What if cultural moral norms track cooperation strategies?
Could this knowledge help resolve disputes about moral norms?
Cultural moral norms are arguably heuristics (usually reliable but fallible rules of thumb) for subcomponents of strategies that solve cooperation problems.
See Oliver Currys Morality as Cooperation papers and Martin Nowaks book SuperCooperators for an introduction to the field. However, note that Oliver Curry explains as cooperation strategies only what is cross-culturally moral in 60 surveyed societies. I propose that all past and present moral norms can be explained as parts of cooperation strategy explanations. Further, the coherence, diversity, contradictions, and strangeness of past and present moral norms people typically argue about are products of three major norm categories: (There may be other categories of moral norms specific to cooperation by kin-altruism and hierarchies that are less often debated.)
Partnership moral norms Parts of strategies that solve cooperation problems between people with equal moral standing. These include heuristics Do to others as you would have them do to you, Do not steal, lie, or kill, and Be loyal to your group which advocate initiating indirect reciprocity. (Cross-culturally moral norms are partnership moral norms.)
Domination moral norms Parts of strategies to cooperatively exploit an outgroup to benefit an ingroup. These include Slaves must obey their masters and Women must be submissive to men.
Marker moral norms Markers of membership in and commitment to a more cooperative ingroup. Preferentially cooperating with members of an ingroup can reduce the chances of being exploited and thereby increase the benefits of cooperation. These markers include eating shrimp is an abomination, masturbation is immoral, and other food and sex taboos.
Note that to be stable in a society, game theory shows that cooperation strategies must include punishment (of at least reputation-damaging social disapproval) of violators such as free riders. This necessity 1) explains why we have our intuitions about moral norms strange innate bindingness and often anger at their violations and 2) enables distinguishing moral norms as cultural norms whose violation is commonly thought to deserve punishment.
This knowledge can help resolve disputes about cultural moral norms because it provides an objective basis for:
1) Not following moral heuristics (such as the Golden Rule or Do not steal, lie, or kill) when they will predictably fail in their function of solving cooperation problems such as in war and, relevant to the Golden Rule, when tastes differ.
2) Revealing the exploitative component of domination moral norms and the arbitrary origins of marker strategies.
3) Piercing the mysticism of religion and cultural heritage that protects moral norms from rational discussion by revealing that cultural moral norms have natural, not mystical, origins.
4) Refining cultural moral norms to be more harmonious with our moral sense (because our moral sense also tracks cooperation strategies).
What about its limits? This observations usefulness in resolving moral disputes is limited by its silence on important ethical questions. It is silent about what our ultimate moral goals either are or ought to be and what we imperatively ought to do. It is silent about who should be in our circle of moral concern (as Peter Singer describes it) and who (or what) can be ignored or exploited. And except regarding cooperation with other people, the observation is silent concerning:
1) How should I live?
2) What is good?
3) What are my obligations?
I am interested in this findings role, if any, in ethics and expect commenters will be tempted to leap into those discussions. But in hope of providing a grounding for further discussions, I request this thread focus on:
Assuming this empirical finding is correct and given its above limitations, do you think this observation about the function of moral norms could be culturally useful for resolving disputes about moral norms? And if not, why not?
Cultural moral norms are arguably heuristics (usually reliable but fallible rules of thumb) for subcomponents of strategies that solve cooperation problems.
See Oliver Currys Morality as Cooperation papers and Martin Nowaks book SuperCooperators for an introduction to the field. However, note that Oliver Curry explains as cooperation strategies only what is cross-culturally moral in 60 surveyed societies. I propose that all past and present moral norms can be explained as parts of cooperation strategy explanations. Further, the coherence, diversity, contradictions, and strangeness of past and present moral norms people typically argue about are products of three major norm categories: (There may be other categories of moral norms specific to cooperation by kin-altruism and hierarchies that are less often debated.)
Partnership moral norms Parts of strategies that solve cooperation problems between people with equal moral standing. These include heuristics Do to others as you would have them do to you, Do not steal, lie, or kill, and Be loyal to your group which advocate initiating indirect reciprocity. (Cross-culturally moral norms are partnership moral norms.)
Domination moral norms Parts of strategies to cooperatively exploit an outgroup to benefit an ingroup. These include Slaves must obey their masters and Women must be submissive to men.
Marker moral norms Markers of membership in and commitment to a more cooperative ingroup. Preferentially cooperating with members of an ingroup can reduce the chances of being exploited and thereby increase the benefits of cooperation. These markers include eating shrimp is an abomination, masturbation is immoral, and other food and sex taboos.
Note that to be stable in a society, game theory shows that cooperation strategies must include punishment (of at least reputation-damaging social disapproval) of violators such as free riders. This necessity 1) explains why we have our intuitions about moral norms strange innate bindingness and often anger at their violations and 2) enables distinguishing moral norms as cultural norms whose violation is commonly thought to deserve punishment.
This knowledge can help resolve disputes about cultural moral norms because it provides an objective basis for:
1) Not following moral heuristics (such as the Golden Rule or Do not steal, lie, or kill) when they will predictably fail in their function of solving cooperation problems such as in war and, relevant to the Golden Rule, when tastes differ.
2) Revealing the exploitative component of domination moral norms and the arbitrary origins of marker strategies.
3) Piercing the mysticism of religion and cultural heritage that protects moral norms from rational discussion by revealing that cultural moral norms have natural, not mystical, origins.
4) Refining cultural moral norms to be more harmonious with our moral sense (because our moral sense also tracks cooperation strategies).
What about its limits? This observations usefulness in resolving moral disputes is limited by its silence on important ethical questions. It is silent about what our ultimate moral goals either are or ought to be and what we imperatively ought to do. It is silent about who should be in our circle of moral concern (as Peter Singer describes it) and who (or what) can be ignored or exploited. And except regarding cooperation with other people, the observation is silent concerning:
1) How should I live?
2) What is good?
3) What are my obligations?
I am interested in this findings role, if any, in ethics and expect commenters will be tempted to leap into those discussions. But in hope of providing a grounding for further discussions, I request this thread focus on:
Assuming this empirical finding is correct and given its above limitations, do you think this observation about the function of moral norms could be culturally useful for resolving disputes about moral norms? And if not, why not?
Comments (105)
First, when you say "this empirical finding," I am assuming you are referring to this, plus your generalizations/summations, right?
Quoting Mark S
This is all fine. Just to add, the study of the natural origins and mechanisms of morality goes at least as far back as Darwin, and has been particularly active in the past 100 years. There are multiple theories from anthropology, ecology, psychology, neuroscience, developmental biology, many of which are not mutually exclusive, but rather provide different and mutually supportive ways of looking at the same subject. Morality as cooperation strategy very much fits into that body of research.
However, I don't understand how you get to this conclusion:
Quoting Mark S
This implies that you can discern the shape of some truer, superior morality by identifying global patterns in its natural origins. And once you have grasped this "super-morality," you can then use it to arbitrate moral puzzles and disagreements. But why? Why must there be some universal, immutable "super-morality" behind the dizzying variety of cultural norms? And why think that this is the way to find it? Just because you can identify patterns doesn't mean that you have found a general principle. Such an approach is redolent of natural science, but then you must believe that morality is a universal principle of nature, like, say, relativity or the least action principle?
I suspect that what is really going on is that you are taking modern science as the paragon of a methodology aimed at truth and then applying that methodology to ethics without first establishing whether ethics is a suitable domain of application.
Identifying general principles behind the historical development of moral norms is a worthy and fascinating scientific endeavor, but I don't think it can inform us about some "truer" morality that supersedes whatever moral norms we may currently hold.
It's important to me that I respond in a way consistent with your intent for this discussion, but I have a hard time "assuming this empirical finding is correct," because I don't really understand it. It does not resemble any theoretical approach to morality I have any experience with. I don't really understand what "Cultural moral norms are arguably heuristics (usually reliable but fallible rules of thumb) for subcomponents of strategies that solve cooperation problems," means.
I'll just leave it at that.
And welcome to the forum.
Thanks for the welcome! I am glad to be here.
My post is a proposal for an approach to establish if a scientific observation about past and present cultural moral norms could have implications for ethics. If that scientific observation is useful for resolving disputes about cultural moral norms, then we have reasons for believing science can have some limited implications for ethics.
As you point out, there are differences of opinion, but I am happy to defend that past and present cultural moral norms track cooperation strategies. Note that this is a claim about what is (sciences domain), not what ought to be (moral philosophys domain).
For this thread, cant we take it as a hypothetical that past and present cultural moral track cooperation strategies and then explore the implications?
The implications:
Quoting Mark S
Without this knowledge, a few people might think of the Golden Rule and Do not steal, lie, or kill as mystical moral absolutes and follow them blindly. Most people would intuitively abandon them in such cases (as cultures typically do) but lack an objective criterion for doing so. I can imagine huge arguments about if and when such norms ought to be abandoned. Knowing that these norms track cooperation strategies seems to me useful for resolving such disputes when these heuristics can be expected to fail at that function.
Key question for you: Why do you think this knowledge would not be useful as I have described?
I want to emphasize the limited implications of science for moral philosophy:
Quoting Mark S
I like your other questions and look forward to exploring some interesting possibilities with you. But, for now, can we focus on why you think this knowledge would not be useful as I have described?
"Cultural moral norms as parts of cooperation strategies" is consistent with cultural moralities being seen as dialects (specific applications) of those strategies.
The dialects can be oppositional though. Contradictions are common. Homosexuality is worthy of death in some cultures and morally irrelevant in others.
Plurality (available variations), particularly in a rapidly changing environment, is beneficial for either biological or cultural reproductive fitness but I expect we would agree that reproductive fitness is not interesting as an ultimate goal for moral behavior.
Well, for proximate beings like us, I think "an ultimate goal" is about as useful for flourishing as tits on a bull.
Thanks for asking! If you did not understand my key point, I expect there are also many others here who did not. Ill try to clarify "Cultural moral norms are arguably heuristics (usually reliable but fallible rules of thumb) for subcomponents of strategies that solve cooperation problems,"
This is not a theoretical approach to understanding morality - what we somehow ought and ought not do. And specifically,
Quoting Mark S
It is an empirical approach to understanding the function of past and present cultural moral norms, a subject of little interest in traditional moral philosophy.
This approach takes moral norms to be cultural norms whose violation is commonly thought to deserve punishment, though the violator may not actually be punished.
Its scientific truth claim is based on its explanatory power for past and present cultural moral norms, no matter how diverse, contradictory, and strange plus other relevant criteria for scientific truth. Virtually all past and present cultural moral norms can be explained as parts of cooperation strategies. (Proposed counterexamples are always welcome.)
For example, Do to others as you would have them do to you is a heuristic (a usually reliable, but fallible rule of thumb) for initiating the powerful cooperation strategy, indirect reciprocity. But the Golden Rule only initiates indirect reciprocity; it is only a subcomponent of the strategy. Indirect reciprocity typically includes other subcomponents such as punishment of people who do not reciprocate (free-riders) and criteria for who you choose to cooperate with and who you choose to ignore.
So we have:
Cultural moral norms such as the Golden Rule are arguably heuristics (usually reliable but fallible rules of thumb) for subcomponents of strategies such as indirect reciprocity that solve cooperation problems."
This is a scientific claim about what is. It is a different category of knowledge than claims about what we ought to do.
Does this help at all?
Quoting 180 Proof
When I said "ultimate goal" I was thinking of standard moral goals such as increasing flourishing or reducing suffering.
But It makes the moral labels superfluous and is not what people mean when they make a moral claim.
It sounds like trying to apply scientific interference into human behaviour to produce desired outcomes but it does not sound anything like a morality but also it sounds very manipulative.
The whole idea is like discovering what we thought of as morality was just self serving AKA Dawkins selfish genes. My idea of morality, that I thought others shared, was to do with good character reflected in your actions. Compassion etc. A sense of duty and empathy.
I thought the only point of religions was to give meaning to life. If life has no innate meaning then peoples goals are going to be subjective and arbitrary. I personally see no reason to mindlessly reproduce our genes. I think hopefully people that do want to have children are not mainly focused on spreading their genes but maybe they are? But if you appreciate sunsets hopefully that is not just another strategy to entice you to replicate.
I've always thought along these lines. Moral norms are traffic lights that help guide the flow of human behaviour. Humans can't help but build systems to follow - is morality more than a code of conduct tied to a value system? For me morality seems to be an open conversation and contest of ideas conducted between groups holding a multiplicity of values and beliefs. The best ideas don't always win.
Where I find difficulty is in how that helps resolve moral disagreements.
You and I are standing on the edge of a cliff. I say that my moral values lead to the concussion that I should throw you off. You say "hold on a moment, let me talk to you about what is." I listen patiently, thank you for the interesting insight into what is, but since you have given me nothing about what I should do, my should from earlier remains and I throw you off.
How does the "is" help with disputes about "should" and "ought?"
Quoting Andrew4Handel
Cooperation is a rapidly expanding field, a wonderful topic all on its own, and people can certainly talk about it without mentioning moral norms.
But assume you are arguing with someone about cultural moral norms. If you said We could enjoy more benefits of cooperation in our society if you abandoned this or that cultural moral norm either permanently or in these special cases and rather followed this or that moral norm, I expect all you would get is a puzzled expression.
Most people would be thinking Why is he talking about cooperation when the dispute is about following moral norms? My religion or culture provides my moral norms and my intuitions are that they apply to everyone. There is nothing in them about cooperation.
Using the insights from cooperation studies to solve disputes about moral norms requires an extra bit of empirical information - cultural moral norms track cooperation strategies. This hypothesis can be shown to be correct based on its explanatory power for past and present cultural moral norms, no matter how diverse, contradictory, and strange. That such as simple hypothesis has the ability to explain such a huge, superficially chaotic data set supports its robustness as scientific truth.
That cultural moral norms are parts of cooperation strategies must be presented if we are to use what we have learned from cooperation studies to resolve disputes about cultural moral norms.
I am not a fan of Dawkins selfish genes perspective. While perhaps technically correct, it is highly misleading and other technically correct perspectives provide useful insights much more readily.
Right. But ethics is a much broader subject than cultural moral norms which advocate parts of cooperation strategies. What goals ought we have for our cooperation? How ought we live, apart from living cooperatively with other people?
The open contest of ideas is more about these important ultimate goals and values, a subject that moral norms as cooperation strategies is silent on.
Quoting PhilosophyRunner
The is claim about cultural moral norms being cooperation strategies could help me if you were going to throw me off the cliff because one of your cultural moral norms advocated killing me and you are trying to act as a moral person.
By explaining that the moral norm, perhaps something like People who work on the Sabbath should be killed, is a marker strategy for increasing cooperation in your ingroup, you might be convinced, as a moral person trying to act coherently, to not cause that harm (if causing harm would contradict other moral norms or values you try to follow).
But what if your moral values lead you to believe that you ought to throw me off the cliff because it would be fun and you have no more important moral values that tell you that you should not do so? There is nothing about what we ought to do in the is claim about cultural moral norms, so I expect I should be ready to resist being thrown off the cliff.
What I propose as culturally useful is that cultural moral norms are parts of cooperation strategies, an is claim. My claim is silent regarding the broader scope of ethics.
If I just had a more memorable name for the idea
As I said - that's where the contest of ideas comes in. Which is already in place and morality (in the West) is an active part of public discourse and subject to incremental tweaks, mods, and set backs over time. As a secularist, I might argue for preventing suffering as the primary goal. No doubt others have their goals, from pleasing gods to rule utilitarianism. Which to choose? All we can do is argue a case based on our convictions.
Quoting Tom Storm
I agree, except our convictions can be naive or informed by the accumulated moral wisdom of the ages from moral philosophy.
What I am proposing (that is newish in the modern age) is the usefulness of understanding cultural moral norms underlying principles. Cultural moral norms are a topic almost ignored by traditional moral philosophy as just a chaotic mess. Fortunately, sciences tools can sort through such messes to reveal underlying principles. And I am happy to say that these conclusions about what moral means are are complimentary, not contradictory, to traditional moral philosophys investigations into moral ends.
You may be familiar with a new breed of psychological and philosophical work on the origin of ethical values that divides the realm of subjective emotional sentiment from rational objectivity. Our ethical values arise from biologically evolved subjective feeling differing from culture to culture and era to era, which we can study and compare using an evaluatively neutral empirical naturalism at the same time that we maintain a relativistic stance on moral values. The resulting position is a mixture of objective rationalism and subjective relativism.
Even though moral values are dependent on subjectively relative emotional dispositions, it is possible to determine one moral position as being objectively better than another on the basis of non-moral meta-empirical values such as consistency, universalizability and effects on well-being.
It has been pointed out that such an empirical stance carries with it its own ethical baggage. That is to say, the supposed neutrality of objective scientific inquiry is itself grounded in pre-suppositions ( consistency, parsimony) that amount to ethical valuations Thus, science is as much in the business of determining oughts as any other ethical stance.
Well, to summarize my perhaps a bit convoluted response, I'll reiterate PhilosophyRunner's question:
Quoting PhilosophyRunner
You yourself seem rather conflicted on this point. In your OP and responses to others you both acknowledge it and contradict it. This is what I find most confusing. There are plenty of people among those who comment on morality who blithely ignore or deny the is-ought problem. But with you I can't even figure out where you stand.
Let me try to reconstruct your thinking and you tell me if I got something right:
1. Science can give us insights about generative principles behind moral norms.
2. Those generative principles constitute a purer form of morality than the specific norms that result from it.
3. Therefore, by gaining an understanding of those principles, we can apply a corrective to the actual moral norms that we hold, or fill the gaps left by existing norms.
(2) is the most problematic step here, in my opinion, although plenty can be said about (1) and even (3) to further complicate the issue.
Thanks for pointing out that my explanations need more details to clarify how I am handling is/ought issues.
Assume there is a dispute about when, or even if, following a cultural moral norm will be advocated.
Lacking the empirical knowledge that cultural moral norms are heuristics for parts of cooperation strategies:
The mysticism of religious and cultural heritage and moral norms intuitive imperative oughtness can protect cultural moral norms from rational discussion.
With this empirical knowledge:
Any perceived imperative oughts are debunked. (Despite our intuitions, the Golden Rule, do not lie, steal, or kill, and other cultural moral norms do not have any innate, mystical, imperative oughtness. They are only heuristics for parts of cooperation strategies.)
Agreement on if or when moral norms will be advocated becomes an instrumental choice. If people want the material and psychological benefits of cooperation in their society, they should (instrumental ought):
o Advocate following cultural moral norms when they will predictably solve cooperation problems and
o Advocate not following those moral norms when they predictably will create cooperation problems. (Not following the moral norms when, as fallible heuristics, they act opposite to their function.)
The scientific study of cultural moral norms reveals that, as heuristics for cooperation strategies, advocating or not advocating cultural moral norms can be justified as an instrumental ought.
What if they don't care about the benefits of cooperation but believe instead in the benefits of might is right and getting what they can through power and brutality? Is there any way your model can arrive at a justification for its initial axiom/s?
In other words how do you justify cooperation to those who aren't interested?
In biology two kinds of relationships exist:
1. Parasitic: in a relationship, one gains and the other loses
2. Symbiotic: in a relationship, both register a gain
Morality is, by the looks of it, all about symbiosis and reducing parasitism.
Quoting Joshs
I agree, but the subject of moral positions in terms of answers to How should I Live, What is good?, and What are my obligations? is beyond what I would like this thread to be about. Id like this thread to focus on what science can tell us about cultural moral norms as heuristics for cooperation strategies. Perhaps we can return to this in a future thread?
Quoting Joshs
I understand this is a position some have defended. I see science as not based on premises (pre-suppositions) but as a coherent web of knowledge (as per W. V. Quine) from which the specific pre-suppositions you refer to emerge. Again, this is a topic I would like to put off for another thread.
Well said, Smith! :up: :100:
Indeed. Nicely phrased.
Quoting Joshs
These presuppositions are valued because they are good at a particular job relative to a framework - so is it argued that this selection is itself an act 'ought making' and thereby an ethical choice?
Quoting Tom Storm
I can't. What I can do is have nothing to do with them. If they exploit other people, I can, at minimum, warn other people these are poor cooperators and they should have nothing to do with them also.
If they just want to be left alone, we can leave them alone.
This is how our ancestors have been handling the problem for perhaps hundreds of thousands of years.
Just remind me, what problem are you trying to resolve with your approach? Is it just finding a justification (underpinnings) for potential ethical choices if we have already determined that we must cooperate? What form of cooperation does one use - anything from Communism to neo-Liberalism would be in scope, right?
Right. You are talking about what is, at bottom, a cooperation problem that symbiotic relationships have solved by gene-motivated behaviors selected for by the reproductive fitness gains both partners obtain. My subject is about how cultural moral norms solve the same cooperation problems. Nice parallel. Thanks.
I am not making an ethical proposal of the form You imperatively ought to do such and so which would require an explanation of where the ought comes from.
Rather, I am first reporting an empirical observation that virtually all past and present cultural moral norms can be explained as parts of cooperation strategies. It is the nature of empirical observations that is not necessary to explain why they are what they are and not something different (in this case different from cooperation).
Second, I am arguing that this empirical finding is useful for resolving many disputes about cultural moral norms since:
Quoting Mark S
Yes, but you are making an ought - that there is a way to approach this using empirical observation (and the norm model) which are values which need to be justified to those who believe in moral truths which come from theism or a Platonic realm, or similar.
Seems to me that your model only works if everyone who comes to a study of ethics shares your initial axiom - which requires a commitment to a particular worldview.
Quoting Mark S
Yeah, that's a non-starter then. Is does not debunk ought. A naturalistic theory of morality does not have it as a consequence that moral imperatives are false, invalid or obsolete. Strictly speaking, there is no logical coupling between the two. Perhaps entertaining such theories can influence one's moral reasoning in some way, but not via inference.
Generally, a reductive explanation does not debunk its explanandum. But here we don't even have a reductive explanation. A moral imperative is not reducible to an explanation of its neurochemical mechanism or its social function. To see why, simply note that, as Hume argued, causal explanations neither contain nor imply any oughts, nor do they motivate action on their own, without being supplemented by some imperatives.
You still have the choice to abandon moral norms and leave only non-moral imperatives (instrumental oughts), but that choice cannot be justified by science. It's no less "mystical" than accepting moral norms in the first place.
I want to also push back against this charge of "mysticism":
Quoting Mark S
This implies that moral norms must derive their oughtness from something - if nothing else, then "mysticism." But I don't think that we necessarily derive our oughts. We may rationalize them, but that is optional and done after the fact.
There is no getting away from norms. We have rational, epistemic norms - those aren't derived either. Moral norms are just a different kind of norm, and they are not derivable from anything non-moral, though many things can influence them.
What about moral norms such as the prohibition of homosexuality, the acceptance of slavery, the inequality of the sexes, the application of the death penalty and so on.
Quoting SophistiCat
Quoting SophistiCat
I am an admirer of Hume and, perhaps like you, have yet to find any convincing argument for how to derive an imperative ought from what is they are different categories of thing.
The mysticism of cultural moral norms that science debunks is the mystery of their origins and why they have the strange intuitive properties (that John Mackie described as queerness) of bindingness and violations deserving punishment.
By explaining the queerness of our intuitions about cultural moral norms as subcomponents of cooperation strategies, science debunks the mysticism that shields cultural moral norms from rational discussion.
This mysticism is not in the category of imperative oughts.
Science reveals an objective basis for evaluating cultural moral norms as instrumental oughts. If you want the benefits of cooperation, you ought not follow cultural moral norms when they predictably will create rather than solve cooperation problems. That seems simple to me.
On the other hand, consider a stoic, a consequentialist (perhaps for flourishing or reducing suffering), and a religious divine command theorist. What implications, if any, does this science have for their answers to What is good? and How should I live?? There are no necessary implications at all. They are about different categories of thing.
Past and present cultural moral norms are subcomponents of cooperation strategies. We know this is true in the normal provisional scientific sense based on the hypothesis incredible explanatory power for known past and present cultural moral norms, plus meeting other relevant criteria for scientific truth such as simplicity and integration with the rest of science.
Quoting Andrew4Handel
From the OP:
Quoting Mark S
1) prohibition of homosexuality The simple prohibition is a sex taboo marker norm of membership and commitment to a more reliably cooperative ingroup. But the effect of this moral norm on ingroup cooperation can be enhanced by claiming that homosexuals are somehow a threat to the ingroup that all must unite against. Due to our evolutionary history in small groups, we are strongly inclined to increase cooperation when our ingroup is threatened. So claiming that homosexuals are both evil and somehow a threat to society is an example of a domination moral norm which exploits an outgroup, homosexuals, as an imaginary threat to the ingroup (the society).
2) Moral norms condoning slavery and the inequality of the sexes Both are examples of domination moral norms.
3) Acceptance of the death penalty Moral norms are cultural norms whose violation is commonly felt to deserve punishment. Laws about the death penalty are in a different category. But a relevant moral norm could be Do not kill people for fun; that merits execution. Executing people who kill for fun is a punishment component of cooperation strategies. For cooperation strategies (composed of moral norms) to be stable in the face of free-riders and other exploiters, there must be punishment of violations. The relevant insight science provides is that execution can be parts of cooperation strategies encoded in a societys moral norms. Whether or not to advocate for such norms can be an instrumental choice based on which option will most likely increase the benefits of future cooperation. Of course, this is only an insight into what the moral norm is, not what the moral norm ought to be. We both might advocate that moral norms whose violation merits death also be judged based on a Rawlsian view of justice and minimizing suffering. Remember, science is silent about what moral norms ought to be. Science can only tell us what moral norms are.
What kind of threat though?
There is something very specific about the continued stigmatisation of homosexuality in various cultures. Why did the writers of the bible care about it?
It really seems very arbitrary. I don't see the creation in groups and out groups as a moral system as opposed to a hierarchy.
But I don't see what the benefit in this case is of condemning homosexuals (to the point of neuroticism) If a morality evolved from such irrationality it seems unreliable.
What kind of threat are homosexuals to society? An imaginary one.
Being imaginary does not prevent right-wingers in the United States and other places from advocating against the threat of the gay agenda to families and children to demonize homosexuality. Why would people do that?
Demonizing homosexuality can be beneficial for the people doing it. First, among Christian fundamentalists, it marks them as moral people worthy of respect at little cost to themselves. It even marks them as leaders fighting to defend innocent families and children.
Do they know the threats are imaginary? I dont know. I do know that when it is in someones self-interest not to understand something, they are unlikely to ever be able to understand it.
Why do Christian fundamentalists who are not trying to be leaders believe it, often against the evidence of their own experience? Beyond the religious teachings calling for the execution of male homosexuals (Leviticus 20:13), they can believe it because it feels good. Due to our evolutionary history, cooperating to defend our groups (here families and children) triggers pleasurable emotions of pride, elation, and righteous indignation. There is an emotional feedback system in biology underlying our moral sense that can be hijacked to resist the threat of even imaginary threats.
Marker strategies are often random. If they dont make any sense, then people who follow them must be sincere and committed to the ingroup and therefore likely to be good people to cooperate with.
For example:
The many food and sex taboos including the execution of male homosexuals (Leviticus 20:13);
Stoning of those who curse (Leviticus 24:1016),
Stoning of those who work on the Sabbath (Exodus 31:15)
Do not wear clothing woven of two kinds of material (Leviticus 19:19)
Yes, understanding the function of past and present cultural moral norms as solving cooperation problems does require a worldview one that accepts, rather than rejects, science as a powerful way to understand what is in our universe and how it works. But dont we agree about that?
If that scientific understanding of past and present cultural moral norms is, like the rest of science, instrumentally useful for achieving our relevant goals (here achieving the benefits of cooperation in our societies), then is not that useful science?
Note that I am not proceeding to say This is the benefit of cooperation (flourishing or reduction in suffering) you ought to pursue. This would be claiming an ought which would have to be justified.
Identifying an instrumental ought (you ought to do X if you want to achieve Y) from science does not imply any oughts that must be justified. Are you still thinking it does?
Quoting Mark S
That's your foundational axiom or presupposition, which is not one all people would share. How do you get buy in for this when many people think morality comes from - gods/s, higher consciousness, a Platonic realm, etc?
The next problem is how to establish what counts as an appropriate cooperative model. Communism?
Anarcho-syndicalism? Participatory democracy? As soon as you talk about societal cooperation you enter into politics.
Quoting Mark S
Sounds to me like this is heading towards scientism. Science can be a useful and powerful tool with which to make interventions in the world. But it does not get us to absolute truth and I think the questions of what our universe is and how it works (along with many others) are open questions.
You begin with a metaphysical position - that reality can be understood by humans and that science is the chief tool in this enterprise. Not sure about that. Many would not agree. How do you get cooperation about this metaphysics?
I think there is an equally, if not more, important affective dimension; the moral sense. The moral sense is based on love, for those closest to one, and general compassion for others.
Where did you get this classification? Is it yours?
Morality may as well be a religion if it is just making up a system of rules and ideas to keep people happy.
But it has no truth value. No one has discovered a truth value to moral claims or moral instructions.
So moral systems are a sham at heart but people don't believe that so keep on making moral claims relentlessly.
Quoting neomac
I was hoping someone would ask about the nomenclature.
The sociologist Riane Eisler coined the names of the basic patterns of cooperation in societies as partnership and domination morality in her 1987 book The Chalice and the Blade.
Ive not seen her nomenclature (or any good alternatives) used in the science of morality literature. But hers seems wonderfully appropriate, so I thought I would try it out here. Previously, I have referred to these categories as ingroup and exploitation (cooperation to exploit an outgroup) moral norms but now prefer Eislers names. What do you think?
Nomenclature in the science of morality field is still in flux. Perhaps by having a better name, the domination subset of human morality will get more of the attention it deserves. The present science of morality fields focus (such as Oliver Currys Morality as Cooperation and Jonathan Haidts Moral Foundations work) is on partnership moral judgments, with unfortunate neglect of domination moral judgments and norms.
Marker moral norms has been used in the field for some time (and the strategy in game theory they implement has been called the green beard strategy). More recently, these norms have been called signaling norms (signaling membership and commitment to a more reliably cooperative ingroup) as in this 2021 paper:
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/full/10.1098/rstb.2020.0294
Which do you think communicates better, marker norms or signaling norms?
Quoting Janus
But our moral sense can also judge domination moral norms as right and even obligatory, such as extreme cases in the middle east of killing ones daughter to protect family honor because she eloped with a neighbor boy the family judged unsuitable.
The thing to remember is that the selection force for the biology underlying our moral sense is the reproductive fitness benefits of the cooperation it motivates. That reproductive fitness benefit is what encodes the same partnership and domination cooperation strategies in our moral sense as is encoded in cultural moral norms.
I find Eislers names more appropriate:
- ingroup is expected to be the antonym of "outgroup" while in your name convention is unexpectedly contrasted to exploitation (which according to your definition presupposes the notion of "outgroup" anyways),
- besides "ingroup" and "outgroup" seem to refer to "groups", so they seem to suggest relations between groups, while cooperation can simply hold also between "individuals".
- if we do not stipulate a terminological contrast between "outgroup" and "exploitation" , then when can avoid to inconveniently equate "ingroup" with "partnership", and will leave room for the idea of forms of ingroup's exploitation.
Quoting Mark S
"signalling" sounds more appropriate and it may fit well with analogous notions used in animal ethology (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Signalling_theory)
I'm very much interested in this topic and I'm sympathetic to your views so I hope we can discuss it further but I would like to finish to read Oliver Currys Morality as Cooperation
Quoting Andrew4Handel
So you find no truth value in the OP? Humm
Moral claims are oughts i.e. from a photgrapher's perspective, how the girl should look, not how she looks. Of course moral claims aren't true; we have to make 'em true. That, I believe, is God's will - we're to turn this world into a paradise.
Quoting Tom Storm
Consider getting buy-in for understanding domination moral norms such as women must be submissive to men as cooperation to exploit an outgroup.
Women who are being exploited and are questioning the morality of that exploitation should be easily convinced. The scientific explanation of the shameful reasons such norms exist should be attractive to them. I dont see a problem with getting them to buy in.
Men who enjoy the benefits of this exploitation and are not concerned with the morality of it will be resistant if not impossible to convince. But at least those being exploited have some objective reasons for arguing against the normal mysticism of religious and cultural domination norms.
Quoting Tom Storm
No. The metaphysical position I take is not a premise. It is an empirical provisional truth from science. Science has empirically shown it is a powerful means for understanding what is and how it works. Science has not shown it is a suitable means for understanding what ought to be or what we imperatively ought to do. They are different categories of things.
Quoting neomac
I am moving to agreement that, in part because of its increasing usage in the science of morality literature, "signaling norms" may be preferrable to "marker norms".
Quoting neomac
I'm glad to hear of your interest! Proposing the potential relevance of the science of morality to questions in moral philosophy and practical ethics can be a lonely business on philosophy websites.
The problem I have with Oliver Currys scientific model
of moral cooperation is the same problem I have with his embrace of a Popperian approach to philosophy of science. Curry believes his approach bypasses philosophy by using Popperian science to treat moral questions. However , rival views of the role of science (Kuhn, Feyerabend, Rouse, Rorty) reveal Popperian science (as Curry calls his approach) as stuffed with philosophical presuppositions that lead to a reductive treatment of human motives. For instance , the concept of innate modules directing cooperative as well as competitive behavior is disputed by enactivist neuropsychological perspectives, which argue that organisms are self-organized on the basis of normative goals of sense-making that originate in neither a bottom-up nor top-down manner. Currys reductive evolutionism slights the inseparable reciprocal interaction between embodiment and interpersonal relations in the determination of moral issues in favor of a one-way determinism.
Quoting Joshs
I understand Currys two main claims for Morality as Cooperation to be that cross-culturally universal moral judgments 1) solve cooperation problems (an empirical claim about what is that I agree with) and 2) cross-cultural moral judgments solving cooperation problems are also somehow(?) normatively moral (a position about normative moral oughts that Curry does not adequately defend IMHO).
I try to be careful to only rely on Currys empirical observations which appear to be good scientific data. I have not been able to follow Currys arguments for Morality as Cooperations normativity and in no way rely on it.
This is nothing but a groundless assumption. If we have evolved to be loving and compassionate, then why are we not all loving and compassionate?
Quoting Mark S
Not if they think this is god's will or the natural order. Chances are they won't even be seeing the same empirical 'reality' you think you see.
Quoting Mark S
This is taking the view that reality can be understood - a metaphysical position. I think a lot of people might dispute science's capacity here as @Joshs has outlined.
Quoting Joshs
Quoting Mark S
You keep coming back to this and I am not sure why. I haven't raised Hume's is-ought problem.
I view moral claims as "oughts". I don't see the point of moral claims that can be ignored.
You could call them moral laws.
The laws of physics impose themselves and impose limitations and boundaries.
You can impose any system of belief on a society or on someone and that doesn't resolve its truth value. It will result in people subjectively rejecting your system but you imposing it on them anyway not through reason.
We all have different goals and values they are not all compatible.
It is Ok with me that you are not convinced. We can simply disagree.
Quoting Tom Storm
The idea that reality can be understood is a metaphysical position.
I took your implication to be that I was improperly basing the empirical observation "past and present cultural moral norms are parts of cooperation strategies" on an unjustified metaphysical premise. I am not.
Science has empirically shown it is a powerful means for understanding what is and how it works. That means the idea that important aspects of what is in our reality and how it works can be understood is a provisionally true, highly robust, scientific hypothesis - not a premise.
Again, if you want to disagree, that is fine with me.
But I must ask. Do you then conclude that there is no point in doing science at all? And if some science is worthwhile, how do you distinguish what is worthwhile from what is not? Perhaps just how you feel about the answers provided?
Quoting Mark S
I've not said science is useless. Science can be a very useful tool and can be a consistently reliable approach to making useful interventions in our world - especially through technology.
Quoting Mark S
What do you mean this is 'not a premise'? I said nothing of premises. I am saying yours is a metaphysical presupposition that science in some magical way has access to reality as it really is. 'Reality' is one of the big unresolved questions of philosophy.
This conversation might be better served if you can demonstrate in clear dot points how your approach works on a particular moral question.
Let's take slavery is wrong as a starting point. Can you work though this?
Quoting Andrew4Handel
You are correct that people have different moral goals that they feel everyone should conform to. How does that contradict what the science of morality reveals - the subject of this thread?
As I said in the OP about the science of morality:
Quoting Mark S
When the science of morality explains that "past and present cultural moral norms are parts of cooperation strategies", it explains what moral means are, not what moral ends (goals) are.
And there is nothing imposed on people by this science except a better understanding of reality. Like the rest of science, this science is useful when it reveals instrumental oughts.
Here, that instrumental ought can be expressed as If you want to increase the benefits of cooperation in ways that will better achieve your goals, then you ought to follow your cultural moral norms when they will predictably solve cooperation problems and abandon them when they will create cooperation problems.
Cultural moral norms have been destructive and abusive. Cooperation can be a bad thing. There was a lot of cooperation and self sacrifice in the two world wars and amongst Nazis and in other acts of cruelty and destruction.
Maximising cooperation would only be moral or good if people were not being harmed by the goals involved.
I don't accept there is a science of morality or the authors analysis of moral norms.
You could study religion in the same way and make a compilation of religious aspirations and beliefs and see what commonalities were between them but it wouldn't validate the beliefs.
It seems a very arbitrary and self serving analysis to try and find some kind of unifying feature to very diverse data.
The notion of what a benefit is will be subjective based on individual preferences even if these individual preferences are widely shared they are not universalizable.
I agree. Science is about how things are, ethics is about what to do; these are very different questions.
At the core, that we do cooperate does not imply that we ought cooperate.
Of course, science and ethics answer different questions.
How should I live? this is a question for moral philosophy about what to do.
Why do cultural moral norms exist? - this is a scientific question about what things are.
That we do cooperate does not imply that we ought cooperate. Right. To think otherwise would be a category error confusing what is with what ought to be.
Where do you think my OP or the rest of my comments contradict either of your two points?
Science can only "dubunk" the mysticism of moral norms when it is opposed to mystical narratives concerning their origins and operation, such as those offered by some religious traditions. But we are not talking about that. There is no mysticism involved in accepting moral norms without or independently of an awareness of history and mechanism. (The "queerness" of which Mackie wrote is something else - it concerns moral "properties" when viewed alongside items in a naturalistic ontology of properties.)
And while conservative religious societies may indeed oppose the kind of scientific research into the anthropology of morality that you have been championing in this thread, somehow I don't think that is what you have in mind when you talk about debunking and shielding. What then? The questions that science opens to rational discussion concern the whats and the hows of morality: What norms are there? How did they arise? How do they operate in society and in individual? Etc. What it cannot do is advance the discussion of norms as such - that is, whether one ought to accept them - except indirectly and arationally, similarly to how learning and life experience can over time affect one's moral outlook.
We can set aside the question of naturalizing morality via scientific insights into its origins, which I think has not progressed much in this discussion, and talk instead about putting those insights to practical use. But I don't know how much there is to be said here. Morality is a social institution, and just about anything having to do with sociality involves cooperation strategies - even conflict above individual level. "Solving cooperation problems" can describe everything that goes on in society, from family life to wars.
Contradiction? Perhaps not.
Quoting Mark S
But as you agree, it does not tell us what to do. Sure, cooperation is a core characteristic of humanity, but it is adept at doing wrong as at doing right.
That seems to be pretty much the same critique as , , , and so on.
Quoting Mark S
it looks like you want to keep your cake and eat it.
Quoting SophistiCat
I should not have mentioned the explanatory power for Mackies queer properties of bindingness and obligation. I am trying to limit this thread to how this science reveals useful instrumental oughts relevant to refining cultural moral norms. Please ignore my mention of Mackie.
Quoting SophistiCat
Right, there is nothing in the science (or in what I have said here) that addresses normativity. Justifying normativity is outside sciences domain.
I want to limit this thread to only 1) introducing the science and 2) arguing for this sciences instrumental usefulness (the same kind of instrumental usefulness provided by the rest of science If you want to achieve that, do this).
But perhaps you are wondering how these instrumental oughts for refining moral norms can be useful without an argument that people somehow ought to follow their moral norms?
People already follow their cultures moral norms such as Golden Rule and Do not lie, steal, or kill and will continue to do so. No philosophical reasoning about normativity is required. So I dont see the lack of imperative oughts from science as affecting this sciences usefulness for refining cultural moral norms.
On the other hand, this science does reveal the exploitative origins of domination moral norms and can debunk their mystical origins. Again, I dont see the lack of imperative oughts against exploiting others as a serious hindrance to using the science to refine moral norms.
What about any implications this science might have for normativity, the metaphysics of morality, and so forth? I look forward to exploring these topics but prefer to have that discussion to the next thread where I can start with a fresh OP focusing only on that.
Quoting SophistiCat
Exactly right. As Martin Nowak likes to say, we are SuperCooperators. Our ability to cooperate is what has made us the incredibly successful social species we are.
We are near time to start a new thread on philosophical implications. That may be more interesting for this audience.
You might have a look my most recent comments above to ?SophistiCat. I address at least some of your points.
And even then I'm not even sure instrumental oughts are oughts. Rather they are a way of trying to shoehorn the word ought in disguised behind an adjective.
Quoting Mark S
Such a thread should include not just the implications for philosophy , but the metaphysical pre-suppositions of the biologically-based science of human cooperation that researchers like Nowak have contributed to and Curry and Haidt build on.
For instance, mathematical biologist Martin Nowak wrote:
God is not only creator, but also sustainer. God's creative power and love is needed to will every moment into existence. God is atemporal. In my opinion, an atemporal Creator and Sustainer lifts the entire trajectory of the world into existence. For the atemporal God, who is the creator and sustainer of the universe, the evolutionary trajectory is not unpredictable but fully known.
I would suggest this is not just a matter of science influencing Nowaks theology, but of his theological and philosophical assumptions grounding his empirical model. Even though many of the other contributors to the biology of cooperation research are atheists, they share with Nowak certain universalist assumptions concerning scientific values. Sociobiology went out of favor as its ideological foundations were revealed. Current biologically-based cooperative models of morality are also amenable to such scrutiny.
Quoting PhilosophyRunner
I prefer what all well-informed, rational people would advocate as moral regarding interactions between people after Bernard Gert's definition in the SEP as my basis for what is morally normative, an imperative ought.
I did not realize "instrumental oughts" is a controversial idea.
My bad I made a typo in my post. Both my points were about instrumental oughts, but I incorrectly wrote imperative oughts in my first sentence. That point was:
"Instrumental ought are really just conditional oughts. So it doesn't solve any problems, just kicks the can down the road to the condition. And an ought is still required on the other side of the condition."
That man is struggling to breathe. Science tells me that IF I want to save his life I ought to put an oxygen mask on him. But if there was a moral disagreement on this issue, it would not be about the scientific principals behind mask usage, but whether saving that mans life is good or bad or worth the consequences. In which case your instrumental ought really doesn't help.
Quoting Joshs
I am happy to address all of those. But I can't talk about everything at once, particularly as I aim for 600 to 1000 words per post.
Nowak's theology is a curiosity, but I am unaware it has influenced either the data he presents, his highly respected work in game theory, or his broad conclusions. And Curry and Haidt have some poorly supported ideas about cross-cultural commonality somehow implying normativity that they mention in passing, but the data they have gathered is high quality and untainted.
Please let me know immediately if you see any data or conclusions I present that appear tainted by theology.
Sorry, couldn't resist it.
Pragmatism in morality is not an effective tool for mediating conflict, as it's the very cause of the conflict. Whether a moral norm is useful depends on how it impacts you and those close to you. That's dependent upon your social position and personal circumstances, and morality is proficient in adapting to those.
Religious or not, it makes little difference. Morality functions with or without any conscious agreement, and although something like the 10 commandments seems objective, they're not applied that way. "Thou shalt not kill" but Christians did a lot of killing, the objective moral law saying not to kill was not an impediment to having pragmatic moral views whatsoever.
Why would what personally benefits me be usable as an objective mediation tool? You're emphasising golden rules such as "do not kill", but that's not how morality works, we justify killing when it's useful. To whom is it useful when that occurs? Everyone? No, it will disproportionately impact some groups more than others, and our moral views adapt well to this reality.
What conflicts could you resolve by explaining what would be useful for us? We're already doing that anyway and usefulness depends on your position, you can't explain what's most useful for everyone, right?
Quoting Judaka
Consider some cross-culturally common moral norms:
Do to others as you would have them do to you.
Do not lie, steal, or kill.
Contrary to your claim, people do not commonly try to compute the behavior that would be most useful to them when making moral judgments. Rather, people experience motivation to follow the moral norms they grow up with such as those above. This motivation comes from the biology underlying our moral sense and from the potential punishment of at least reputation damage if they are seen to violate their cultures moral norms.
People commonly have serious conflicts over when it is moral to follow the above norms and when it is not. The mystical origins of religious and cultural moral norms tend to make rational discussion difficult and these conflicts virtually unresolvable.
The empirical observation that all cultural moral norms are parts of cooperation strategies punctures that mysticism and provides an objective basis for agreeing on when it is and is not moral to follow the above moral norms.
From the OP,
[quote="Mark S;d13929"
]This knowledge can help resolve disputes about cultural moral norms because it provides an objective basis for:
1) Not following moral heuristics (such as the Golden Rule or Do not steal, lie, or kill) when they will predictably fail in their function of solving cooperation problems such as in war and, relevant to the Golden Rule, when tastes differ.
2) Revealing the exploitative component of domination moral norms and the arbitrary origins of marker strategies.
3) Piercing the mysticism of religion and cultural heritage that protects moral norms from rational discussion by revealing that cultural moral norms have natural, not mystical, origins.
4) Refining cultural moral norms to be more harmonious with our moral sense (because our moral sense also tracks cooperation strategies).[/quote]
Quoting Mark S
I wonder if you are taking morality to be man-made? And our moral choices to be made consciously? One may not be aware of the cold & calculative process which determines what they think is moral, the calculation happens with or without their intent. Find an individual and learn what he values, and see whether or not you can't find the source of the belief in his circumstances. See whether his values promote his circumstances, his personality, and his characteristics or don't they.
Do not steal or kill, but after all, who wants to die or be robbed? What unites us is pragmatic there, that's why there's little disagreement.
Though we do find ways to break these rules all the time, they are not golden rules at all. As loopholes, we separate ideas. Theft is wrong but what is defined as theft is very calculated. Imperialism was not theft to the imperialists, paying someone below minimum wage is not theft, and tax is not theft. How many examples of "theft-like" behaviours could we find that aren't called theft? When something is morally justified, it changes shape. It's not that we can't kill others, it's that killing others is conceptually reserved for killing when it's done immorally. If we're calling it murder, then we're condemning it, if we weren't condemning it then we'd call it something else, perhaps if we're lazy we'll call it by the very word of "justice"?
Why do you imagine the cooperation must be on the scale of a nation? Isn't it naive to expect people to join together and cooperate on a culture-wide basis? What objective basis is this? You're privileging one type of cooperation over another, and yours is less pragmatic and goes against our tribalistic nature.
Quoting Judaka
The point of my OP is that the cooperation strategies that compose past and present cultural moral norms are innate to our universe. So, no, morality as cooperation strategies is not man-made. People adapt these strategies as they see fit in terms of definitions of who is in ingroups and outgroups and markers of both and the like.
People make moral judgments virtually instantaneously based on their emotional responses from their moral sense. (See Hume, plus Jonathan Haidt for a modern data-driven version.) So no, moral choices are not commonly based on conscious thought processes. What can be based on conscious thought processes is resolving disputes about cultural moral norms, again as described in the OP.
Quoting Mark S
Quoting Judaka
Cultures will decide what they want to about who is in ingroups who deserve full moral regard and who is in outgroups who can be ignored or exploited. Science is silent on the matter. Again, from the OP:
Quoting Mark S
Those moral heuristics just get bypassed whenever they're inconvenient, they're not as in need of flexibility as you seem to propose. You say that people are not taking into account what's beneficial for them when forming opinions on morality and that they merely follow what they've been taught. However, as you yourself have noted, it is beneficial for someone to follow the status quo, as the norms are legally and socially enforced. So, it's unsurprising to see people following those norms.
However. take an example such as urbanisation, recent examples are well illustrated in China. The older generation is rural and grew up in a very different, poorer China, while their children are working in modern cities. When you examine these two generations and compare the differences in their moral codes, their rules, priorities and so on, the differences are predictable. Why is this? Because the practicalities of your circumstances weigh heavily on determining what obligations or responsibilities you have, what you should or shouldn't be allowed to do and so on.
Look at a country like the US, it's got large political divides between people who live in cities vs the country, it's a common theme.
As cultures contain many different people living in many different circumstances, with all kinds of dividing factors, it makes sense that moral views would clash for this reason. I imagine none of the above is news to you, so what's the deal? You obfuscate this problem when you just say "our ultimate moral goals" and such, as though there's a presumed unity that there would be such as thing as "our ultimate moral goals". What's your actual proposal? To turn morality into a science? To assert it'd be anti-scientific to go against whatever scientists proposed was the objectively correct way to cooperate?
My proposal is that people understand that all cultural moral norms can be explained as parts of strategies to solve cooperation problems. That knowledge is instrumentally useful for resolving disputes about when or if to enforce those moral norms because it:
1) Shows that mystical explanations from religions or cultural history are, at best, suspect.
2) Provides an objective, rather than subjective, basis for resolving those disputes. (What better basis do you suggest for resolving moral norm enforcement disputes?)
3) Resolves those disputes in ways most likely to achieve the benefits of cooperation (to achieve the benefits that have made human beings the incredibly successful social species we are).
4) Provides an objective moral principle for resolving moral disputes that otherwise does not exist (so far as I know).
Perhaps your objection is that the above requires rational thought about enforcing cultural moral norms?
Sure, people benefiting from domination norms will commonly find themselves unable to reason rationally about those norms. So what?
People who are being exploited by domination moral norms will find themselves able to think rationally about those as soon as they see the advantage to themselves. So at least half the argument about enforcing domination norms can commonly have an objective basis in science. That is a big advantage in resolving disputes about enforcing cultural moral norms.
You keep pointing out that disputes exist. Again, so what? My point is that understanding why cultural moral norms exist is useful for resolving those disputes regardless of anyone's "world-view".
1) Sure.
2) No, it doesn't. Not any more than you can argue against birth control pills or condoms by pointing out sex is for making children, or against junk food by pointing out that we eat to sustain ourselves.
As I've been trying to point out, the cooperation morality is helping to create is tribal in nature. Conflicts are a part of the nature of morality, it's a healthy part of what it evolved to be. I have no desire to resolve such disputes.
3) Morality evolved for the purpose of cooperation, but it's much more than that now, just like so many other things about human behaviour. There's money to be made, power to be had, ideals to be upheld and yada yada. And as I've said, it's not about species-wide or culture-wide cooperation.
4) Why do humans care about bad things happening to other people, for example? Is that rational? Why can I listen to the story of someone going through a terrible experience and cry for them? Why do I feel such an urge to want to help them? It encourages cooperation, yes, but it's not based on the desire to cooperate.
If one person cares about X and another Y, and you say "let's cooperate!" I mean... come on... you can't be serious. They're not caring about X and Y out of love for cooperation, and they're not going to change their minds because the concept of cooperation was invoked.
I'm just trying to point out that if you engage with the complexities of the issue. If you stop analysing the concepts of morality and cooperation together in an isolated environment, then you'll see the problems. Morality is more complicated than its original function, and how it accomplishes this original function is not through a conscious love of cooperation, it's so very far away from that.
I think trying to find a theory that will help resolve moral disputes may be admirable, but it's the wrong place to start. It may be that the best moral theory is the one that many people have a difficult time accepting. It also may be that the theory that most people accept isn't the one that has the best moral foundation. Imagine trying to do science this way. The best arguments should win the day.
You may find similar moral norms in various cultures, but there will still be disputes as to what makes these moral norms right or wrong. Most people already agree on the basics of what's moral or immoral (lying, murder, stealing, etc.). What's disputed are the foundational questions, and you're probably not going to find consistency here. For me, the foundational questions are the real questions.
One could easily argue that ethics is both about how things are, and how one should then act.
First, remember that "past and present cultural moral norms are parts of strategies that solve cooperation problems" is claimed provisionally true science with no innate normativity. People may find it useful or not. No problem if they do not.
Second, the foundational problems you reference refer to (I assume?) what ought our goals be or what ought we do regardless of our needs and preferences. These problems likely have no objective answers based on the failures of the last 2500 years of study by incredibly bright people to find any. You are advocating potentially condemning people to endless, unresolvable debates which will provide little to no objective help in resolving common moral disputes.
Third, the MACS perspective is the most useful objective basis that I am aware of for judging whether cultural moral norms fulfill or do not fulfill their function of increasing the benefits of cooperation (increasing the benefits of living in a society). Contrary to your claim, most moral disputes are about when cultural partnership moral norms will be enforced such as "lying, murder (or 'killing'), stealing" and following the Golden Rule or if domination moral norms and marker norms will be enforced. Virtually no one, except philosophy majors, argues about the ultimate source of morality as consequentialism, virtue ethics, and the like.
I see the MACS perspective as culturally useful for resolving common moral disputes. It is essentially silent regarding solving the foundational questions you seem most interested in.
Maybe that silence is a good thing. That means MACS does not directly threaten the intellectual edifices that have been constructed regarding your foundational moral questions.
The cooperation that morality enables does so by solving problems that are innate to our universe. The nature of moral norms is to solve conflicts. If you have no desire to resolve such disputes, you would not be a good person to associate with. OK.
There is nothing about groups in the cooperation problems that are innate to our universe. Cooperating in groups (tribes) and discriminating against outgroups is just one cooperation strategy, not an innate feature of the problems being solved.
Quoting Judaka
Sure, ethics has grown far beyond cooperation strategies to include answers to broader questions such as What is good?, How should I live?, and What are my obligations?
So? The subject of this thread is What if cultural moral norms track cooperation strategies? and Could that knowledge help resolve disputes about moral norms?
Quoting Judaka
Perhaps you are thinking about the complexity added by two powerful human-invented cooperation strategies: money economies and rule of law?
Money economies are fantastically more efficient means of solving cooperation problems than moral behaviors as defined by moral norms. And rule of law efficiently supplies the necessary punishment component of cooperation strategies by reducing the risk of punishment provoking escalating cycles of retribution.
Money economies and rule of law do not directly complicate the function of morality. Their chief effect has been to obscure the function of morality as solving cooperation problems.
Prior to the invention of money economies and rule of law, it would have been common knowledge, even obvious, that the function of morality was to increase cooperation. People knew they needed to solve cooperation problems and acting morally was the only means they had to do so, except for inefficient barter or force within hierarchies.
See Protagoras explanation of morality as cooperation in Platos dialog of the same name. Protagoras described as ancient knowledge that morality as cooperation was a gift from Zeus. Entertainingly, Socrates ignored and did not respond to 1) this correct explanation of morality (correct if we substitute biological and cultural evolution for Zeus) and 2) Protagoras main point in the debate about teaching morality. Perhaps Socrates ignored it because morality as cooperation was too commonplace an idea and therefore uninteresting. Or perhaps Socrates had nothing to say to criticize it and commenting favorably did not suit his purposes.
Psychopaths (people with diminished or absent empathy and conscience) will not feel any love of cooperation they only love themselves.
In contrast, the spontaneous feeling of satisfaction and optimism in the cooperative (moral) company of friends and family is a primary source of durable happiness for most people.
Yes. At issue is how one derives what one is to do from how things are. In WIttgensteinian terms, direction of fit.
We need to introduce televised puppy-kicking events. We ought offer public rewards to those who can kick the puppy farthest. We need a breeding program specifically to find the best puppies for kicking.
We ought celebrate the high levels of cooperation needed for proper puppy kicking.
Then cultural moral norms will track cooperation strategies.
I agree.
Quoting Mark S
The foundational issues I'm speaking of have to do with what it is that makes murder, stealing, lying objectively immoral? I believe one can appeal to objective reality to make the case that these examples are objectively immoral. So, I disagree that they don't have objective answers. Because people disagree, this in itself doesn't mean there hasn't been progress, or that there aren't good theories. It sounds like your idea of failure is due to there not being a consensus. However, it's not about consensus, it's about good arguments, and many or most arguments aren't any good. Moreover, most people don't seem to be that good at reasoning through some of these ideas. They let a particular ideology guide their beliefs.
And we would finally leave behind that annoying question of what to do. Just kick the pup.
The OP proposes that the function of past and present cultural moral norms is solving cooperation problems. That is what cooperation strategies do. How do you imagine kicking puppies solves cooperation problems? You are just making up nonsense.
I think the puppy kicking is just an analogue for any kind of egregious potential human behavior that can be assessed as right or wrong, regardless of any cooperative components. Humans cooperating may lead to human sacrifice, burning of witches, hanging of gay people, gassing of minority groups - all as part of a prevailing social order.
And what cooperating to kick puppies shows is that this is misguided. It does this by setting out an instance of cooperation that is not morally acceptable.
The function of past and present cultural moral norms is to tell us what to do.
Sure, that might on some, or even most occasions lead to improved cooperation, but that is incidental, and not their function.
What you are proposing here and in your other thread is blind to the purpose of moral and ethical discussion, that being deciding what we ought to do. As points out, the discussion is about good answers, it is about the endless unsolvable debates. And this is simply because what we do changes what we ought to do. The discussion goes on.
To put it bluntly, what you are suggesting is that cooperation is useful. Well, yes, but that does not even begin to address issues of morality, of what it is we ought cooperate in doing.
Quoting Tom Storm
Yep.
Innate to our universe? What does that mean?
Healthy cooperation is based on mutual benefit, between you and the other parties, but not necessarily outside of that. You're imposing this kind of species-wide cooperation mandate that doesn't make any sense, as though all humans need to cooperate with each other.
Doesn't healthy cooperation require aligning interests? Do all humans have aligning interests?
Quoting Mark S
There is only one way to resolve these disputes, and it's through tyranny. Oh, of course, our noble philosophers wouldn't ever dare dream of tyranny, they only assert objective moral truths which do the tyranny for them. The truth imposes itself on everyone by its nature, and so wipes one's hands clean from having to do the imposing themselves. Disagreement is an obvious outcome of freedom, for people to fight for what works best for them, to fight for their ideals and beliefs. What's wrong with a dispute? Is it your desire to rid the world of moral disputes? Why? So we can all hold hands and work together in a beautiful utopia? Ugh, I despise the attempt, and it won't ever work out that way.
We should only aim to limit our cooperation to peaceful means and to reconcile our disputes in peaceful ways. I know I'll never see eye to eye with everyone else regarding what's right or wrong, but we could at least try to be respectful of our differences. Isn't that what things such as freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and so on, are all about? We want to create the perfect environment for disagreement to be conducted in a peaceful, civil and productive manner., not eliminate disagreement...
Quoting Mark S
Morality doesn't exist in a vacuum. For example, through propaganda in the late 20th century, the US demonised communism, consistently morally condemning it and this caught on and continued within US society for decades. This moral condemnation was politically motivated, and it's a good example of how outside influences are impacting moral views. You're acting like morality exists just to solve problems of cooperation, and this is just entirely lacking in nuance, it's rarely that simple, or innocent.
Quoting Mark S
I'm afraid of the moral views of others, we hurt others in the name of righteousness, and think of ourselves as just. We can be so brutal in doing it... humans aren't saved by morality, we've done terrible things in the name of justice. Look at some of the prisons of our world, people there are treated like animals, deprived of any dignity or safety. It's fine though, they deserved it, and it's morally okay.
Don't expect me to view the invoking of the term morality with trust, I don't have any respect for the concept of morality as a whole. It's a feature of the concept that one views themselves as trustworthy, "we won't hurt anyone unless they deserve it", great, how reassuring. Morality is only beautiful when you're only looking at it from the perspective of what you find moral. Because what you find moral will always take your needs and desires into account, but the morality of others isn't so convenient. Species-wide cooperation lol... under whose rule?
As to what I claim, referring once again to my OP,
Quoting Mark S
I argue that this knowledge is useful for resolving many disputes about when and if cultural moral norms will be advocated in a society. Therefore, understanding that past and present cultural moral norms are parts of cooperation strategies is culturally useful knowledge.
Your objection, as I understand it, is there is no normative content to this science telling us what we morally ought to do the business of ethics as you see it.
Ace! Youve got it!
But rather than the downfall you see, its lack of normative claims is its power. It provides a culturally useful basis for resolving common moral disputes (as described in the OP) without the necessity for any agreement on moral premises or normativity. No requirements for agreement on moral premises or normativity is a big advantage.
I see the business of ethics as also helping people resolve common disputes about cultural moral norms using the most effective means available. You disagree?
Do you propose to help people resolve their common disputes about cultural moral norms based on sophisticated, complex, unresolved assertions about moral premises and sources of normativity?
Good luck with that. That huge mess is what I am looking to help people avoid. Not everyone is a philosophy major who loves nothing better than endless arguments about moral premises and normativity.
On the other hand, principles that underlie the empirical observations about the function of past and present cultural moral norms may (spoiler alert) turn out to be normative what we ought and ought not to do. This is possible. We are talking about the function of all cultural moral norms no matter how diverse, contradictory, and strange. That function should have something to do with morality.
Coincidentally, I am just finishing a post on the normativity of MACS and will present it in a day or two. I define the universal principles underlying MACS and argue for their normativity. I hope for many good comments.
But that argument is complicated and not one I would inflict on average people looking to resolve a dispute about when to advocate not following the Golden Rule.
Most people trying to resolve disputes about moral norms will be more successful starting with the elementary understanding that cultural moral norms are parts of cooperation strategies.
Quoting Judaka
No. I am discussing the cultural usefulness of understanding that past and present cultural moral norms are parts of cooperation strategies.
Of course, ethics is a much broader topic than the function of cultural moral norms.
From my OP
Quoting Mark S
Your theory provides an answer to what we might do derived from what we have done in the past.
But is that what we ought to do?
Again your answer seems to be to some other question.
Does MACS define what we imperatively ought to do? No, of course not. I have no reasons to believe such imperative oughts ever have or ever will exist.
Does MACS define what all (or virtually all) well-informed, rational people would advocate as moral in their society? I argue it does, and is therefore normative, in my post Normativity of Morality as Cooperation Strategies.
Without considering what all rational people would do (with no assumed normative content), is MACS useful for resolving disputes about when to advocate cultural moral norms? Yes, that is the point of this post as:
Quoting Mark S
If these do not contradict one another, they are at the least contrary.
So again, sure, it's nice when folk cooperate. But morality and ethics do not consist in cooperation.
Your theory does not tell us what we ought do. And from what you have said, you agree with this.
No, the two claims are not contrary.
Quoting Mark S
Quoting Banno
As I argue in this thread, MACS is useful for resolving many disputes about moral norms (disputes about what we ought to do) despite lacking arguments for any kind of normativity (and especially imperative ought normativity, which I expect exists only in our delusions). So, yes, MACS, even with no normative claim tells us about what we ought to do.
Being culturally useful without any normativity makes MACS an excellent candidate to evaluate for normativity, as I do in Normativity of Morality as Cooperation Strategies.
By Gerts definition of normativity what all rational people would advocate under specified conditions MACS is normative in the sense of defining right and wrong. But there is no source of imperative bindingness in Gerts definition hence no imperative ought; it can be rational to act immorally.
MACS without normative claims helps resolve many disputes about cultural moral norms. When shown to meet Gerts definition of normative, MACS tell us much more (but not all) about what is moral and immoral.
You are referring back to one of your other threads, which shows that the three ought be merged.
And Gert is defining morality, not normativity. Here's the quote:
Quoting Gert
You would replace doing what is right - being ethical - with doing what is expected, what is "normal". You want "well-informed, mentally normal, rational people" - presumably white middle class cis hetro males. :rofl:
Look a that first line again: "There does not seem to be much reason to think that a single definition of morality will be applicable to all moral discussions."
Sorry for the delay in responding. I had immediately composed my reply but then did not hit the post comment button.
You are misreading Gert.
He says:
"There does not seem to be much reason to think that a single definition of morality will be applicable to all moral discussions.One reason for this is that morality seems to be used in two distinct broad senses: a descriptive sense and a normative sense. More particularly, the term morality can be used either
1) descriptively to refer to certain codes of conduct put forward by a society or a group (such as a religion), or accepted by an individual for her own behavior, or
2) normatively to refer to a code of conduct that, given specified conditions, would be put forward by all rational people."
In the article, he goes on to describe the rarity of definitions of moral normativity and why he thinks defining it is important.
But perhaps our miscommunication is due to different understandings of what descriptively moral and normatively moral refer to. What do you think they refer to?
Well, you've got some gall. :grin:
Other than as a starting point for discussion, does any of this really help us determine the more pressing question of what we ought, or ought not do?
Tom, you did not address your question to me, but briefly:
1) Gert provides a useful criterion for what is normative - what we ought or ought not do. If you have a better alternative, don't keep it to yourself.
2) Understanding the underlying universal function of cultural moral norms as parts of cooperation strategies provides a well-grounded candidate for normativity by Gert's definition.