Patricia Churchland - Morality and the Brain

2012.

[@TheWorldTeacher]

THE ORIGINS OF LAW/MORALITY/ETHICS: Unless one believes that God or a god bestowed a universal meta-ethical principle upon humanity, with a law-book full of definitive examples of moral norms (which would be practically impossible, since there are an almost infinite number of possible variables and nuances of each and every suspected moral infraction), it seems perfectly reasonable to assume that an intuitive sense of morality developed within the human psyche over the history of our species. So, as Homo sapiens evolved, especially after language had sufficiently developed, we would have used the concept of morality/law/ethics to DESCRIBE situations and circumstances in which we noticed that harm was being done to either individuals or groups of individuals. As time progressed, we would refine our understanding of this concept of harm (“hiṃsā”, in Sanskrit) and ascribe immorality to a greater range of deeds, such as including verbal acts of harm like insults, swearing, blasphemy, slander, and libel. One does not need to have a degree in ethology to know that many species of non-human animals display moral/amoral/immoral behaviour. When one observes a troop of monkeys or a community of apes, there is an abundance of evidence that there is moral behaviour being enacted. For example, if a beta-male chimpanzee tries to interfere with a baby chimp in its clan, the mother of that infant will naturally attack the aggressing male. That is due to the fact that the mother ape has noticed that the beta-male chimpanzee is trying to HARM her child. The fear experienced by the mother ape arises from maternal instinct, which in turn, is a consequence of the evolutionary process of her species. So, according to the definition of morality given above (ahiṃsā), many species of higher animals exhibit rudimentary moral behaviour. Primatologists have observed simple moral behaviour in great apes, so it is reasonable to assume that all our hominid ancestors did likewise. Even species lower than apes have displayed behaviour that can be explained only from a purely moral perspective, such as in the great many incidences captured by film and videography in which one genus of animal (even CARNIVOROUS species!) rescue animals of another genus. After all, if for example, a cat is seen to be playing with a mouse, it has no need of eating the rodent unless it was compelled by hunger. Quite coincidentally, not long after composing the previous sentence, I happened across videographic footage of a domestic cat, that not only was playing with a large rat, but the cat was affectionately licking the rat in the same way that it would naturally lick the fur of a fellow feline! Subsequently, as humans began domesticating animals, we would ascribe possible violations of our moral code to those acts that harmed our domesticated pets and herds of animals. Of course, due mainly to the popularity of the vegan movement, we know now that keeping flocks or herds of animals for the purpose of consuming their bloody carcasses to be objectively immoral (unless, of course, one is literally dying of starvation). It is truly shocking that the average person is grossly offended by any perceived harm that may be caused to a family pet, yet when confronted with the untold suffering (or to be more accurate, the immense pain) perpetrated upon animals for “food”, they see nothing immoral being enacted, and turn a blind eye to it. Therefore, to make it exceedingly clear, morality/ethics/law has ALWAYS referred to this notion of non-violence towards humans, to a community of humans, and in recent times, to animal life (as well as towards the plant kingdom). Thus, it could be asserted that morality is more a description of a certain state of affairs, rather than a prescription for normative behaviours. So, essentially, the concepts of morality and immorality developed via the evolutionary process in birds and mammals using the faculty of INTUITION, and only in the past few thousand years, became intellectualized in the philosophical institutions of modern Homo sapiens. Indeed, in the past two or three hundred years, morality has become overintellectualized in academia! If this chapter of “F.I.S.H” was, by some miracle, transported to the typical human being living (let us say) fifteen thousand years ago, he or she would not be able to make sense of its wisdom, even if that person was made familiar with all the concepts mentioned herein, such as law, rule, metaethics, normative ethics, subjective, objective, relative, absolute, the is-ought problem, the Euthyphro dilemma, etcetera. However, the typical human residing on earth fifteen millennia ago would undoubtedly be capable of understanding the most fundamental basis of morality/dharma, and that is, to avoid unjustifiable harm (otherwise the human species would, in all probability, have long-ago become extinct due to lawlessness).

[@Summalogicae]

Given the length of your comment, you cannot expect anyone to engage with the multiple, and often controversial, claims you make. The format of this platform precludes meaningful discussion on this subject.