Beyond the Sociobiological Dilemma: Social Emotions and the Evolution of Morality

Is morality biologically altruistic? Does it imply a disadvantage in the struggle for existence? A positive answer puts morality at odds with natural selection, unless natural selection operates at the level of groups. In this case, a trait that is good for groups though bad (reproductively) for individuals can evolve. Sociobiologists reject group selection and have adopted one of two horns of a dilemma. Either morality is based on an egoistic calculus, compatible with natural selection; or morality continues tied to psychological and biological altruism but not as a product of natural selection. The dilemma denies a third possibility—that psychological altruism evolves as a biologically selfish trait. I discuss the classical treatments of the paradox by Charles Darwin ([1871] 1989) and Robert Trivers (1971), focusing on the role they attribute to social emotions. The upshot is that both Darwin and Trivers sketch a natural‐selection process relying on innate emotional mechanisms that render morality adaptive for individuals as well as for groups. I give additional reasons for viewing it as a form of natural, instead of only cultural, selection.     

META‐HUMANS AND METANOIA: THE MORAL DIMENSION OF EXTRATERRESTRIALS

Abstract. Although we do not know whether intelligent extraterrestrials exist, they are a permanent fixture of literature and philosophical argument. Part of their appeal is that they watch us from above and thus serve as a metaphor for human self‐reflexivity. This makes fictional aliens especially useful when moral issues are at stake. In order to evaluate stories about aliens with respect to moral conclusions two conditions must be fulfilled. First, the stories have to be detailed enough that we can understand the circumstances of the aliens' moral choices. Therefore science fiction often is more useful than arguments involving aliens in short technical papers. Second, their fictional lives need to be possible in our own universe, or very nearly so, in order to be relevant for our own moral conduct. Taking as an example the unfallen aliens in C. S. Lewis's novels Out of the Silent Planet (1938) and Perelandra (1943), we can acknowledge the theological interest and literary subtlety. Nonetheless, the stories fail as moral parables in one important respect: The aliens depicted could not be a product of evolution in our universe, at least as we currently understand its scientific laws. This realization has important consequences for our self‐understanding and thus underlines how fictional aliens can be useful in making sense of the complexities involved in moral argumentation.     

冠心病诊治中的过度医疗

近年来,过度医疗问题引起了医学伦理学界的普遍关注.过度医疗是一个经济现象,同时也是一个伦理问题,确切的说是一个医学-社会问题.结合冠心病过度医疗的特点,从医学伦理学角度剖析冠心病过度医疗的原因,并提出了医者、患者、医疗机构和社会针对冠心病过度医疗应采取的措施.     

FROM VIRTUE TO DECENCY

Abstract: In her work on virtue ethics Rosalind Hursthouse has formulated an Aristotelian criterion of rightness that understands rightness in terms of what the virtuous person would do. It is argued here that this kind of criterion does not allow enough room for the category of the supererogatory and that right and wrong should rather be understood in terms of the characteristic behavior of decent persons. Furthermore, it is suggested that this kind of approach has the added advantage of allowing one to make sense of the centrality of negative precepts in commonsense morality.     

Stopping nutrition and hydration technologies: a conflict between traditional Catholic ethics and church authority.

This article focuses on the troubling effects of the secular values of individual freedom and autonomy and their impact on laws regarding suicide and euthanasia. The author argues that in an increasingly secularized culture, death and dying are losing their meaning and are not thought of within a moral framework. The debate regarding the provision of artificial nutrition and hydration is critically considered in light of the history of Catholic morality as well as within the modern healthcare context, and finally with new insight from the recent statements made by the late pope. Drane argues that the pope's insistence on providing artificial nutrition and hydration despite irreversible persistent vegetative states in unconvincing.     

Kant and Kantians on “the Normative Question”

After decades of vigorous debate, many contemporary philosophers in the Kantian tradition continue to believe, or at least hope, that morality can be given a firm grounding by showing that rational agents cannot consistently reject moral requirements. In the present paper, I do not take a stand on the possibility of bringing out the alleged inconsistency. Instead I argue that, even if a successful argument could be given for this inconsistency, this would not provide an adequate answer to “the normative question” (i.e., “why should I be moral?”). My defense of this claim emerges from a defense of a claim about Kant, namely, that he did not attempt to answer the normative question in this way. After carefully articulating Kant’s answer to the normative question, I argue that his answer to this question contains a lesson about why we should not embrace the approach that is popular among many contemporary Kantians.     

初中生感戴维度研究

根据文献检索和理论分析,通过开放式问卷和个别访谈,编制初中生感戴问卷,并对问卷进行探索性因素分析和验证性因素分析,结果表明:感戴包含人物取向、事物取向和道义取向3个维度,该问卷具有较好的信、效度,可以作为初中生感戴教育的测量工具。     

The evolution of tianxia cosmology and its philosophical implications

The terminology tianxia has both historical evolution and cultural and philosophical connotations. This concept not only denotes a geographical and spatial meaning, but also implies the moral construct of metaphysics. A systematic study of its historical and cultural repercussions can show that the evolution of the meaning “tianxia” not only embodies the cosmological construction, moral belief and self-identity of the Chinese nation, but also manifests the historical processes of modern China evolving from “tianxia” to a modern nation-state. Meanwhile, the deconstruction of the tianxia cosmology has shattered the old Chinese concept of a single united tianxia, or the whole world under one Heaven. Also, “Confucian China” has been increasingly losing its vitality and strong hold on the people, while the concept of nation-state has gained its way into people’s consciousness, which has added more diversity and open-mindedness to the concept of tianxia. __________ Translated from Wenshizhe 文史哲 (Literature, History and Philosophy), 2004 (6) by Huang Deyuan     

The influence of temporal distance on justice and care morality

Agerström, J., Björklund, F. & Allwood, C. M. (2010). The influence of temporal distance on justice and care morality. Scandinavian Journal of Psychology, 51, 46–55.
The primary goal of this study was to examine whether changes in the temporal distance of a moral dilemma affect how it is perceived and subsequently resolved. Based on Construal Level Theory ( Trope & Liberman, 2003 ), it was predicted that the relative weight of abstract justice features should increase and the relative weight of concrete care features should decrease with temporal distance. The results showed that females became increasingly justice-oriented with greater temporal distance. However, this was not the case for males who were unaffected by temporal distance. This interaction was conceptually replicated in a follow-up experiment in which abstraction was manipulated directly by a mindset manipulation. The present results suggest that temporal distance is a contextual factor that can alter the extent to which moral judgments and reasoning are based on justice and care, although this effect seems to be moderated by gender.     

THE HEFNERIAN LEGACY: RETHINKING THE "NATURE" OF NATURALISM

Philip Hefner calls for religion-and-science to shift attention from pure ideas to embodied ideas. He urges scholars to get back to the Baconian idea that science is intended to enhance life; in Hefner's wording, we must give attention to "science-as-enabler-for-changing/improving-the-world." I believe that this is the realm of overlap between all academic disciplines—what I call the pragmatic overlap. To make his argument Hefner mentions two forms of "conventional wisdom" that need to be rethought. First, he is worried that a "pressure toward naturalism" prevents certain words (such as teleological and transcendence ) from having instructive meaning. Second, with this move toward naturalism Hefner believes we dismiss as archaic all valuable implications of traditional religious myths and symbols. He rightly highlights these exceedingly significant concerns. However, narrowing our focus to the implications of naturalism alone misses the root crisis. That crisis can be articulated as: "conventional wisdom" regarding nature is too unsophisticated to account for the phenomenon it depicts, and furthermore, this understanding of nature controls the methodological, metaphysical, and practical versions of naturalism acquiring societal acceptance. Accordingly, an alternative vision of nature is needed to transform our current "conventional wisdom" such that Hefner's worries are addressed.