribe 2, the five descendants leave five more each, making 30
people in Tribe 2. This trend continues until the mutation in Tribe 2 becomes omnipresent in the population. This isn't a random result but the result of population mechanics.
I understand that survivability begets survival. This talk of determinism occurs within the overarching principle that all that is produced by the process of evolution is the product of random events at all points. In the micro you can speak of increasing complexity and order but this can all be overturned in a moment (say nuclear war or dinosaur extinction). In the macro you merely have a heaving mass or randomness that produces upwards and downwards waves of complexity, order, advancement.Sorry perhaps a poor choice of words. I was building to the idea that a set of moral guidelines and a naturalistic process like evolution can be related.
Must be related, I would have thought. There are no other components involved than mutations sifted by environmentOK, one minor point to begin with. Using a train as a paradigm for evolution is a bad idea since it implies a destination. Like I've said before evolution is not a ladder, more a treadmill. It simply favours those organisms which are well adapted to their environment. There is no goal or objective involved.
We're agreed on that last point.
I wasn't supposing the evolutionary train having a fixed destination in mind - I was instead picturing what I understood to be the implication of adhering to an evolutionary-related morality. It appears to be suggested that we step away from whatever morality we individually labour under (let's say, a bad, selfish morality) opting instead for the morality understood to have been central to our success (let's say, one prizing sociability). To do that, however, would entail some of us turning our back on where evolution had brought us as individuals (which includes our bad morality) and deciding to move to a non-natural (for these individuals), morality. These individuals would have stepped off the train, so to speak.I've highlighted the relevant part of your post above so that I can demonstrate that it is not post-hoc reasoning. You see, our degree of sociability is determined, to a degree, by our biology.
Humans, thanks to their evolutionary history have non-precocious offspring i.e. human infants are not able to fend for themselves, unlike, say, horses. This means that mothers have to spend an inordinate amount of time caring for their offspring, placing an increased burden on them. The consequence of this is that human females developed a concealed oestrus, meaning that the males would no longer be able to tell when the female is in season. This means that the male has to stick around to have any guarantee of paternity. Thus the male is around for longer to help the female with food gathering and child rearing. This changes the dynamic of male-female relationships and thus the rules which we came up with.
Similarly, humans began as apes which gradually spread out from a tree-dwelling existence into the African savannah. This lead to biological changes as human individuals adapted to life in a changing environment. However, group selection also played a part int the changing environment. In an environment where game was less densely populated, those that survived did so because they hunted collaboratively. The males hunted big game in groups while the women cared for the children collaboratively, gathering whatever other foods were required (e.g. nuts, seeds, fruit etc.) The tribal nature of humans evolved as a response to adaptation to a changing environment. The moral rules concerning our society evolved as a response to our adaptation to living in groups. It's not post-hoc reasoning at all. The causal mechanisms can and have been clearly demonstrated.
Okay, I'll leave post-hoc aside as I'm interested more in the issue of why we one morality is to be consider more valid than anotherI don't know exactly what would happen in that kind of hypothetical but it seems unlikely to last.
It's not all that hypothetical: bad moralities exist all around us and those who possess those bad moralities are demonstrably as successful as the alternatives*: the mutations + the environment they've occupied have brought them to the present day. Perhaps the bad elements of peoples morality are parasitical, reliant on the larger grouping of good moral elements. But parasites have proven successful
* not that I see folk split into good and bad moralities, rather all of us sharing 'good' and 'bad' elements of morality to greater or lesser degree.It's unlikely that a moral framework such as that, as out of sync as it would be with our biology, would last very long.
It's not out of sync with it's own biology -That's a tough one. One of the more curious aspects of our evolution is that we have evolved to the point of choosing not to adhere to basic biological instincts i.e. people choosing not to have children. So whether this individual trait or a similar trait on a group level could be said to have evolved is debatable. Maybe as we unravel epigenetics further, we might get some answers. The short answer is I don't know.
But surely the choice not to have children is but one evolved component overriding another evolved component (biological drivers to have children). I mean, every element and propensity we have is the result of evolution.Well I wouldn't accept that all moralities are as valid as each other for a start. For example, the biblical moral code contains clear examples of unjust laws and so I would consider it to be mostly useless/invalid as a morality.
I mean validity in the sense that all moralities are arrived at through evolution. The concept of justness being mere convention arrived at by a predominate evolved trait rather than measurement against some absolute measure standing outside evolution
If it's survived then it's valid. Since survivability is the only measure in evolution.Secondly, we're not left with an argumentum ad populum kind of morality. At least, we're not required to be. Like I've said already, this is something that Qualia explains in depths in the first two videos. Perhaps you should watch them again, they should certainly answer this last question.
What kind of morality are we left with then - is my question. How does one morality suppose itself superior/more valid/more just than another if all moralities around today can point to their success at having survived?0 -
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antiskeptic wrote: »What, aside from inner convictions causes a person to:
"base our morality on non-arbitrary principles other than our own personal tastes"
I mean, deciding to adhere to non-arbitrary principles is the product of personal taste. If I want to give someone a smack but decide against it on the non-arbitrary principle indicating otherwise then that becomes my personal taste (at least at that moment).
Except that you weren't talking about the person's choice of rules in your original post you were talking about the rules themselves. The rules are based on non-arbitrary principles. The person's decision to adhere to them isn't. The goalposts are fine where they are. Stop moving them.antiskeptic wrote: »I've no sound on this computer. Does he sign it?
Why don't you watch it and find out?:)antiskeptic wrote: »It's a worldview that supposes utility need be involved. When morality is defined as that which God condones (or that which is in alignment with his will) then you're at the end of the line. The Euthypro Dilemma is resolved similarily: good is merely defined as that which reflects God's character (thus selflessness is good (because that his character) and selfishness bad (because that's not his character)
Now there is a rationale to God condoning some things and not others. It has to with the order he intended for mankind which would lead to optimal conditions for mans enjoyment of both mankind and God. This order is currently out of sync in any number of ways: homosexual activity being an an example of same.
God is in a better position to know best how to construct a world order than we are - one which knows the effects of all causes in butterfly-flaps-it's-wings fashion. We can't view the total effect and can only argue from the position of partial knowledge. We, in our micro-understanding look at a particular behaviour, figure it won't do any harm and decide to live and let live.
OK, two things here.
Firstly, utility is necessary, whatever your worldview. If you're going to say that something is moral solely because God says so, then you're just making an appeal to authority. Secondly, just saying that homosexuality (or anything else) is immoral because God says so doesn't explain anything. It doesn't explain why it is immoral or why God condones it. You have to add on an explanation like you have above.
Secondly, the order he intended for mankind would assume at best a directed evolution or at worst direct creation. But there is no evidence to suggest either of these things, especially when you're only talking about humans.
Finally, suggesting that God made homosexuality immoral is an insufficient explanation for a number of reasons. It doesn't explain why God allows someone to be born homosexual in the first place if it doesn't fit within his order. It simply pushes the question back a step because then you have to ask why the order God intends should be considered right or just or why God's character should be considered right or just. After all, the only purported record of God's actions don't portray a being whose character or actions are right or just.antiskeptic wrote: »It's not so much punishment as harm (although punishment has it's place too). Consequences follow actions and when those actions are out of step with God's order then harm follows. We might think we can spanner on a factory-built Audi engine: "hey it now goes faster - utility says this is good" But Audi have taken all into consideration when designing the engine: performance, fuel economy, reliability, emissions. Audi isn't punishing you when your engine throws a con rod because you've souped it up. It's merely a consequence of upsetting the designers order.
But how does it upset the designer's order. Since homosexuality isn't a matter of choice, then these people have no mens rea, no guilty mind in being outside the designers order. Furthermore, since homosexuality isn't a matter of choice, the fact that one person is homosexual isn't going to cause anyone else to be homosexual nor is it going to interrupt anyone else who follows God's order. It's like saying that someone who eats a donut is interrupting someone else's diet.antiskeptic wrote: »I'd point you to the principle above. Once you've concluded God exists, has to total overview in hand, you trust his judgements over the partial knowledge (how partial we do not know - we could be throwing our hands up in the air in a hundred years time over the current conclusions of Science - much as we do about bloodletting as a cure for all ills now)
Except that this point would only be relevant if we didn't know if choice could be a factor. Except that we do know and choice isn't a factor.antiskeptic wrote: »There are reasons behind "the bible says it, I believe it, that settles it". There is nothing illogical about paying attention to what God says once you've concluded God exists.
Your worldview does sit behind your position: empiricism and rationalism are philosophies which themselves aren't provable. Faith finds it's place where proofs fear to thread.
Of course it's illogical. Even if you concluded God exists, putting forth the proposition that something is true because God says it is still a fallacious argument. If something really is true then it should be possible to demonstrate that without retreating into this pointless soundbite.antiskeptic wrote: »Hmm. Is it not the case that the environments treatment of the mutation decide whether the mutation is beneficial? In other words, the advantage is deemed to have arisen only when the mutation meets environment and increased survivability results (in the aggregate of those mutations experiencing increased survival rather than the singular case - an individual experiencing what would actually be a beneficial mutation might still run under a bus and not obtain the chance to express the advantage).
Well, no. If you'll pardon my french you've still got the relationship between the individual and the environment completely arse about face. The benefit of a particular mutation is not that it helps the individual to objectively live longer or be better at survival, just better than other members of its species. It is how many descendants the individual leaves compared to other members of the species that counts, not any objective measure. Also, survivability isn't the only mechanism in play. You also have attractiveness to take into account. For example, like humans, female birds are saddled with a bigger biological burden when it comes to child rearing than the males. Therefore, the payoff for the female is choice. The male must grow plumage which can and often does impact his survival potential in order to woo a female. A female peacock looks for the male with the biggest and most perfect tail feathers because a) if there were any defect in the male's genes it would show up in the tail feather pattern and b) if the male is still alive and healthy and yet has such a big tail then this is another sign of good genes and also good food gathering capability.
So as you can see, because the invidivual doesn't compete directly against the environment and because survivability is not the only mechanism in play and can often conflict with attractiveness, looking at survivability in an environmental context is misguided.
Sharon Moalem has a very good discussion of this topic in his book Survival of the Sickestantiskeptic wrote: »I mean, a mutation always producing twins in an environment which can't sustain twins means both offspring risk death - which is in aggregate sense, reduced survivability.
Sustainability is a different matter entirely. The effect of what is at first a beneficial mutation may either fall away due to selective pressures or turn into a negative. Take malaria for example. A long time ago in Africa where malaria killed an inordinate number of people a mutation arose in the population which altered the shape of red blood cells giving those with the mutation a certain immunity to the disease. Naturally those with the mutation lived longer and left more descendants than those who didn't. Eventually the mutation became so widespread in the population that people began receiving two copies of the altered gene. To simplify, the effect of this was that the altered genes now produced so many of the altered red blood cells that certain functions of these cells were compromised especially iron transportation. The disease sickle cell anaemia arose from this.
So how long a mutation will remain beneficial is not pertinent to its initial survival advantage.antiskeptic wrote: »Deciding a particular mutation beneficial (because it would appear on face value to confer advantage) before the environment has it's say would be a curious thing to decide.
Except that we're talking about the transgenerational effect of the mutation. Obviously if a person gets a mutation which gives them a natural lifespan of 500 years and then gets hit by a bus when they are fifteen, then the mutation can't be said to have had any effect at all. A mutation is deemed beneficial restrospectively, once we have seen it's effect, not what it's effect might be.
Remember that most of the time in evolutionary biology we're looking at particular genes to see why they have survived in a particular species' genome for so long. For example, look at blood types. Blood type O is caused by the recessive form of a gene on the long arm of chromosome 9 which was altered due to a frameshift mutation. One of the principal effects of this change was that people with blood type O unlike the others were susceptible to cholera. Therefore, you would imagine, blood type O would have disappeared from the genome a long time ago. However, when we looked at why O remains we found that people with blood type O have a higher malarial resistance than the other types.antiskeptic wrote: »If advantage is only conferred once the environment deems that so (by way of increased survivability) and the environment is the produce of random events then my point above stands. Does it not?
No. A truly random process would mean that any mutation which occurred in say generation 1 would have an equally likely chance of still being found in the genome in generation 10. However, that's not the case. Mutations which confer benefits regarding survival/attractiveness are more likely to be found in the genome in later generations.
One side point here. Most mutations are in fact neutral, or at least they are on their own. Our base mutation rate (i.e. the number of differences between the genes copied from both our parents is about 128) so most of them are necessarily neutral. For example gene duplication can be a neutral mutation when it first happens. An extra copy of a gene is produced and the second one becomes redundant. Because this spare gene is freed from selective pressure it can experience a much higher mutation rate than the operative gene. The result of this is that after many generations the second gene can be mutated to the point where it now has a novel and important function in the host organism. Like the evolution of nylon eating bacteria for example.antiskeptic wrote: »This doesn't alter the conclusion I was making (the once above). The environment (of which all cheetahs and their mutations are but components) is a product of random mutation/chance.
The fact that the mutation occurs is due to random chance. The fact that the mutation gets retained in the genome over several generations isn't.antiskeptic wrote: »I wasn't supposing the evolutionary train having a fixed destination in mind - I was instead picturing what I understood to be the implication of adhering to an evolutionary-related morality. It appears to be suggested that we step away from whatever morality we individually labour under (let's say, a bad, selfish morality) opting instead for the morality understood to have been central to our success (let's say, one prizing sociability). To do that, however, would entail some of us turning our back on where evolution had brought us as individuals (which includes our bad morality) and deciding to move to a non-natural (for these individuals), morality. These individuals would have stepped off the train, so to speak.
OK, I've highlighted the important part of your point above. This is veering dangerously close to arguing from the naturalistic fallacy. At several points in the past people, creationists mainly, have argued that evolution leads to social darwinism that evolution dictates a particular morality. It doesn't. Evolution explains our evolutionary development into social animals. It explains why we have a moral code. It gives us hints as to why certain moral commands (murder, incest etc.) might exist. But that's it. Evolution states what is not what ought to be.antiskeptic wrote: »I mean validity in the sense that all moralities are arrived at through evolution. The concept of justness being mere convention arrived at by a predominate evolved trait rather than measurement against some absolute measure standing outside evolution
If it's survived then it's valid. Since survivability is the only measure in evolution.
Well I'd have to disagree with that. Just because a particular moral code has survived doesn't make it valid. Even Christians would have to admit this since they have either dispensed with certain commandments entirely (i.e. shellfish, tattoos etc.) or would not advocate the punishments outlined in the OT (the death penalty for most crimes).
Secondly, it is whether the moral codes themselves can be logically justified make a moral code valid not that the moral code still exists. For example, take these biblical moral codes:
Cannibalism as punishment (Jeremiah 19:9)
Punishing children for mockery by being ripped apart by bears (2 Kings 2:23-25)
Punishing children for their parent's actions (Isaiah 14:21-22)
Victimless crimes (Numbers 15:32-36, Leviticus 18:22, Exodus 20:4)
None of these moral pronouncements can be logically defended as valid without recourse to God says it as an excuse. They fact that they've hung around doesn't make it valid. People are stupid that way. They buy into silly ideas which hang around.0 -
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