Evolution of Morality

Consuming Morality

by Richard Wilk

Published as Wilk, Richard 2001 “”Consuming Morality.” Journal of Consumer Culture 1(2): 245-260.

This essay began as a set of exasperated notes while reading books about consumption, such as Lasch’s (1979) The... more This essay began as a set of exasperated notes while reading books about consumption, such as Lasch’s (1979) The Culture of Narcissism, a complaint about the shallowness of modern consumerism. Reading an early version of Miller’s piece, ‘The Poverty of Morality’ (this issue), prompted me to revise that essay. The result is neither a critical response to Miller’s work nor
a completely separate and distinctive essay.We share literatures and critical reactions,many field experiences and have exchanged many drafts, ideas and conversations about consumption. Despite, or maybe because of, this relationship, we do not agree about everything. Part of the difference is no doubt due to my American perspective. I live in a state where more than 40 percent of adults are clinically obese and the roads are crowded with mammoth sport-utility vehicles. On this side of the Atlantic it is easier to take concepts like ‘overconsumption’ and ‘affluenza’ seriously. I have also
been deeply engaged for several years with the issue of global climate change and I believe that consumption is the most urgent and fundamental environmental issue that we face (Wilk, 1998).

L. Magnani (2010), Moral mediators in a technological world

by Lorenzo Magnani

In: R. Feist, C. Beauvais, and R. Shukla (eds.), Technology and the Changing Face of Humanity, University of Ottawa Press, Ottawa, pp. 112-133.

Technology moves us to a better world. We contend that through technology people can simplify and solve moral tasks... more Technology moves us to a better world. We contend that through technology people can simplify and solve moral tasks when they are in presence of incomplete information and possess a diminished capacity to act morally. Many external things, usually inert from the moral point of view, can be transformed into what we call moral mediators. Hence, not all of the moral tools are inside the head, many of them are shared and distributed in “external” objects and structures which function as ethical devices. For example we can use external “tools”, like computer or biotechnology, to reconfigure previously given social orders morally unsatisfactory: two interesting examples we will illustrate are e-democracy projects and their possible role in enhancing human rights or cloning and genetic engineering for enhancing human health.

Values Education for the Global Village

by Shiv Talwar

Published in Fu Jen International Religious Studies, Volume 3, Number 1, N. Summer 2009, Fu Jen Catholic University, Taiwan (ISSN 1994-8778).
Print your copy by visiting spiritualeducation.org.

Religious value systems around the world help to mediate between the individual and the community. But no such system... more Religious value systems around the world help to mediate between the individual and the community. But no such system mediates between conflicting individual and community issues on one side and broader global concerns on the other. In recent years, some spiritual leaders have attempted to transcend religious differences, going beyond their boundaries to unite traditions.
However, except for those few, the community at large has no idea about relating with the world outside. For most people, we are ‘us’ and they are ‘them’. We do not have to treat ‘them’ as we treat ‘us’. The world is thus conditioned to live on the basis of this exclusive ‘us’ ‘them’ duality.
Now, modern science and technology have reduced the world to a global village. The spread of democracy has also contributed immensely to enlightened ways of governance that promote pluralism and equal rights. The principle of equal rights requires a worldview that recognizes all others as equals, regardless of the other’s religious or moral views. Limited identities based upon religion, culture, nation, gender, ethnicity, or race must be secondary to the over-arching human identity. Failing that, communities exist in distrust of each other in an uneasy peace.
Today, limited identities run supreme. Traditional thinking regards spiritual development as synonymous with religious development and defines people and communities accordingly. We are too caught up in the religious paradigm, unable to think deeply enough to break free of its clutches to affect a paradigm shift. Either we teach religion or we exile it completely. We totally fail to notice that between barren secularism and segregated religious ideas, there is the third choice of teaching everyone in one integrated educational system human values based upon core spirituality which has the potential to unify us all in one global family.
Spiritual development is of prime importance in today’s dangerous world. This article presents a structural analysis of religion and attempts to show that the traditional approach to practicing and teaching religion is divisive, while spirituality is not. Broadly speaking, what follows is the map to a possible human journey from the supremacy of limited identities to that of the global human identity.

How infants and toddlers react to antisocial others

by Karen Wynn

Social Evaluation by Preverbal Infants. 2007

by Karen Wynn

Every Moral Has A Story, Simpler Moral, Simpler Story

by Christina Dietz

forthcoming in Noumena

In this paper, I hope to show that it’s possible to have moral/evaluative judgments in primitive languages. I will... more In this paper, I hope to show that it’s possible to have moral/evaluative judgments in primitive languages. I will argue that the complexity of a language invariably determines the complexity of a moral or evaluative judgment. In The Evolution of Morality, Richard Joyce does not seem to give the kinds of primitive languages I will talk about any consideration. If I am right, then it will follow that many of Joyce’s requirements for a moral language are mistakenly high.

I will argue that Joyce’s account of language (and as such, moral judgments) does not take relevant degrees of language complexity into account. As such, Joyce’s argument that language is a prerequisite for making moral judgments is weakened by the high complexity standard he has for a moral language. Such high standards of language complexity are unnecessary and have controversial consequences. I hope my thesis will provide a constructive alternative that Joyce can adopt without any serious consequences.

BETWEEN DARWIN AND CULTURE: THE FALSE DILEMMA OF MORALITY

by Mircea-Dan Mitroiu

Do I have more free will than you do?

by Brian Earp

Earp, B. D. (2011). Do I have more free will than you do? An unexpected asymmetry in intuitions about personal freedom. New School Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 9, No. 21, 34-40.

The present research explores the relationship between moral evaluations and intuitions about the causes of human... more The present research explores the relationship between moral evaluations and intuitions about the causes of human behavior, in particular freedom of the will. Two studies test for a self-serving bias in intuitions about free will. Study 1 explores whether individuals may seek to exculpate themselves from wrongdoing by denying free will, while justifying blame of others by endorsing free will. Study 2 explores whether individuals may justify personal failures by denying free will, while taking credit for personal successes by endorsing free will. In neither study do the data show the predicted differences between conditions. However, an unexpected finding is reported. By pooling the data from both experiments and collapsing across conditions, it is shown that participants give greater endorsement of free will whenever actions are described from a first-person, instead of third-person, perspective—a tentative “I have more free will than you do” effect. Possible explanations for these findings are discussed, as are avenues for further research on this topic.

Climate change and moral judgment

by Ezra Markowitz

Markowitz, EM & Shariff AF (2012). Climate change and moral judgment. Nature Climate Change.

A Study on Primary Classroom and Social Studies Teachers’ Perceptions of Moral Education and Their Development and Learning

by Halil Eksi

Yeliz TEMLİ
Derya ŞEN
Hanife AKAR
Educational Sciences: Theory & Practice -11(4) • Autumn • 2061-2067

The purpose of this study was to examine teachers’ perceptions of moral education, to what extend teacher education,... more The purpose of this study was to examine teachers’ perceptions of moral education, to what extend teacher education,
both pre-service and in-service, prepared teachers to deal with morality and moral education in their professional classrooms through a cross-sectional survey research design. The data were collected through a questionnaire that included items on demographic background information and open-ended items that aimed at exploring the teachers’s perceptions on the matter. The participants were a representative number of primary classroom teachers and teachers with different social credentials (N= 824) in 15 provinces of Turkey where high increasing population rates were observed based on national statistical data retrieved from the Turkish Statistical
Institute. Findings showed that most teachers regarded moral education as essential and wanted to deal with it in their classes, yet they complaint that both in-service and pre-service preparation had given minimum pedagogical emphasis on this matter. Teachers thought that helping students acquire global values and leaving personel moral dispositions out of the class were important assets during formal education, whereas they urged a need on how to teach those values. Cooperation among schools, family, media, and people with whom learners were in a close relationship were found essential in the implementation of moral education.

Dawkins and Morality

by Adrian Kumarasingham

From the Sensory Order to the Moral Order; Bridging Hayek to Hayek (Part 1)

by Troy Camplin

Published in NOMOI

In this paper I attempt to build a bridge between Hayek's ideas on the brain as a self-organizing system and his... more In this paper I attempt to build a bridge between Hayek's ideas on the brain as a self-organizing system and his theory of the moral spontaneous order using evolutionary psychology and Marc Hauser's evolutionary theory of morals.

Assessing Components of Morality

by Robert Shaw

Robert Keith Shaw (1997) Assessing Components of Morality. Thesis (Master of Philosophy). Auckland: The University of Auckland.

An investigation into the assessment of the moral components which were developed by John Wilson, is reported. Tests... more An investigation into the assessment of the moral components which were developed by John Wilson, is reported. Tests fox the classroom measurement of two components were developed. The components were; PHIL(CC), the claiming of concern for other persons as an overriding, universal, and prescriptive principle in moral decision making; and; GIG, knowledge of factual information which is relevant in making moral decisions which subjects face. The test development exercise was undertaken at a time when public interest in moral education was growing. The recent demand for moral education in Auckland is reviewed.

'The Prehistoric Mind as a Historical Artefact’, Notes and Records of the Royal Society, 65 (2011), 1-8.

by Matthew Daniel Eddy

On 8 July 2010 the front page of The Guardian newspaper featured an attractive colour drawing by the artist John... more On 8 July 2010 the front page of The Guardian newspaper featured an attractive colour drawing by the artist John Sibbick. It was entitled ‘Meet the Norfolk relatives’ and it depicted a pastoral scene of farmers and hunters going about their daily routines. However, the image was not included to illustrate a gargantuan sum recently paid for an impressionist painting. Nor was it a taster for an article about a long-lost work of art. This drawing was slightly different from the kinds that one would normally see on the front of a leading British newspaper. Its subjects were naked. Their bodies were hairy. They were, in fact, an artist’s impression of the early humans who lived on the Norfolk coast a million years ago...

On the Evolution of Morality by Means of Cooperation, Empathy and Natural Selection

by Tas Bain

Human intelligence: An amazing evolutionary mistake

by George Clarke

The Ethical Responsibility of Global Leadership

by Jason Wakefield

This humble article is on the relationship between ethics, morality, rights, authority and human dignity in the media... more This humble article is on the relationship between ethics, morality, rights, authority and human dignity in the media today.

ETHICS OF CONSCIENCE

by Jonathan Okeke

Is there a Genetic Fallacy in Nietzsche's Genealogy of Morals?

by Paul S. Loeb

The Question of Non Human Primates Morality

by Mateusz Stępień

Source:

Mateusz, Stępień, The question of non human primates morality, „Studies in the Philosophy of Law" 2010/5, pp. 135-154.