Morals and values --- how are they related?

[GE Morton]

If you want to understand how humans came to conceptualise their feelings of right and wrong, eventually coming up with rational theories, you can't ignore our evolutionary development as a social species.

I disagree. Indeed, I think in order to come up with a rational morality for civilized societies we have to do precisely that, i.e., ignore our evolutionary development, our mammalian, primate heritage, particularly those innate "moral" sentiments --- because they often conflict with the precepts of a sound, rationally justifiable, moral theory. Those sentiments evolved among creatures living in small, insular, kinship-based tribal communities. They are largely inoperable, inapplicable in "societies of strangers," and a theory deriving from them will be unworkable in those societies.

Tribal societies did not have moralities in the modern sense, i.e., systematic, intentional, articulated sets of duties and constraints which were debated, questioned, argued for and against, and explicitly taught to the young --- any more than they had codified systems of law; laws and definitive moralities are both products of civilization. A fair analogy is the modern nuclear family --- their members cooperate, take care of one another, not because they have adopted any express moral code, but because they love each other, value each other, depend upon each other. They have biological and emotional bonds with one another. No law or moral precept is necessary to induce mothers (at least most of them) to take care of their babies, whether human mothers or wolf mothers or eagle mothers. Even bees, wasps, ants, and other social insects care for their young and for one another, and defend their hives.

Rather than deriving from primordial primate "ethics" (actually just innate behavioral dispositions), workable moralities for civilized societies are pragmatic endeavors invented de novo, to enable humans who have no natural bonds and no common interests to nonetheless coexist peacefully and cooperate when it is to the mutual advantage of the cooperating persons.

Once that caring for others neurological mechanism is in place for mothers, it can adapt to care for other kin and kith, and empathy can be stimulated for strangers too.

But for others not kin it doesn't so "adapt." Not for most persons. And the kinship bonds are different from the maternal bond; the former arise from familiarity and personal affinities (which can also form with non-kin, such as lifelong friends), while the maternal bond is pre-programmed. The former is contingent; the latter biologically mandated. The former is not an evolutionary development from the latter; their origins are quite different. (There are many examples of animals of different species, who may not even be social "in the wild," who become bonded, develop affinities, as a result of long association and interactions).

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/27/scie ... ether.html

Later came the process of going  about creating systemic rational formulations of what is right and wrong.  Where all sorts of other factors can come into play depending on the cultural setting. From defining the good as something which objectively exists in God, given to us and arbitrated by God's revelations to us, to the notion that  morality is completely subjective and so anything goes.

Well, a morality per which "anything goes" would not be a morality at all. Values are completely subjective, but morality is not concerned with values; it is concerned with the means by which one goes about securing whatever it is one values.

To escape such a solipsistic morality we need to acknowledge there is something meaningfully worthwhile about the welfare of others.  And to think beyond the neurobiological under-pinnings.

And that's where you and I agree - that the qualiative nature of conscious experience is what under-pins oughts in our interactions with others.  And that belongs to all experiencing subjects.  The onus to respect that foundation falls onto moral agents, because they have agency and choice, but it's the having of qualiative experience which ultimately justifies notions of right and wrong and oughts.

That is what justifies a principle of equal agency as a postulate of a sound moral theory, but it does not entail an obligation upon all moral agents to value all others. Any moral theory that presumes to command values will be an exercise in futility --- which wouldn't preclude its appeal to various totalitarians.

It's a social framing, which draws others in simply by dint of their ability to flourish or suffer. I don't have to personally value every person or critter to understand my moral duty towards them.  My neurobiology naturally prioritises my circle of care, but I can rationally extend that circle when it comes to my behaviour.

I think that is inconsistent. To be "within your circle of care" just is to value it. A workable morality (for a society of strangers) requires that one understand one's moral duties to sentient creatures even if one doesn't care about them (value them). Acknowledging that duty requires no emotional commitment.

[Gertie]

GE

Gertie wrote: ↑November 14th, 2022, 10:59 pm
If you want to understand how humans came to conceptualise their feelings of right and wrong, eventually coming up with rational theories, you can't ignore our evolutionary development as a social species.

I disagree.

Indeed, I think in order to come up with a rational morality for civilized societies we have to do precisely that, i.e., ignore our evolutionary development, our mammalian, primate heritage, particularly those innate "moral" sentiments --- because they often conflict with the precepts of a sound, rationally justifiable, moral theory.

Put it this way then, we wouldn't have come up with the concept of right and wrong, if we hadn't evolved predispositions related to caring for others, guilt, social shame, fairness, trust, cheaters, theory of mind, empathy etc.   (We don't have to look beyond that, to a god for example, to understand the origins of a sense of right and wrong).   If we relied on reason alone, without this sense of right and wrong, reason would simply come into play as a means for achieving our goals, regardless of whether those goals are moral/immoral.

This is what eventually led to the concept of morality, that some things are explicitly  right and wrong. Then we can reason from that concept (how ever we come to understand what right and wrong conceptually means) about behaviours and choices within the context of oughts.

Those sentiments evolved among creatures living in small, insular, kinship-based tribal communities. They are largely inoperable, inapplicable in "societies of strangers," and a theory deriving from them will be unworkable in those societies.

I'd say that's over-stating things, but yes you're spot on that the environmental context shaped our specific evolved neurobiological predispositions. However, once we've developed the concept of right and wrong (based on some appropriately justifiable foundation) we can then judge our predispositions in light of our foundation.

Tribal societies did not have moralities in the modern sense, i.e., systematic, intentional, articulated sets of duties and constraints which were debated, questioned, argued for and against, and explicitly taught to the young --- any more than they had codified systems of law; laws and definitive moralities are both products of civilization.

Sure. This articulated, explicit conceptualisation of right and wrong we came to call 'morality' came later. The codification of ever more sophisticated rules and institutions, teaching, archetypes, myths/religion, mores, etc would have been part of that process, leading to abstract theorising about right and wrong.

Rather than deriving from primordial primate "ethics" (actually just innate behavioral dispositions), workable moralities for civilized societies are pragmatic endeavors invented de novo, to enable humans who have no natural bonds and no common interests to nonetheless coexist peacefully and cooperate when it is to the mutual advantage of the cooperating persons.

That's part of it. 

First there's the evolutionary utility which created the neurobiology, enabling  the notion of right and wrong to eventually explicitly emerge as we became more thinky critters.  Once this abstract concept has been created, we reason about what constitutes right and wrong in terms of oughts and virtue. And that, hopefully, contributes to how we organise civilised, reflective societies.  We can choose together as a society  to do what's right.  If you ignore that latter part, you've excised the notion of right and wrong from morality, and made it only about utility again.  But morality as a concept without right and wrong is meaningless.

Once that caring for others neurological mechanism is in place for mothers, it can adapt to care for other kin and kith, and empathy can be stimulated for strangers too.
But for others not kin it doesn't so "adapt." Not for most persons. And the kinship bonds are different from the maternal bond; the former arise from familiarity and personal affinities (which can also form with non-kin, such as lifelong friends), while the maternal bond is pre-programmed. The former is contingent; the latter biologically mandated. The former is not an evolutionary development from the latter; their origins are quite different. (There are many examples of animals of different species, who may not even be social "in the wild," who become bonded, develop affinities, as a result of long association and interactions).

Agreed.

Later came the process of going  about creating systemic rational formulations of what is right and wrong.  Where all sorts of other factors can come into play depending on the cultural setting. From defining the good as something which objectively exists in God, given to us and arbitrated by God's revelations to us, to the notion that  morality is completely subjective and so anything goes.

Well, a morality per which "anything goes" would not be a morality at all. Values are completely subjective, but morality is not concerned with values; it is concerned with the means by which one goes about securing whatever it is one values.

I'm not sure that 'values' is the most illuminating way to think about this myself. I agree that morality in practice is about how we go about things, because I'm a consequentialist.  But at its heart morality is about right and wrong, surely?  That's its distinctive, defining nature. What enables us to make specifically  moral judgements about choices and behaviour, rather than just grabbing what you desire/value.

To escape such a solipsistic morality we need to acknowledge there is something meaningfully worthwhile about the welfare of others.  And to think beyond the neurobiological under-pinnings.

And that's where you and I agree - that the qualiative nature of conscious experience is what under-pins oughts in our interactions with others.  And that belongs to all experiencing subjects.  The onus to respect that foundation falls onto moral agents, because they have agency and choice, but it's the having of qualiative experience which ultimately justifies notions of right and wrong and oughts.

That is what justifies a principle of equal agency as a postulate of a sound moral theory, but it does not entail an obligation upon all moral agents to value all others. Any moral theory that presumes to command values will be an exercise in futility --- which wouldn't preclude its appeal to various totalitarians.

Equal agency is a practice which requires a moral foundation to first be in place. It says those with the agency to act morally, should do so (as I recall).  Which is fine.  But the underlying foundational justification, in our view of morality, is that conscious subjects have a quality of life.  And that will also guide what those practices should entail. Ie showing consideration  for the welfare of experiencing subjects. I don't think you've taken on the key role of the underlying moral justification, in informing the practices.

And there's a difference between oughts and authoritarian demands. Nobody ever only did the moral thing all their lives, even Peter Singer I dare say, it's not realistic. That doesn't mean there isn't a difference between doing the right and wrong thing. But it means there are practical limits on what we should expect of ourselves and others, and a need to prioritise. Those priorities inform rules. In a democracy we get a say in where we draw the lines.

It's a social framing, which draws others in simply by dint of their ability to flourish or suffer. I don't have to personally value every person or critter to understand my moral duty towards them.  My neurobiology naturally prioritises my circle of care, but I can rationally extend that circle when it comes to my behaviour.

I think that is inconsistent. To be "within your circle of care" just is to value it. A workable morality (for a society of strangers) requires that one understand one's moral duties to sentient creatures even if one doesn't care about them (value them). Acknowledging that duty requires no emotional commitment. 


Right.  (I don't know if the term 'value' adds much, we care or we don't).  But once we've created the concept of right and wrong, we can apply it in line with our conceptualised moral foundation. It's not an inconsistency, I'm describing a sequence -

TLDR -

Humans evolved in such a way as to experience caring for self and others via various neurobiological mechanisms.  This eventually led to us creating the abstract concept of right and wrong.  This led to us creating theories of what might be foundational to rightness  and wrongness, and practices to enact righteous choices and behaviour. 

[Ecurb]

Tribal societies did not have moralities in the modern sense, i.e., systematic, intentional, articulated sets of duties and constraints which were debated, questioned, argued for and against, and explicitly taught to the young --- any more than they had codified systems of law; laws and definitive moralities are both products of civilization. A fair analogy is the modern nuclear family --- their members cooperate, take care of one another, not because they have adopted any express moral code, but because they love each other, value each other, depend upon each other. They have biological and emotional bonds with one another. No law or moral precept is necessary to induce mothers (at least most of them) to take care of their babies, whether human mothers or wolf mothers or eagle mothers. Even bees, wasps, ants, and other social insects care for their young and for one another, and defend their hives.

Rather than deriving from primordial primate "ethics" (actually just innate behavioral dispositions), workable moralities for civilized societies are pragmatic endeavors invented de novo, to enable humans who have no natural bonds and no common interests to nonetheless coexist peacefully and cooperate when it is to the mutual advantage of the cooperating persons.

Tribal societies obviously differ from complex, modern societies. Nonetheless, it is pure bunk to make a general statement that they lack "systematic, intentional, articulated sets of duties and constraints which were debated, questioned, argued for and against, and explicitly taught to the young."

Tribal societies differ. Members of many of them philosophize just as we do. Like us, many tribal members work on creating intentional rules and regulations, apporved modes of behavior, rules for distribution of goods, etc. etc. etc. Why would you possibly think otherwise?

I agree with you that "societies of strangers" require different modes of regulation from smaller societies. But we cannot infer from this that members of tribes lack intentionality in creating an ethos for their group.

[GE Morton]

Put it this way then, we wouldn't have come up with the concept of right and wrong, if we hadn't evolved predispositions related to caring for others, guilt, social shame, fairness, trust, cheaters, theory of mind, empathy etc.   (We don't have to look beyond that, to a god for example, to understand the origins of a sense of right and wrong).

Keep in mind that the sense of right and wrong applies well beyond "moral" rights and wrongs. E.g., people learn the "right" ways to skin a rabbit or build a tipi and the "wrong" ways, the "right" way to treat a wound and the "wrong" ways. Most of those ways they learn through experience. There is, of course, an innate impulse to protect what you love and whatever else is important or valuable to you. But that impulse does not cover things NOT important to you, and so we can't rely on it to inform us as to what is "right" or "wrong" in dealing with other people who are not important to us. What is important to most of us is a congenial, peaceful, stable social environment that allows us to realize the advantages of living in a social setting, such as cooperating with others to pursue some common interest and enabling a division of labor, with the resulting possibility of exchanging one's products and services for those of others. We've found that there are "right" ways to make this possible and "wrong" ways, just as we've found regarding building tipis. It is not empathy or other sentiments that justify moral rules, but pragmatics.

If we relied on reason alone, without this sense of right and wrong, reason would simply come into play as a means for achieving our goals, regardless of whether those goals are moral/immoral.

Not so. If we expect to achieve our goals in a social setting, and we value that setting, then we have to take into account the effects of our acts on the other people in that setting. We don't necessarily have to value those other people. They are means to our ends --- but (as Kant said) they are also ends in themselves, with interests and goals of their own. A workable morality must recognize that, and that is a rational, not a sentiment-driven understanding.

[Gertie]

Put it this way then, we wouldn't have come up with the concept of right and wrong, if we hadn't evolved predispositions related to caring for others, guilt, social shame, fairness, trust, cheaters, theory of mind, empathy etc.   (We don't have to look beyond that, to a god for example, to understand the origins of a sense of right and wrong).

Keep in mind that the sense of right and wrong applies well beyond "moral" rights and wrongs. E.g., people learn the "right" ways to skin a rabbit or build a tipi and the "wrong" ways, the "right" way to treat a wound and the "wrong" ways. Most of those ways they learn through experience.

Irrelevant here.

There is, of course, an innate impulse to protect what you love and whatever else is important or valuable to you. But that impulse does not cover things NOT important to you, and so we can't rely on it to inform us as to what is "right" or "wrong" in dealing with other people who are not important to us. What is important to most of us is a congenial, peaceful, stable social environment that allows us to realize the advantages of living in a social setting, such as cooperating with others to pursue some common interest and enabling a division of labor, with the resulting possibility of exchanging one's products and services for those of others. We've found that there are "right" ways to make this possible and "wrong" ways, just as we've found regarding building tipis. It is not empathy or other sentiments that justify moral rules, but pragmatics.

We wouldn't have the moral sense of right and wrong we do have without the assorted social neurobiological mechanisms we evolved. That's just the way it is. (Just take Theory of Mind. If we hadn't developed that as a result of evolving in a social setting, humans would have no concept of harm to others, and any concept of morality which might have arisen would likely be completely self-focussed).

However, once we conceptualise and intellectualise moral right and wrong, we can use reason.
If we relied on reason alone, without this sense of right and wrong, reason would simply come into play as a means for achieving our goals, regardless of whether those goals are moral/immoral.

Not so. If we expect to achieve our goals in a social setting, and we value that setting, then we have to take into account the effects of our acts on the other people in that setting. We don't necessarily have to value those other people. They are means to our ends --- but (as Kant said) they are also ends in themselves, with interests and goals of their own. A workable morality must recognize that, and that is a rational, not a sentiment-driven understanding.

Because we are a social species, with a particular evolutionary history. That's the Is state of affairs which molded our innate sense of morally right and wrong. Which we later came to conceptualise and intellectualise and reason about.

That next step is where we come up with moral theories. The most important task being to create a moral foundation. Once we have that in place, we can devise pragmatic principles and rules of thumb in order to put our morality into practice. Our foundation guides those principles, and also provides a touchstone to judge the consequences of implementing them - providing a corrective/method of improvement in practices. You don't start from the practices, rather your practices are guided by your foundation.

We agree that something like ''Promoting the Wellbeing of Sentient Creatures' is the correct moral foundation.

The reasonable first good practice would then be to ensure sentient creatures have the means/ability/resources to flourish. But this is the part you can't get your head around, because you're overly concerned with subjects' idiosyncracies. I say, there are things we all have in common as humans which we need to flourish, and that our idiosyncratic differences will only be realistically achievable once they are in place. Crudely put, it doesn't matter if you prefer chocolate or vanilla ice cream, if you can't afford to eat.

So if we take our moral foundation seriously, we have a moral duty to first ensure our basic needs are met, then give people the freedom to pursue their idiosyncratic notions of what wellbeing means to them. If you don't have access to a safe home, food, a bit of spare cash, healthcare and education your chances of flourishing are severely stymied, and we moral agents ought to help out. These are tangible, measurable goals we can easily achieve as a society, and we have a moral duty to do our bit. If you take our moral foundation seriously.