Evolution Of Ethical Behavior Research Paper

The ideas on EEB will be exemplified by a review of arguments, first, of the originators of EEB; second, of ecologists, ethologists, geneticists, linguists, neurophysiologists, and cognitive scientists; and third, of sociobiologists and their supporters and opponents.

1. The Originators Of The Idea

Charles Darwin, in On the Origin of Species (1859), established the homology between human and nonhuman primate morphology, but not between human and nonhuman behavior. In his revised edition of The Descent of Man (1885), he recognized that the moral sense or conscience differentiates humans from the other animals, and that ‘The imperious word ought seems merely to imply the consciousness of the existence of a rule of conduct, however it may have originated.’ He believed that the understanding of the EEB would be enlarged by studies of nonhuman behavior, and that nonhuman animals possessing parental and filial instinct would exhibit a kind of rudimentary intellectual and moral sense. He supported this by arguing that, first, social instincts lead animals to social groups and to perform ‘social services’; second, as the mental faculties develop, images and feelings endure and are subject to recall; third, development of language facilitates communication; and last, acquisition of habits helps to guide the conduct of individuals within the community.

Humans, to Darwin, are social animals who have lost some early instincts but retain the protohuman instinctive love and sympathy for others. Some instincts are subject to group selection; the altruistic social behaviors of early humans were not for the good of species or individuals, but for the welfare of the group. Humans ought to obey the instincts acquired and prescribed by the rule of conduct within society.

These Darwinian views have been accepted, except that a small number of biologists finds the theory of group selection (that is, a natural selection operating on more than one member of a lineage group, in which the selection is beneficial for the group rather than for the individual) inadequate to explain altruism (behavior that increases the fitness of the other at cost to self). There are three Darwinian contributions to EEB. First, the acceptance of morphology as a product of evolution repudiated creationism and thus, the divine source of morality, and at the same time implied that human behavior is also evolutionarily derived. Second, the rejection by Darwin of what John Dewey called ‘the holy arc of permanence’ meant that all human behavior, including ethics, evolved, is evolving, and will evolve. Third, EEB is concerned with the origin of ethical behavior, and not with the prescriptions of ethics.

Spencer asserted that ethical behavior began in nonhuman social animals, was developed by—and conforms to—the law of evolution, and reached its full expansion in cultural evolution. He argued that cooperation is beneficial to social units, is a cause of physiological and sociological divisions of labor, and it profits all members in a society, but only when social bargains are respected. Cooperation arose at the dawn of life when altruism was dependent on egoism, and egoism was dependent on altruism. Offspring are preserved and species maintained by altruistic acts. To Spencer, evolution was thus a progressive moral force operating within human society and leading to the ethical improvement of humankind.

Spencer replaced the Darwinian natural selection with the ‘survival of the fittest,’ and developed his concepts in economic terms that led to Social Darwinism. It is now realized that the nurturing of offspring in human and nonhuman families can only be explained in terms of the Spencerian concept of cooperation, which thus appears to be evolutionary. In social groups there must be selective pressure to encourage altruism and to discourage selfishness. By definition social life is altruistic. Spencer’s ideas on cooperation were more fully developed by Kropotkin (1902).

1. H. Huxley (1894, reprinted in Nitecki and Nitecki 1993) supposed that protohuman morphology, human society, intellect, and morality are parts of nature, but that human behavior—unlike behavior in other animals—is not innate; therefore, there is a chasm between humans and other animals. Human character, by which he meant the moral and intellectual essence, is passed from generation to generation. He accepted the pessimistic view of human life as a continuous and uneven struggle against the cosmos, and assumed that competition is the exclusive element of the living world. Perhaps Huxley overstressed competition and selfishness as a natural instinct, and underrated cooperation and altruism as evolutionary factors. His panoramic view of life replaced the old body soul dichotomy with the nature culture dichotomy.

Although Huxley objected to Social Darwinism as expressed in the Spencerian ‘survival of the fittest,’ he nevertheless accepted the seventeenth-century perspective of natural selection as a ‘struggle for existence.’ It was this eternal struggle between humans and cosmos that colored his view of nature, and blinded him to the role of cooperation in evolution.

2. The Unintended De Elopers Of The Idea

The conclusions of early psychological behaviorists were that behavior, with the exception of physiological actions, is purely a cultural phenomenon. Learning was also cultural. However, ecologists (Allee et al. 1949) and ethologists (Tinbergen 1951) established that behavior and learning are processes of the central nervous system, and are products of genetics and of social interactions. Thus behavior may be both innate and acquired. Animal social interactions are occasionally in a one-to-one relationship (cause and effect), but transmission from the stimulus to the response is mostly through a complex of neurological channels. Behavior is so complex that it does not allow itself to be controlled by a single gene.

The environment and the chemical releasers of animals control and influence behavior by acting upon endocrine glands and upon sense organs. If the cooperative human and nonhuman groups are units of selection, then survival is of greater importance to the group as a whole than to the individual.

Ecologists documented that mutualism occurs not only between organelles within cells and among individual organisms, but also in groups and even in kingdoms of organisms: herbivores cooperate with symbiotic algae, bacteria fix nitrogen within leguminous plants, and fungi with algae form lichens. Ecologists postulated that instincts are inborn nervous mechanisms that may be activated, and that instinct contributes to the fitness of both individuals and groups. Animals are social only when acting within the group of the same species.

In the reverse of anthropomorphism, ethologists applied the concepts derived from the studies of nonhuman behavior to humans, and established that both human and nonhuman physiology and behavior are constantly modified, changed, and influenced by the presence of other individuals. Without the presence of another individual, the terms ‘good’ or ‘bad’ behavior have no meaning.

Ethologists stressed the role of genes in human behavior, the role of information encoded in the genome, and also the role of development in forming the behavioral patterns. They argued that human nature is neither inherently good or bad, but is both, and therefore ‘natural’ cannot be equated with ‘good’ or ‘bad.’

The geneticist Muller (1959) reasoned that altruistic acts foster the multiplication of altruistic genes, and that cooperation (or mutual aid) is a genetic factor of great value for the worldwide social organization. He agreed with Darwin that the protohuman group was the primary unit of selection in which altruism developed, but for altruism to become fixed in humans the group must remain isolated. Not only our morphology and our DNA, but also our behavior evolved. Linguistic studies (Pinker 1997) proved that language capacity is already present in newly born humans. Ecologists had already pointed out that human behavior, including language, requires at least two individuals.

Linguists added that this presence is necessary for language to develop. Therefore, the capacity for language is genetic, but it must be socially primed to be activated. Since human infants can do simple additions before they can talk, linguists reasoned that even arithmetic has an evolutionary basis. However, to many researchers the structural features of human language differentiate it from nonhuman communications. Others believed that the difference is of degree only.

Neurophysiological and cognitive studies recognized that all mental activities, including conscious- ness, are products of the physiological functions of the material brain. Mental activities are programmed by instinct and are controlled in recognized locations in the brain. Consciousness is innate in humans. These investigations shifted the argument from dualism to materialism. It is self-evident that the very long human infancy requires cooperation of parents and society. Infants recognize and learn altruism and love of mother, and how to reciprocate.

It follows, from the ecological to cognitive researches, that nonhuman and much human behavior have evolutionary bases. Biologists now agree that, at least in some nonhuman animals, complex behavior has more than simple genetic components, and that humans are both biological and cultural beings. These studies established the positive correlation between brain structure and mental activities, questioned the brain mind dichotomy, and laid the foundations for the sociobiological analysis of EEB.

3. Sociobiology

Sociobiology is the systematic study of the biological basis of all social behavior in all organisms, including humans (Wilson 1975). Ecologists and neurophysiologists accepted the nonhuman and some human behavior and ability to learn as innate; sociobiologists concluded that altruism is also innate. Sociobiological emphasis on the analysis of altruism reinstated the almost dormant EEB. Originally sociobiologists alleged that, in human choices of ethical behavior, heredity plays a greater role than environment. They hypothesized that since men and women are sexually different, their behavior is also different, and the economic and political ranking of humans is natural.

Since sociobiologists contend that a straight line from nonhuman to human behavior exists, they presumed that the fusion of sociobiology with neurophysiology would explain the rules and properties of ethical behavior. Some sociobiologists proposed that ethics should be biologized and that the range of study of nonhuman behavior should be expanded into the domain of psychology. They assumed that ethical and moral concepts are guided by natural selection and by social forces, and that as long as some philosophers fail to accept the evolutionary bases of social behavior they will continue to reject EEB. Furthermore, the emerging sociobiology threatened the three popular existentialist dogmas: the uniqueness of the individual, the search for the meaning and purpose of human life, and belief in the freedom of choice of action. These assertions raised instant responses.

3.1 Voices Of Dissent

Anthropologists (Sahlins 1976) immediately objected to the application of sociobiology to human behavior and morality. They claimed that culture cannot be reduced to biology because cultural environment controls the phenotype and behavior, and that human ethical behavior is fundamentally different from nonhuman. In this view sociobiology was mired in a Eurocentric patriarchal worldview.

Leftist and feminist critics (Caplan 1978) saw negative political consequences in genetic determinism and surmised that all social human behavior is exclusively environmental and without biological bases. They accused Wilson of Social Darwinism and sexism, that is, of the puritanical and moralistic defense of the old cultural interpretation of ethics, and of human behavior. They linked sociobiology to Nazism and racism. Those critics claimed not only that the science of sociobiology was wrong, but also that it was morally wrong, and their attack on sociobiology became, and continues to be, an attack on EEB.

The sociobiologists’ injection of anthropomorphic terms for descriptions of nonhuman behavior was criticized for confusing homology with analogy and for introducing difficulties in analyzing behavior. Homology, when applied to morphology and behavior, requires common ancestry. Altruistic behavior is a function of the social group, but tendencies of organisms to form social aggregates do not appear homologous. Terms may imply homology, but, if altruism in nonhuman and human animals is not homologous, then the term altruism will incorrectly suggest that ethical principles have biological roots. However, terms usually have more than one meaning that is decipherable only from the context of the sentence. If anthropomorphic terms are restricted to human actions and new terms are coined for nonhuman behavior, then the concept of EEB can be more clearly defined.

3.2 Soft Answers

The Christian tradition of the Fall, caused by original sin, held that humans are born evil, and Huxley claimed that cosmos is manifestly amoral. The struggle for existence, an intrinsically ‘bad’ property of all creation, did not need explication, but cooperation and altruism did, and all moral actions were judged in relation to the benefit of the group, however defined. Men sacrificing their lives in war were worshiped as heroes, and those dying for faith were beatified as martyrs. Cooperation and altruism have always been socially rewarded, while selfishness was condemned. It is this emphasis on virtue that the study of sociobiology introduced.

Thus altruism, the contrariant of the cold-hearted selfish power of the cosmos, demanded explanation. Because altruism was difficult to explain by natural selection, which acts only on individuals, Darwin proposed group selection. However, the term ‘group selection’ is too broadly used and includes population, community, and even species selection. For group selection to operate, all individuals must be related, altruistic, the group must be isolated and the gene flow restricted. Group living may be beneficial when it provides protection from predators (group size decreases predation), but it may also be harmful (it spreads diseases). Therefore, a surrogate model was proposed, that is, kin selection, a form of group selection, which was defined as the natural selection of genes in which the donor benefits its kin and thus favors the survival and reproduction of kin who possess the same genes. Although this process reduces the fitness of the donor, it increases the reproductive fitness of one or more kin and increases the frequency of genes of kin in the future generations.

Three other theories have been offered. First, inclusive fitness (Hamilton 1964) is not only the fitness of an individual and its offspring but also the fitness of all kin who share the same genetic constitution. This will insure the reproductive success of an individual, its offspring, and all relatives. Inclusive fitness and kin selection explain the genetic origin of cooperation and altruism.

Second, reciprocal altruism (Trivers 1971) is the genetic behavior causing cooperative behavior in expectation of return of altruistic acts. Reciprocity and most mutual aid are most common among relatives. It was assumed that human disoperation, aggression, reciprocity, kin-selected altruism, and general cooperation are not culturally controlled but are subject to natural selection. Thus, sociobiologists introduced a tit-for-tat concept to explain altruism, and they assumed that tit-for-tat is selected because there must be selection for altruistic acts.

The third theory argued that the unit of selection is a gene, not an individual, and the individual is only a carrier for the gene (Dawkins 1976). Selected genes are selfish and do not act for the survival of species, but only for the survival of the genes themselves. The value element of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ was thus replaced with altruism and selfishness as value-free properties. Since sociobiologists strongly adhere to the concept of natural selection, it follows that a struggle for existence, or even an ‘arms race’ should occur among genes. However, the role of genes in controlling human behavior and the contribution of human embryology to the ontology of behavior are still poorly understood.

Although genes responsible for such human behavior as altruism, homosexuality, and criminality have been claimed by sociobiologists to exist, it is doubtful whether they have been identified. It is also very difficult to differentiate what is genetically or environmentally fixed and what activates behavior, and it is too early to claim a detailed knowledge of the great complexity of behavior or of genes.

3.3 Voices Of Assent

Zoology assumes that humans are animals; therefore, after Darwin, it became a proper approach to study the biological aspects of moral behavior, and to accept the comparisons of human with nonhuman social behavior. But, this produces nontrivial consequences. For if humans are animals, the definition ‘animal’ must include the properties that characterize humans. Thus, human ethical behavior becomes ‘natural’ and subject to natural selection. Many students of EEB recognize some dependence between evolution and ethics, and accept the role of natural selection in evolution, but are aware of the restrictions placed by natural selection on EEB. Natural selection is only a guiding force, and not the sole source of behavioral (and morphological) changes, and EEB in social groups is only one evolutionary component. The origin of ethical behavior in protohumans and its subsequent development are a subject matter of sociobiology, but the solution of prescriptive ethical problems, of what we ought or ought not do, is a concern of philosophy. While the study of evolution may explain EEB, it does not explain ethical values or goals.

Lumsden and Wilson (1983) emphasized that neither culture nor evolution is autonomous: ‘culture is created and shaped by biological processes while the biological processes are simultaneously altered in response to cultural change.’ Human ethics works because cultural forces alter the innate bases of behavior. While genes may control the basic instincts, the behavioral responses to stimuli may be automatic; therefore, the response may not be always driven by natural selection.

The history of the idea of EEB circles around various theories of human nature, the interpretation of which is central to the entire gamut of dichotomies from nature nurture to brain mind. The evolutionary psychologist Cyrulnik (1993) called these dichotomies pseudoconcepts, because ‘human behavior … is 100 percent innate and 100 percent acquired. Or, what amounts to the same thing, nothing is ‘‘innate’’ and nothing is ‘‘acquired.’’ … the acquired can only be acquired by means of the innate, which in turn is always shaped by the acquired. Nature is nurtured!’

What EEB is asking is not prescription, but how we came to think about prescription. Although sociobiologists accept deep evolutionary bases of morality, few of them are comfortable with the concept of ‘evolutionary ethics.’ The use of this term has begun to disappear, not because all the questions on EEB have been answered, but because the term ‘evolutionary ethics’ unnecessarily confuses the ethical meanings of ‘good’ and ‘ought’ with the biological origin of altruistic behavior.

Bibliography:

1. Allee W C, Emerson A E, Park O, Park T, Schmidt K 1949 Principles of Animal Ecology. Saunders, Philadelphia
2. Caplan A 1978 (ed.) The Sociobiology Debate. Harper, New York
3. Cyrulnik B 1993 The Dawn of Meaning. McGraw-Hill, New York
4. Darwin, C 1859 On the Origin of Species. Murray, London
5. Darwin C 1885 The Descent of Man. Murray, London
6. Dawkins R 1976 The Selfish Gene. Oxford University Press, Oxford, UK
7. Farber P L 1994 The Temptations of Evolutionary Ethics. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA
8. Flew A G N 1967 Evolutionary Ethics. Macmillan, London
9. Hamilton W D 1964 The genetical evolution of social behavior. Journal of Theoretical Biology 7: 1–16, 17–51
10. Kropotkin P 1902 Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution. Heinemann, London
11. Lumsden C J, Wilson E O 1983 Promethean Fire. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA
12. Muller, H J 1959 The guidance of human evolution. Perspectives in Biology and Medicine 3: 1–43
13. Nitecki M H, Nitecki D V (eds.) 1993 Evolutionary Ethics. State University of New York Press, Albany, NY
14. Pinker S 1997 How the Mind Works. Norton, New York
15. Richards R J 1987 Darwin and the Emergence of Evolutionary Theories of Mind and Behavior. University of Chicago Press, Chicago
16. Sahlins M 1976 The Use and Abuse of Biology. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, MI
17. Spencer H 1897 The Principles of Ethics. Appleton, New York
18. Stent G S (ed.) 1980 Morality as a Biological Phenomenon. University of California Press, Berkeley, CA
19. Tinbergen N 1951 The Study of Instinct. Oxford University Press, London
20. Trivers R 1971 The evolution of reciprocal altruism. Quarterly Review of Biology 46: 35–71
21. Wilson E O 1975 Sociobiology: The New Synthesis. Harvard University Press, Cambridge, MA