Chapter 11, Ethics and Religion
The chapter in the book that would most challenge conservatives, or anyone who thinks morality and religion are handed down from on high.
Key points in this chapter:
On ethics:
- Author summarizes arguments on both sides, the transcendental and the empirical, for the origin of ethical sentiments.
- Theologians see natural law as an expression of God’s will, despite allowing the faithful to justify war, slavery, and genocide.
- Wilson is an empiricist, of course. “The primary origin of the moral instincts is the dynamic relation between cooperation and defection.” That is, our moral instincts arose as rules to solve ethical dilemmas in the primitive environment, e.g. regarding money, status, power. Thus we evolved cooperation, remorse, shame. The dark side of these sentiments is xenophobia.
- “Ethical and religious beliefs are created from the bottom up, from people to their culture. They do not come from the top down, from God or other non-material source to the people by way of culture.”
- And yet moral sentiments can change — as a result of new knowledge and experience; certain rules may be relaxed, others devised. That’s why we find things like slavery unpalatable today.
- Ultimately ancient sentiments will adapt for the conditions of modern life. Wilson sees the result as likely democratic, to the detriment of rival ideologies and religions, though it will be slow.
On religion:
- Religions are born, grow, compete, reproduce, and eventually die. They begin as cults. They involve a creation myth and a mystery only devotees have access to.
- The religious drive arises from the survival instinct, i.e. fear of death. It provides an understanding and control of life, explained via mythic narratives, and the supernatural as evidence of another world so desperately desired.
- Humans are easily seduced by confident, charismatic leaders, especially in religious organizations.
- People are attracted by transcendentalism since empiricism seems sterile and inadequate. But passion and desire are not the same as truth.
- Theology is a history of abstractions: the Hebrews resolved the pantheon into a single person; later philosophers have moved away from God as a literal person.
- “The essence of humanity’s spiritual dilemma is that we evolved genetically to accept one truth and discovered another.”
- We’re learning too much about how the world works for this contradiction to remain.
- Yes, people need sacred narratives. And so religion must incorporate the discoveries of science in order to remain credible. The result will be the secularization of the human epic, and of religion itself.
\\
Comments:
- Wilson’s spin in this book is his gene-culture coevolution, but the general themes here have been uncontroversial among the educated for at least a century, on some points, decades on others. Still, Wilson crystalizes ideas that are themes of my blog here, as gathered from many books, including this one when I read it 20+ years ago.
- A key point is that the ethical sentiments of our ancestors, evolved in the primitive environment of the savanna, do not necessarily apply any longer. This is something conservatives simply reject. Ironically, from a 10,000 foot level it can be seen that the invention of writing froze the moral sentiments of that time into print, allowing the morality of small bands of desert sheep-herders, as it were, to prevail across the millennia.
- The conservative instinct then can be seen as thinking that things can never change, no matter how much circumstances (the way humanity has filled up the planet and no longer lives in small, isolated tribes) and knowledge (of the cosmos, of how human biology really works). Thus many conservatives simply reject knowledge about how the world works if they feel it would oblige them to change their thinking.
- The item in yesterday’s post about Constitutional originalists and consequentialists exactly parallels this contrast. Origilinalists, ignoring changing vocabulary and real-world circumstances, insist the original intent must prevail; consequentialists take into account changing vocabulary, and real-world circumstances, and make judgments suitable for the modern world.
\
Summary and Quotes:
On ethics:
Centuries of debate come down to this: either ethical precepts are independent of human experience, or else they are human inventions. The difference is everything in how we view ourselves. Author thinks moral reasoning is consilient with the natural sciences. The divide isn’t between religion and secularism; it’s between transcendentalists and empiricists. On either side, God is a separate issue. Theologians typically see natural law to be an expression of God’s will. And they see natural law as being self-evident, whatever the origin. Jefferson extended those laws to his idea of natural rights, also invoking God. And yet such lofty ideas have been used countless times to justify war, slavery, and genocide.
Perhaps we can do better taking empiricism more seriously. This entails knowing the biological roots of moral behavior and so fashioning wider ethical consensus.
Turning cards face up: Rarely do scholars admit they might be wrong. Author states he is an empiricist. On religion, he “leans” toward deism; it depends on astrophysics. Author now presents a debate between the two sides.
P241, The transcendentalist:
First, the argument for theism. It can’t be disproved; thousands of years of testimony, millions of people, they *know*. What facts require the rejection of a personal God? Saying it’s unnecessary isn’t enough. God subsumes science. God can explain everything; science cannot. Where did the laws of nature come from? Why is there something rather than nothing? And there’s a practical reason for belief in ethical precepts ordained by a supreme being. The Enlightenment thinkers believed in God; note John Locke. As do a minority of modern scientists. Darwin’s ideas justified Naziism and communism. Design is a simpler explanation than autonomous evolution. And theism supports the idea of an immortal soul.
P243, The empiricist:
Granted, religious belief is attractive to many. But religion has a dark side: ethnic and tribal wars, throughout history. Back to the Old Testament, in which the Israelites felt entitled to destroy the ‘heathen.’ These speak to the origins of their ethical systems. In the Darwinian struggle among cultures, religion won by conquering its rivals. This results from tribalism, which is not religion per se, which also gave rise to totalitarian ideologies. [See quote below.] This entails sacrifice by individuals for the good of the group. Thus selfish, prosperous people have lost to selfless, poor members of rival ideologies. Submission to the group is a device for survival in social organisms. It’s dangerous to suppose ‘I was not born to be of this world’. An illusion? Noble Lie? No evidence supports prayer, or blessings of armies by priests, etc. Recall Pascal’s wager. Nonbelievers are not less law-abiding or productive members of society. True character arises the moral principles of a society. Science is not the enemy. It favors no tribe or religion. Precepts and religious faith are entirely material products of the mind. They increase the survival and reproductive success of those who conformed to tribal faiths. Definitions of ethical codes, and religion [Another quote below]. The empiricist hypothesis fits the evidence best. The shift has been happening since the Enlightenment. Albeit slowly. Empiricism is resisted on emotional grounds; it lacks the poetry, the symbols, the ceremony, that people crave. Yet author thinks it would be tragic to abandon sacred traditions. Even ‘under God’ in the Pledge. But never forget who we, the human race, actually are.
Here are couple quotes, p245t:
Tribalism cannot be blamed on religion. The same causal sequence gave rise to totalitarian ideologies. The pagan corpus mysticum of Nazism and the class-warfare doctrine of Marxism-Leninism, both essentially dogmas of religions without God, were put to the service of tribalism, not the reverse. Neither would have been so fervently embraced if their devotees had not thought themselves chosen people, virtuous in their mission, surrounded by wicked enemies, and conquerors by right of blood and destiny.
And another, p247t:
Ethical codes are precepts reached by consensus under the guidance of the innate rules of mental development. Religion is the ensemble of mythic narratives that explain the origin of a people, their destiny, and why they are obliged to subscribe to particular rituals and moral codes. Ethical and religious beliefs are created from the bottom up, from people to their culture. They do not come from the top down, from God or other nonmaterial source to the people by way of culture.
The empiricist’s arguments is the author’s argument, and it echoes many past writers. Wilson reflects on Kant, who at his core was wrong about free will and how the brain works. Later G.E. Moore, and the naturalistic fallacy, is to ought. The categorical imperative; Rawls’ premise that justice is fairness. But they knew nothing of the brain or human nature. Yet still scholars resist natural science and stick with transcendentalism. But isn’t that equating is with ought? Example scale of thinking about adultery, 250m, from “it doesn’t feel right” to “God commands us to avoid this mortal sin.” Ideas from Rawls and Nozick. The empiricist reverses the chain of causation. Moral codes are devised to conform to some drives of human nature and to suppress others. But they can change with new knowledge and experience…
[[ This is the key, I think. ]] p251.4:
The empiricist view… recognizes that the strength of commitment can wane as a result of new knowledge and experience, with the result that certain rules may be desacralized, old laws rescinded, and behavior that was once prohibited freed. It also recognizes that for the same reason new moral code may need to be devised, with the potential in time of being made sacred.
Ought is the product of a material process. The solution is to grasp the origin of ethics. The primary origin of the moral instincts is the dynamic relation between cooperation and defection. We can revisit the Prisoner’s Dilemma. The dilemma is solved by an ethical precept: never betray another member. Similar dilemmas occur constantly in everyday life. With payoffs as money, status, power, etc. It’s likely been like this since the Paleolithic. Some heritable human propensities have endured because they solve such dilemmas. Cooperation, remorse, shame, etc. The dark side of these is xenophobia, because the sentiments above evolved to be selective. Morality and tribalism are complementary. And they were manipulated when cultures settled down and became more dense with the agricultural revolution. What were egalitarian societies became hierarchical, and ethical codes shifted to the advantage of the ruling classes; then came the idea of law-giving gods, again, favoring the rulers.
Moral reasoning by modern societies is a mess. They retain things ill-adapted to the modern world, like quick hostility to strangers and competing groups. Thus institutions arise to maintain order. Thus ethics, and political science, are confused, with no basis in the natural sciences. The following subjects need to be understood:
⦁ The definition of the moral sentiments;
⦁ The genetics of the moral sentiments;
⦁ How these are products of the interaction of genes and environment;
⦁ Their deep history.
Understanding these will help adapt ancient sentiments for the changing conditions of modern life. What will be the result? Likely democratic, to the detriment of rival ideologies and religions. But it will be slow.
On religion:
p256. Similarly we can study religion. Religions are like superorganisms; they are born, grow, compete, reproduce, and eventually die. They begin as cults; they involve a creation myth; they involve a mystery that only devotees have access to; Examples. They compete as tribes, one group dismissing the beliefs of their rivals. Still, their origin is similar to those of the moral sentiments. The religious drive arises from the survival instinct, i.e. fear. The understanding and control of life, explained via mythic narratives, and the supernatural as evidence of another world so desperately desired. It’s allied with tribalism. Religious mythos are invented over and over throughout history. There is a hereditary selective advantage to membership in a group united by belief and purpose. Altruism plays a role here: the individual pays, his genes and tribe gain, altruism spreads.
P258. Of particular significance is that if empiricism is disproved, then universal consilience fails. Or could such behavior arise through natural selection? Examples of wolves and rhesus monkeys. Their dominance behavior resembles human obeisance in religion. Humans too are easily seduced by confident, charismatic leaders, 260.2. especially in religious organizations. And the symbol-forming human mind dresses this behavior up with ritual and communion. And a kind of transcendent enlightenment. To dissolve into something complete and great. Ultimate meaning. To think this can all be ‘explained’ is not to trivialize it. What is this destination we seek? Recalls St. Teresa of Avila.
Transcendentalism seems right; empiricism seems sterile and inadequate. Science defeats religious dogmas, but the latter continue to win the heart. Still, passion and desire are not the same as truth. 262.3. Theology tries abstractions. 262.6 how the Hebrews resolved the pantheon into a single person, Yahweh. Later philosophers like Spinoza moved away from God as a literal person; God as all of nature. This notion continues in the modern era. Paul Tillich; process theology. Even scientists strive for a Theory of Everything. Steven Weinberg. Einstein. Hawking.
P264, “The essence of humanity’s spiritual dilemma is that we evolved genetically to accept one truth and discovered another.” Can we resolve the contradictions? No. We’re learning too much about how the world works. Author will suggest how this conflict will be settled. That the empiricist interpretation, and gene-culture coevolution, will be supported. Still, people need sacred narratives. A sense of larger purpose. These will come from the material history of the universe and the human species. This story is grander and with more content than all religious cosmologies combined. Science may never explain all of ethics and religion, but religion must incorporate the discoveries of science in order to remain credible. 265.7 The eventual result will be the secularization of the human epic, and of religion itself.
