The brilliant but relentlessly optimistic Steven Pinker offered today a link to a brief article about a new cross-cultural study of human morals.
The article, which you can read here, lists seven moral rules that seem to be universal to all cultures. They are:
1) Love your family.
2) Help your group.
3) Return favors.
4) Be brave.
5) Defer to authority.
6) Be fair.
7) Respect others’ property.
It’s easy to see why these would be selected for (easy, that is, if you accept the still-controversial idea of group selection): groups whose individuals instantiate these moral axioms will form robust and cohesive societies that are able to compete effectively against other groups.
The author, Oliver Scott Curry (Director of the Oxford Morals Project), explains:
Converging lines of evidence ”“ from game theory, ethology, psychology, and anthropology ”“ suggest that morality is a collection of tools for promoting cooperation.
For 50 million years humans and their ancestors have lived in social groups. During this time natural selection equipped them with a range of adaptations for realizing the enormous benefits of cooperation that social life affords. More recently, humans have built on these benevolent biological foundations with cultural innovations ”“ norms, rules, institutions ”“ that further bolster cooperation. Together, these biological and cultural mechanisms provide the motivation for social, cooperative and altruistic behavior; and they provide the criteria by which we evaluate the behavior of others. And, according to the theory of ”˜morality as cooperation’, it is precisely this collection of cooperative traits that constitute human morality.
What’s more, the theory leads us to expect that, because there are many types of cooperation, there will be many types of morality. Kin selection explains why we feel a special duty of care for our families, and why we abhor incest. Mutualism explains why we form groups and coalitions (there is strength and safety in numbers), and hence why we value unity, solidarity, and loyalty. Social exchange explains why we trust others, reciprocate favors, feel guilt and gratitude, make amends, and forgive. And conflict resolution explains: why we engage in costly displays of prowess such as bravery and generosity; why we defer to our superiors; why we divide disputed resources fairly; and why we recognize prior possession.
And, as predicted by the theory, these seven moral rules ”“ love your family, help your group, return favors, be brave, defer to authority, be fair, and respect others’ property ”“ appear to be universal across cultures. My colleagues and I analyzed ethnographic accounts of ethics from 60 societies (comprising over 600,000 words from over 600 sources). We found that these seven cooperative behaviors were always considered morally good. We found examples of most of these morals in most societies. Crucially, there were no counter-examples ”“ no societies in which any of these behaviors were considered morally bad. And we observed these morals with equal frequency across continents; they were not the exclusive preserve of ”˜the West’ or any other region.
For example, among the Amhara, “flouting kinship obligation is regarded as a shameful deviation, indicating an evil character’. In Korea, there exists an “egalitarian community ethic [of] mutual assistance and cooperation among neighbors [and] strong in-group solidarity’. “Reciprocity is observed in every stage of Garo life [and] has a very high place in the Garo social structure of values’. Among the Maasai, “Those who cling to warrior virtues are still highly respected’, and “the uncompromising ideal of supreme warriorhood [involves] ascetic commitment to self-sacrifice”¦in the heat of battle, as a supreme display of courageous loyalty’. The Bemba exhibit “a deep sense of respect for elders’ authority’. The Kapauku “idea of justice’ is called “uta-uta, half-half”¦[the meaning of which] comes very close to what we call equity’. And among the Tarahumara, “respect for the property of others is the keystone of all interpersonal relations’.
All very good so far, and not really surprising at all. “Love your family.” “Help your group.” “Be brave.” If you were designing a set of rules to make groups more resilient in competition with other groups, and to ensure that there would be a stable framework for nurturing and providing for succeeding generations, you’d probably come up with these very ideas. And the pitiless meat-grinder of evolution has done exactly that, at horrifying cost.
But there is a trap here for the unwary: it is to confuse the universality of these moral frameworks with the universality of their scope.
Here is the last paragraph of the article, and it has an all-too-familiar ring:
And so there is a common core of universal moral principles. Morality is always and everywhere a cooperative phenomenon. And everyone agrees that cooperating, promoting the common good, is the right thing to do. Appreciating this fundamental fact about human nature could help promote mutual understanding between people of different cultures, and so help to make the world a better place.
There is a very dangerous equivocation here: “everyone agrees that cooperating, promoting the common good, is the right thing to do.” But does “the common good” mean the same thing to a Maasai warrior, or a Somali Muslim, as it does to Steven Pinker, or a researcher of morals at Oxford? Do the concepts of “your group” (rule 2), or “authority” (rule 5), have the same referents?
It seems clear enough that Messrs. Pinker and Curry, along with the rest of the clerisy that currently occupies the commanding heights of Western cultural and political power, quite obviously believe that they do — and that even if they don’t, they ought to.
Furthermore, “ought” implies “can”. And if your Universalist faith is strong enough, you will make the move from “ought’ to “can”, and go straight on to “shall”. Amen.
On this they have pinned their belief in our salvation, and are willing to stake our civilization’s future. What could go wrong?
13 Comments
“Crucially, there were no counter-examples — no societies in which any of these behaviors were considered morally bad.”
But that’s demonstrably false. When any white person in a white country tries to apply the rule “help your group” or merely asserts that his racial or ethnic or national group _is_ a group with its own interests, that is considered the most immoral thing in the world.
Likewise, if a Christian in the west wanted to help Christians specifically–Christians in the Middle East, say, not just Middle Easterners in general–that would be considered morally wrong.
For that matter, if Americans want a non-racial non-ethnic policy of “America First” that is considered morally wrong or at least highly suspect. It seems immoral to care more about your fellow Americans than some bunch of foreigners who arrived illegally last week to take your jobs, ruin your neighborhood and ruin your children’s schools.
Western countries are obvious counter-examples. I wonder why that didn’t occur to them. An implicit assumption that white people transcend any moral categories that apply to the rest of the world?
Pathological altruism?
Jacques,
But that’s my point exactly: we are living under a Universalist clerisy for whom it is an article of faith that the proper scope of a morally advanced people’s “group” is everyone, everywhere.
The unspoken, and patronizing, hidden premise is that, since we white people of the West have been chosen to be God’s agents in this world, other groups might not have got to our level of understanding yet, so it is our moral duty to lead the way by example. And because the Universalist faith itself insists that there can be no real differences between any human groups — that all apparent differences are due to “mere” culture, and more importantly to white racism — then if we simply accept the Other into our bosom, atone for our sins, and cleanse our own hearts of any suspicion that people actually differ, then all the world’s people will follow us into the Kingdom Of Heaven. If you are a Westerner who disagrees, you are a therefore a heretic and a sinner — and you are in the way.
It’s nothing more than the old, familiar, White Man’s Burden, in a brand new bottle.
Robert,
Yes, that’s what it is.
Hi Malcolm,
Yes, I understood that was your point, and I agree. More precisely, you’re right in describing the hidden underlying premise. At the same time, there is what they are implicitly claiming with respect to their silly “studies” and then there is what their own “studies” actually say! My point was a bit different (but compatible with yours). I was just noting that, in reality, the results they are reporting very obviously conflict with their absurd beliefs. For example, it’s obvious that in the societies they’re describing “Help your group” does not mean what they want it to mean, or think it should mean. They’re actually reporting that everyone outside the degenerate west is ethnocentric and operates with a dual morality. So in that respect, it is obviously false that no one thinks it is morally wrong to follow that rule: degenerates in the west, like the authors of the study, think it is morally wrong for members of their own group to follow that rule. On the other hand, if “Help your group” is given their insane universalist interpretation, their claims are obviously false in a different way: people outside the west just do not accept that rule, and almost certainly there are many non-western or non-liberal groups who think it would be morally wrong to follow that rule.
So whenever the results are given a consistent interpretation, it turns out obviously false that there are “no exceptions”. Either we are the exception, or everyone else is.
But, for sure, you are right about the universalist clerisy.
Jason, if you happen by?
As I don’t know whether you’d picked up on that effort of mine wherein I tried to explain my disagreeing with your using the term evolution – but if you did read it and were still confused …
Thankfully Mr. Curry provides me a better illustration than my putting you through the unenviable task of deciphering my description of birds flying into the pathway of speeding cars:
(I am Jason as I recognize (or so I’ve been informed *You know who you are) hard to follow. *Cryptic is I think the word most generally?)
Thanks JK for your nice comment. I’ll confess I’ve been reluctant to respond to your previous one, for fear of “not getting the joke” and subsequently saying something that appears crass. But, I’d imagine that you and Malcolm would want me to be honest, so I’ll take the plunge while being open to correction. In the reference to your and Malcolm’s parents earlier, you mentioned that the fathers were both in the military. I took that to imply that over eons of “splats against the windshield,” (or over 50 millions years of development, to allude to the passage you just quoted) women have become heavily disposed emotionally to strong males who offer protection. More specifically, to those with obvious martial qualities who made their marks in, say, the wars in Europe and Korea. A prime example, if you will, of how we’re both animals and spirit, or even beasts and angels, something it appears you and I are on the same page on. And alas as maybe you’d also agree, the evidence seems to be piling up from the human sciences that we’re actually MORE determined than free, which understandably many people have a hard time getting their head around.
To give an example of the problem in reference to Malcolm’s post here, a portion of Bosnian Serbs perhaps felt they were fulfilling guidelines at least 1-5 when they drove out Muslims and Croats in order to protect their ethnic group during the 1992-1995 Bosnian War. This was something that members of the latter groups reciprocated – albeit I would argue to a less frequently violent degree(although certainly Muslims and Croats committed atrocities). To be sure, these individuals were violating rules 6 and 7, but what does fairness or respecting property matter if it appears that “your” people are vulnerable? From a Darwinian point view survival is what matters, so why should I risk it out of some abstract notion of justice or charity? As Malcolm suggests, I’m not sure individuals like Pinker or this Curry fellow fully want to confront this “Security Dilemma”. They just seem to go on and on about game theory or other mechanisms of spinning all the plates at once, perhaps unwilling to acknowledge how easily such endeavors simply lead to broken glass.
Sorry about the duplicated comment. Please erase if you want Malcolm. And again, I hope I’m not being too personal.
Jason,
Duplicate deleted.
And no, you weren’t being “too personal” at all. My father was a medical officer in the Royal Navy at the end of the Second World War, and for a little while after, before beginning his scientific career.
Just my opinion Jason but, your “so why should I” becomes my quibble where survival is the point.
Might I Jason return to your 09 May comment (Incels Redux) simply for the benefit of others unused to my way of “considering things”?
That illuminate for you at all Jason, why I’m quibbling not evolution at all rather an innovation? And a cultural one at that.
Our Host just a bit over a decade ago put me onto the notion, very simply put, that Western Culture itself has suffered a viral attack. And though he hasn’t, to my memory, spelled out (as intimated, we being both, sons of MDs) the many varieties of immunological scenarios that “the body” of WC might resort to; surely some individual responses are bound to be contrary to the interests of that very survival.
Malcolm some time ago resorted to, by way of a bacteria that, by some means I cannot with certitude recall and describe; Anyway the bug somehow wound up in (I think) feline urine which then, somehow infected mice which in turn “brainwashed the mice” resulting in the poor mouse becoming a cat’s lunch.
(Mulling this in my memory banks gets me to ‘taximodus plasmodis’ – but hitting the archives informs me, “not even close!”)
At any rate Jason, my thinking leads me to theorizing not evolution at all rather, an infection by an innovating virus.
Shall we leave it at that Jason? I’m not getting to spend much time online these few weeks. And I have been know to lose my train of thought.
Jason, Y’all,
As Malcolm can probably affirm, I’m afflicted with a little something which somehow manages to nag at my ol’ memory banks causing some number of fits and jerks.
But generally …
http://malcolmpollack.com/2012/02/27/cat-people/
And more recently posted Jason:
http://malcolmpollack.com/2016/02/09/toxoprogmosis/
Too I consider Jason, we are on the same page. (Aside from my memory’s haywirey ways, my comment information processor is a little screwy too.)
Thanks for the comments and links JK. Please be assured that I always read or click on them, even when I don’t make a response (for instance, I listened to two of the three conversations about civil wars you once suggested).
Boy, your father must have been a remarkable fellow Malcolm. If I’m correct, he and his colleagues created a vaccine that has saved hundreds of thousands of lives.