Evolution of morality

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What I have been reading on this forum about the effects of genetics on the development of the human mind is rather discouraging. I would think that people whose sense of right and wrong tells them that whatever is good for me is right and whatever is bad for me is wrong are the most likely to prosper and pass their genes on to the next generation; people who care about others and believe in things like love, honesty, and mercy are the most likely to die young.

If this so, one wouldn't have to believe in God to see hell in the future of humanity. Once these character traits are purged out of human DNA, life on Earth will become hell.

I didn't fully understand your point here, but yes, genetics does have a major affect on your outlook and way of thinking (whether you accept it or not).

Cheers.

I don't think that's true. Dying early is mostly irrelevant, as most of us live long enough to procreate. You could also claim that people are more likely to seek out the people who possess the virtues you mention, to have children with.
Overall, I think a person is more likely to be good if they're raised well, than because they have nice genes.

After 100,000+ years of homo sapien sapiens, those qualities still seem to be around. In fact we seem to be building larger scale social constructs over time. Moving from tribe to city states, to nations, to international bodies.

This is an interesting short video on the expansion empathy (as expressed by human civilization) over time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7AWnfFRc7g

The problem with BOTH this and the theist equivalent is the level of reasoning.

Evolutionist:

We like to eat greasy food and drink stimulating fluids.

Today's traits come to us courtesy of evolution.

Humans evolved a taste for coffee and doughnuts.

We are still here.

Ingesting coffee and doughnuts must be a prosurvival trait.

Theist:

We like gadgets.

We were made to God's specifications.

God declared his creation good.

Therefore God predestined us to have iPods.

The iPod is God's will for humanity.

Inter-generational behavioral traits? Sounds rather Lamarckian, not Darwinist

Do I have to point out the logical duality here? You say what's good for me is good and what's bad for me is bad and that these people are the bad people? I wonder, being killed is bad for me, hence I don't kill. Am I making or refuting your point?

I think you need to redefine what you're driving at here. Love is good for me, hence I love. Why does that condemn me to dying before I teach my children to love? Makes no sense.

Sense? You came here looking for sense?

And you came back?

Neither, you're missing it; I was referring to people who equate what is good or bad for them with what is right and wrong. You're attitude sounds very Christian or at least Jesus said something along those lines. He also said something about love your neighbor as yourself and half of what Christians consider to be sin is loving yourself more than your neighbor. People who lie, steel and cheat don't like to be lied to, stolen from or cheated.

I know I can be awfully stingy with words sometimes, particularly here for reasons Philologos already pointed out, there are few serious discussions on this forum. This thread is my reaction to the latest free will debate where the strident atheists are again claiming that we have no will: all of our choices are made by a combination of genetics, environment and experience.

I don't claim to understand the science, however I do accept scientific method and the overwhelming opinion in the scientific community is that our physical form evolved from the apes. Well and good; but wouldn,'t the laws of evoluation apply to human nature as well as human the human body?

Ok, now I understood the argument.

Here's the thing.

While a few die young for being loving and caring, a few die young for being troublemakers and criminals (being a threat to society leads to huge risks).

But many others live long lives as a result of being loving and caring (society tends to do its best to keep such needed people protected from harm).

And genetics is not the only factor that affects our moral choices. The environment plays a role, too.

Experiments have confirmed that a strong magnetic field applied to an area just above the ear will cause any human to lose any sense of morality during decision making processes.

They had people watch rather horrific scenes and told to do things that would be considered unethical (the famous 'electric shock buzzer' setup)... and they found that when the strong magnetic field was active the brain did not react at all to the scenes... and the people with the magnetic field applied would keep on shocking another human being without remorse or feeling empathy.

So - beware of fluctuations in the earth's magnetic field?

Or build circuitry into police and military helmets?

Or just degauss criminals?

Evolution of morality - Many persons look to the Magna Carta as the beginning of aspects of western morality. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Carta - Regarding the idea of genetics, it does seem that it would be possible to breed people like animals in an attempt to turn all of humanity either into some kind of good person or some kind of bad person.

---

Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is a novel written by Mary Shelley.
Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde is the original title of a novella written by the Scottish author Robert Louis Stevenson.
The Borg are a fictional pseudo-race of cybernetic organisms depicted in the Star Trek universe.
- (Wikipedia)

Western Morality goes all the way back to Socrates. That is way before Magna Carta

Do you ever do any research before you post?

ruveyn

this turns out to be my field of study therefore I don't know anything.

But here are some tools
Formally, genes should increase in frequency when

where rB>C

r = the genetic relatedness of the recipient to the actor, often defined as the probability that a gene picked randomly from each at the same locus is identical by descent.
B = the additional reproductive benefit gained by the recipient of the altruistic act,
C = the reproductive cost to the individual of performing the act.

The coefficient of relationship between parent and offspring is 0.5, meaning half of the offspring's genome comes from that parent.[2] Or, more precisely said, half the genes are identical by descent.

Some other relatedness examples: (assuming no consanguinity of the parents, for diploid species unless noted otherwise)

r relationship
0.5 (½) parent-offspring
0.25 (¼) grandparent-grandchild
0.125 (⅛) great grandparent-great grandchild
1 identical twins; clones
0.5 (½) full siblings
0.25 (¼) half siblings
0.125 (⅛) first cousins
0.03125 (1/32) second cousins
0.75 (¾) full hymenopteran sisters[Bees and ants and such]

there you go little buddies you work it out.

-Jake

Even were that possible, even if we were not sure of messing things up more - would it be moral so to do?