Morality and Evolutionary Explanation:

What is the Problem?

Micah Lott

The reason of a social species is not programmable in just any direction. It arises as an aspect of stability and friendliness…When human beings reason practically about what would be best to do, they are wondering what would be best “for such a creature as man.” The range and pattern of possible aims is given with the species. So is a character adapted to them. What counts as help or harm is not a contingent matter. Treating it as contingent, as something logically separate from morality, was Kant’s mistake. For once the nature of a species (or any other system) is given, there are limits to the ways in which you can hope to make sense of it.

Mary Midgley Beast and Man1

1. Introduction: “an accurate overall picture of human life”

Morality has been around much longer than evolutionary science. So too has moral

philosophy. Long before Darwin, humans developed nuanced (and competing) views about good

and bad, right and wrong. And they developed complex views about the metaphysics and

epistemology of morality – answers to questions such as, What is the ground of the moral law,

and how do we know its content? In their reflections, philosophers have typically sought to

understand how morality relates to the kind of creatures that human beings are. As Nicholas

Sturgeon says: “From Plato onward all the great works of moral and political philosophy have

addressed ethical questions in the context of general theories about human nature and the human

condition, and it is common for philosophers writing on ethics to acknowledge the importance of

fitting ethical thought into an accurate overall picture of human life.”2 Like Sturgeon, I believe

that this is the way that moral philosophy should proceed.

Now, at least prima facie, evolutionary science seems capable of making important

contributions to our overall picture of human life. That is, it seems likely that evolutionary

explanations will somehow prove significant for answering our questions about human nature

and the human condition. And that raises a question: Are evolutionary explanations of human

nature significant for morality and moral philosophy? More specifically, does the contribution

1 Mary Midgley, Beast and Man (London and New York: Routledge, Revised Ed. 1995), 270.2 Nicholas Sturgeon, “Moore on Ethical Naturalism” Ethics 1143 (2003): 528-556, 553.

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that evolutionary science makes to our picture of ourselves give us reason to revise our moral

commitments or our views about the metaphysics and epistemology of morality?

In this paper, I consider two authors, Timothy Jackson and William Fitzpatrick, each of

whom rejects some claim about the revisionary implications of evolution. Each of these authors

opposes an evolutionary debunking argument. And each does so by shielding some aspect of

human life from an evolutionary explanation.3 In the case of Jackson, what is being defended

against evolutionary debunking is the ideal of altruism, and Jackson’s defense depends on

shielding our capacity for altruism from an explanation in terms of natural selection. In the case

of Fitzpatrick, what is being defended against evolutionary debunking is moral realism, and

Fitzpatrick’s defense depends on shielding some of our current moral beliefs from explanation in

terms of evolved tendencies and dispositions.

In each case, I agree that the evolutionary debunking argument does not succeed.

However, I also think that there is a problem with each author’s attempt to shield against

evolutionary explanation. Jackson’s defense of altruism, I will argue, rests on a confusion

between two types of explanation that need to be kept separate: explanations of ultimate

causation and explanations of proximate mechanisms.4 Fitzpatrick does not make the same

mistake. But neither does he adequately distinguish between two sorts of evolutionary influence,

which I will call Strict Influence and Wide Influence. By examining the arguments of Jackson

and Fitzpatrick, I hope to shed some light on the (in)significance of evolution explanations for

morality and moral philosophy.

2. Is evolution a problem for altruists?

Suppose we could provide an evolutionary account of our morality capacities – i.e., our

ability to make moral judgments and our basic moral motivations (e.g. sympathy with others,

sensitivity to fairness). Could any evolutionary explanation of the origins of our moral capacities

have revisionary implications for our current moral beliefs and commitments? Might an

evolutionary account of those capacities reveal that we are mistaken to value certain ways of

living and acting? Timothy Jackson says: Yes. In particular, Jackson argues for the following

claim: “If natural selection alone were behind altruism/agape, we could not continue to practice 3 To be precise, Jackson does not oppose an evolutionary explanation of altruism but a natural selection explanation. This is clear in my exposition of Jackson’s argument in section two. 4 I borrow the labels for the two questions from Michael Tomasello, who does an especially nice job of keeping these levels of explanation separate.

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or applaud it once we knew its evolutionary explanation, for then it would be for the sake of self-

interest.”5

If this claim is true, then those of us who applaud and (attempt to) practice altruism have

serious reason to resist at least one sort of evolutionary explanation of our capacity for altruism –

an explanation in terms of natural selection alone.6 Indeed, if Jackson is correct, then such an

explanation will be an explanation of the capacity for “altruism” in name only. I will first explain

Jackson’s argument for this claim, and then explain why I believe that his argument rests on a

confusion between two different questions that should be kept separate.

Jackson’s argument has two premises. The first premise is about the type of motivation

that is essential to altruistic behavior: Genuinely altruistic behavior is done for the sake of the

other’s good, not for the agent’s own good. Importantly, genuine altruism is not the same as

mutually beneficial cooperation in which agents work together but each is ultimately interested

only in her own good, e.g. “I’ll scratch your back, if you scratch my back.” The second premise

is that any basic motivation that is explained by natural selection alone must be ultimately self-

interested. Thus if human “altruism” is rooted in basic motivations that are the outcome of

natural selection alone, then it is not genuine altruism. It is actually self-interested behavior,

disguised as regard for the good of another. In short, a natural selection account of altruism will

“reduce love of neighbor to a form of personal prudence.” In which case, “it is better simply to

concede that Nietzsche and Freud were right: love of neighbor is unnatural and self-deceived.”7

However, Jackson is convinced that humans can practice genuine human altruism, not

merely covert self-interest. Thus he believes that our capacity for altruism cannot be explained

by natural selection alone. How, then, did our capacity for altruism arise in evolutionary history?

As a spandrel or exaptation. A spandrel is a feature of an organism that arose in the process of

evolution but was not selected for because of its own contribution to reproductive success.

Rather a spandrel “exists for no adaptive reason, but as part of an organism’s internal

5 Timothy Jackson, “The Christian Love Ethic and Evolutionary ‘Cooperation’, ” in Martin A. Nowak and Sarah Coakley (eds). Evolution, Games, and God (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2013) 307-325, 317. Jackson defends the same position in “Evolution, Agape, and the Image of God” in Frederick V. Simmons and Brian C. Sorrells (eds.) Love and Christian Ethics (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2016) 226-249.6 Jackson sometimes speaks about “altruism” and sometime “agape,” and sometimes about “altruism/agape.” He understands agape to be a “an elaborated form of altruism” (“The Christian Love Ethic”, 309). Since the evolutionary challenge, as Jackson understands it, applies equally to both, I will restrict myself to the term “altruism.”7 Jackson, “The Christian Love Ethic,” 316.

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engineering.”8 An exaptation is “an adaption functionally shifted from its original use.”9 In either

case, what matters for Jackson is that we can offer an explanation of the origin of altruism in

which altruistic motivation per se was not selected because of its contribution to reproductive

success. If altruism is a spandrel or exaptation, then it cannot be explained as arising because of

its adaptive value – i.e., the emergence of our capacity for altruism per se is not explained by

natural selection. Thus Jackson concludes, “altruism can and should be accounted for in

nonselectionist terms…Either altruism is a spandrel, a currently telling feature with a

nonadaptive origin, or an intentional exaptation of a previous adaption…or it is a delusion.”10

For now, let us set aside the question of whether there are any convincing accounts of

altruism as an evolutionary spandrel or exaptation. I wish to focus on a different question: Is

Jackson correct to think that we need to explain altruism that way, if we are to continue to

practice and applaud altruism? I think not. I agree with Jackson that genuinely altruistic motives

must be the sake of another’s good. But even if our capacity for altruistic motivation was

selected by a process of natural selection, that does not mean that our altruistic motives are

oriented at the good of the agent rather that at the good of another – i.e., it does not mean that

they are actually self-interested rather than altruistic motives.

At this point, it is important to distinguish two questions. One question is about the

evolutionary origins of our psychological capacities. Under what conditions and in what ways

did these capacities arise in evolutionary history? Call this the question of ultimate causation.

Another question is about the proper description of the our psychology or the psychology of our

evolutionary ancestors. What kinds of motivation and representation should we ascribe to

particular agents to explain their attitudes and actions? Call this the question of proximate

mechanism. To see the importance of keeping these questions separate, suppose that there are

creatures with a psychological capacity for altruism, and that altruistic behavior plays an

important role in their form of life. When we ask about the proximate mechanisms of their

behavior, we must (at least sometimes) appeal to genuinely other-regarding motivations to

explain their behavior. However, we might also ask how these genuinely altruistic forms of

motivation arose in evolutionary history – a question about ultimate causation. And suppose that

the answer to that question includes fact that at some point in evolutionary history the ancestors

8 Ibid., 318.9 Ibid.10 Ibid., 321.

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of these creatures developed other-regarding motivations, and those other-regarding motivations

contributed to their reproductive success. Without those motivations, they would not have

produced as many offspring as they did. Even if that fact is important to explaining ultimate

causation, this does not show that the motivations of either these creatures or their ancestors are

“really” self-interested, rather than concerned with the welfare of others. To think that this kind

of fact about ultimate causation must somehow expose purported altruistic motivation as self-

regarding is to confuse the two levels of explanation that correspond to the two questions. A

natural selection explanation at the level of ultimate causation need not displace or compete with

altruistic motivation at the level proximate mechanism. So altruists need not think it is crucial to

shield our capacity for altruistic motivation from explanation in terms of natural selection. Such

an ultimate explanation can still be an explanation of the origins of psychological altruism; it

need not be an explanation of something else.

This point is especially clear in the recent work of Michael Tomasello.11 In A Natural

History of Human Morality, Tomasello offers an account of the key stages in the development of

our moral capacities. Throughout his account, Tomasello stresses the need to keep separate the

questions of proximate mechanism (psychology) and ultimate causation (evolutionary history).

Tomasello recognizes that the “logic of natural selection, of course, stipulates that organisms do

things that increase, or at least do not decrease, their reproductive fitness.”12 But for most

organisms on the planet, it would be misleading to describe them as acting from “self-interest” in

the sense in which a human can act from self-interest:

[W]hat we normally refer to as self-interest is an individual making an active choice to favor itself over others The vast majority of life forms on planet Earth are making no such choice…they have no psychological mechanisms specifying that they should favor themselves over others; the question simply does not arise. To say that they are acting out of self-interest is to confuse ultimate causation with proximate mechanism.”13

In the case of human morality, Tomasello argues that early humans developed a concern for the

welfare of others that went beyond anything found in the great apes. The context for this other-

regarding motivation was increased interdependence in collaborate foraging. In Tomasello’s

story of how morality developed, the star is not reciprocity but mutualism. Because early humans

were dependent upon each other, the motivation of being genuinely concerned for another’s

11 Michael Tomasello, The Natural History of Human Morality (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2016). 12 Ibid., 158.13 Ibid., 159.

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welfare was consistent with the logic of natural selection. In being moved to help someone who

is my partner in a mutually-beneficial enterprise, I may be making a sacrifice in the short run, but

in the long-run I am investing in someone who is helpful to my own good.

It might seem that Tomasello’s account vindicates Jackson’s worry that a natural

selection account will explain away altruism, rather than explain it. Jackson might protest: “If,

when I help you, what I am really doing is investing in my own future good, then this is not the

development of genuine altruism. This is simply more sophisticated prudence.” But once again,

we must distinguish ultimate causation and proximate cause. And that means we should not

confuse what is “really” going on, at the level of psychology, with an account of how having that

sort of psychology could have contributed to an organism’s reproductive fitness. As Tomasello

says, “Because the helper herself benefited from these acts on the evolutionary level, some

theorists would deem this sympathetic motive an illusion. But that is not true at the psychological

level, where early humans’ sympathetic concern for the welfare of others was pure.”14

To be clear, Tomasello does not claim that early humans’ concern for others was “full-

blown” altruism, where that includes a concern with the welfare of all humans, or all living

things. Indeed, he emphasizes that the earliest forms of sympathy did not extend that far.

Although the earliest humans’ concern for the welfare of others was pure, and it included nonkin

and nonfriends, it was focused on one’s collaborative partners and far from universal in scope.15

But this is only one stage in, and one aspect of, the evolutionary development of the human

capacity for morality.16

As noted earlier, my point is that we need not explain our capacity for altruism entirely as

a spandrel or exaptation in order to regard current altruism as genuine, or continue to practice

and applaud altruism. There is no need to fear selectionist elements in our accounts of the

ultimate causation of altruism. If evolutionary explanations are a threat to altruism, it is not for

the reasons that trouble Jackson. At the same time, this does not mean we should resist or avoid

appealing to spandrels or exaptations in evolutionary explanations of altruism or any other aspect

of our moral psychology. It might well turn out that such non-selectionist mechanisms do

provide the best explanation for some aspects of our moral capacities.17

14 Ibid., 79.15 Ibid, 45-50.16 For a useful summary of Tomasello’s view of the whole process, see 147-154.17 As it happens, Tomasello argues that a crucial aspect of human morality did arise as a spandrel, although it was not our basic motivation of sympathetic concern. Rather, in addition to developing new forms of concern for the

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3. Is evolution a problem for moral realists?

3.1. Evolutionary explanation and evolutionary debunking

Like Timothy Jackson, William Fitzpatrick is interested in ways that evolutionary

biology might pose challenges for our thinking about morality18 But Fitzpatrick’s focus differs

Jackson’s in two important ways. First, Jackson is concerned about the potential for evolutionary

explanations to undermine a particular normative ideal – altruism. In contrast, Fitzpatrick is

focused on evolutionary challenges to a meta-ethical position – moral realism. Roughly

speaking, moral realism is the position that (a) moral claims can be true or false in an objective

sense – i.e., their truth is not a function of the attitudes or perspectives of the person who asserts

them, and (b) at least some significant moral claims are true.19 Moreover, very few moral realists

are skeptics about moral knowledge. Almost all moral realists also hold that (c) we have some

significant moral knowledge. As will be clear below, evolutionary debunking arguments often

target the moral realist’s claim about moral knowledge.20

Second, unlike Jackson, Fitzpatrick is not worried about natural selection explanations of

our moral capacities. For Fitzpatrick, the crucial issue is how we explain the content of our

welfare of others, early human developed a capacity to take a “bird’s eye view” of their collaborative activities. And this led to a recognition of “self-other equivalence” that is foundational for the morality of fairness. And this human ability to think in terms of self-other equivalence was, according to Tomasello, an evolutionary spandrel: “In contrast to the case of sympathy based on interdependence of, thinking of others as equivalent to oneself was not a motivation and was not directly selected on the evolutionary level at all; it was simply a part of the cognitive structure of joint intentionality adapted for effective social coordination. As such, from the point of view of morality, we may think of the recognition of self-other equivalence as a kind of structural ‘spandrel’ that basically framed the way that individuals thought about things.” (Ibid., 180). This capacity for self-other equivalence is not the only aspect of human morality that Tomasello views as a spandrel. See also 150-153. 18 William Fitzpatrick “Why There Is No Darwinian Dilemma for Ethical Realism” in M. Bergmann and P. Kain eds., Challenges to Moral and Religious Belief: Disagreement and Evolution (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014); William Fitzpatrick “Debunking Evolutionary Debunking of Moral Realism” Philosophical Studies 172 (4):883-904 (2015); William Fitzpatrick “Misidentifying the Debunkers’ Error: Reply to Mogenson” Analysis 76 (4):433-437 (2016); "Scientific Naturalism and the Explanation of Moral Beliefs: Challenging Evolutionary Debunking," in Kelly Clark, ed., A Companion to Naturalism (Blackwell, 2016) 386-400.

In his Stanford Encyclopedia entry “Morality and Evolutionary Biology,” Fitzpatrick does an excellent job of mapping the conceptual terrain in the area of ethics and evolution. For anyone thinking about these issues – student or scholar, scientist or philosopher – I highly recommend Fitzpatrick’s entry. 19 People who accept moral realism as a meta-ethical position can differ widely in their first-order normative views. For instance, moral realists might disagree over whether altruism is truly laudable. For Fitpatrick’s own account of moral realism, see his “Robust ethical realism, non-naturalism, and normativity” In R. Shafer-Landau (Ed.), Oxford Studies in Metaethics Vol. 3, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008) 159- 205.

20 The literature on evolutionary debunking arguments is large and growing. Two helpful recent overviews are Katia Vavova “Evolutionary Debunking of Moral Realism” Philosophy Compass 10 (2): 104-116 (2105) and Eric Wielenberg “Ethics and Evolutionary Theory” Analysis 76(4): 502-515 (2016).

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current moral beliefs. And he insists that whatever explanation we provide for the origins our

moral capacities, it remains an open question how we should explain the content of our current

beliefs. As he says:

Even if (1) our capacity and tendency to make moral judgments is an adaptation that evolved through natural selection, it remains possible that (2) the content of particular moral judgments is derived autonomously, i.e., free from causal shaping by particular elements in our evolutionary background—in roughly the way that the contents of our beliefs in physics or philosophy seem to be.21

Fitzpatrick distinguishes two kinds of explanation that we might give for someone’s belief,

whether that belief is about morality, philosophy, physics or something else. On the one hand,

we can consider a belief as an empirical phenomenon of the kind investigated by the sciences,

and we can ask what caused the person to form that belief. In this case, we regard the belief as

the result of various biological and psychological factors. And we explain the belief from an

“external” point of view, using the methods of the sciences. On the other hand, we can consider a

belief from an “internal” point of view and ask what reasons led the person to form the belief.

Here we seek a person’s own justifications for her belief. As an example of this kind of rational

explanation, Fitzpatrick offers the case of someone who believes, on the basis of mathematical

understanding, that the square root of two is an irrational number:

In that case, the appropriate question to ask, and what we mean when we ask why you believe that the square root of 2 is irrational, is: What are your reasons for thinking that this propositional content is true? And your answer will appeal to the proof in question, which amounts to a set of considerations you take to show why it is true that the square root of two cannot be expressed as a fraction of whole numbers, thus justifying your belief. Where there is this sort of mathematical understanding, we explain your belief via justification from your perspective an understanding mind, not merely via causation from an external perspective that is blind to issues of truth and justification (as on the model of the rash or post-hypnotic suggestion).22

These two kinds of explanation – the external/causal and the internal/rational – can be applied to

moral beliefs, such as the belief that human trafficking is wrong, or the belief that witches should

be burned at the stake. The key issue, according to Fitzpatrick, is which kind of explanation

21 Fitzpatrick, SEP, 12. And later in that same entry, Fitzpatrick writes: “So far, we have focused on scientific projects that treat morality in the empirical sense as calling simply for causal explanation, as by appeal to evolutionary influences. This is unexceptionable with regard to the origins of the general human capacity for moral judgment: clearly some causal explanation is required, and an evolutionary explanation is plausible. But things are much more complicated when we consider the explanation of the actual content of moral judgment, feeling and behavior.” (21)22 Fitzpatrick, “Scientific Naturalism and the Explanation of Moral Beliefs.” (391) All italics in original.

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provides the best explanation for a given belief. For some beliefs, such as the one about witches,

the best explanation might be an external one. For others, however, the best explanation might be

an internal one, similar to the explanation of the mathematical belief about the square root of

two. If Peter believes that human trafficking is wrong, then the best explanation of his belief

might be that trafficking is morally wrong, and he has come to appreciate that truth “through a

proper recognition of the good reasons there are for believing it, just as with any other true

beliefs.”23 In that case, if we ask “Why does Peter believe that human trafficking is morally

wrong?” then the best answer to that question will include: (a) Peter’s reasons for thinking that

trafficking is wrong – the features about trafficking that make it wrong, that explain its

wrongness – and (b) the fact that Peter grasps those reasons and holds his belief on the basis of

that grasp. Importantly, this way of explaining a moral belief “is not the sort of explanation that

can be captured from the scientific perspective…this explanation requires engagement with

issues of truth and justification internal to moral inquiry.”24

How does all of this relate to the evolutionary debunking of moral realism? The key point

is this: If we have some moral knowledge as the realist understands it, then the best explanation

for some of our moral beliefs is the internal/rational type of explanation. For example, why do

we believe that slavery is wrong? – “we believe slavery is wrong because it is wrong and we

have seen that it is wrong, by seeing why it is wrong, apprehend the good reasons for holding the

belief.”25

The debunker’s key claim is that evolutionary explanations of our moral beliefs should

replace these sorts of internal/rational explanation, because the best explanations for all our

moral beliefs are external/causal explanations. The debunker claims that “there are evolutionary

explanations for these beliefs that, when fully filled-out, appeal at every level only to causal

factors that have nothing to do with tracking or responding to moral facts as such.”26 And thus,

the debunker concludes, we should reject the moral realist’s claim that we have some significant

moral knowledge.

The debunker’s argument, as Fitzpatrick understand it, has a modus tollens structure:

23 Ibid., 394. Italics in original.24 Ibid., 395.25 Fitzpatrick, “Why There is No Darwinian Dilemma” 243.26 Fitzpatrick, “Reply to Mogensen” 4.

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(1) If we have realist moral knowledge, then some significant moral beliefs should be given

an internal/rational explanation that vindicates those beliefs.

(2) But it is not the case that some significant moral beliefs should be given an

internal/rational explanation that vindicates those beliefs.

(3) Thus we do not have realist moral knowledge.27

According to the Fitzpatrick, the problem with the debunker’s argument is that the moral realist

has no reason to accept the crucial second premise. Of course, if we assume that there are no

moral truths, or that we could not grasp them, then the best explanations of our moral beliefs will

not make reference to moral truths. But that would beg the relevant question. The argument is

supposed to debunk moral realism, not assume its falsity from the outset. Moreover, there is

nothing from science per se that supports the debunker’s key claim. And here we need to recall

the distinction between (a) evolutionary explanations of our basic moral capacities and (b)

evolutionary explanations of the contents of our current beliefs. Even if there are convincing

scientific accounts of how our moral capacities evolved, that does not tell us what the best

explanation is for our current moral beliefs. As Fitzpatrick says:

What the debunkers overlook (or fail to take seriously enough) is the possibility that although the basic psychological capacities we draw on in moral thinking originally evolved simply for Darwinian reasons, and although we may also possess certain evolved dispositions to have certain moral feelings and beliefs, we may nonetheless also be able to develop our capacities for moral reflection and reasoning in cultural contexts and exercise them with a considerable degree of independence from those influences. At least some of our moral thinking might proceed according to developed, learned standards internal to intelligent moral inquiry, rather than simply in narrow ways laid down for us by evolved dispositions.28

Thus, Fitzpatrick concludes, evolutionary debunking arguments fail to undermine realist moral

knowledge.

3.2. Independence and influence

27 Fitzpatrick is well aware that the arguments of some evolutionary debunkers are more complicated than this. See, for example, his careful reconstructions of various debunking arguments in Fitzpatrick (2014) and Fitzpatrick (2015). However, Fitzpatrick does sometimes present the basic argument as having this modus tollens form; see Fitzpatrick (2016). Moreover, presenting the debunker’s argument this way helps to bring out what is, for Fitzpatrick, the crucial issue in all the debunking arguments under consideration..28 Fitzpatrick, “Reply to Mogensen”

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I wish to grant Fitzpatrick’s central claim in response to the debunker’s challenge – the

debunkers have thus far failed to show that the best explanation for all of our significant moral

beliefs is an external/causal type of explanation, and hence moral realists have no good reason to

abandon their conviction that we possess some significant moral knowledge which requires an

internal/rational type of explanation. What interests me are the concepts of “independence” and

“influence” that figure in Fitzpatrick’s realist picture of moral knowledge. These concepts apply

to the formation of moral beliefs, and by extension to those beliefs themselves. They need to be

understood in terms of each other, because the relevant kind of independence from a certain kind

of influence.

For Fitzpatrick, to offer an internal/rational explanation for a moral belief is to regard that

belief as formed for reasons, and hence to regard it as formed in a way that is independent from

the influence of causal factors that operate apart from the agent’s own rational capacities and that

are only accidentally related to the truth of the belief.29 Since an evolutionary influence would be

just that type of causal factor, offering an internal/rational explanation for a moral belief requires

regarding that belief as formed independently of evolutionary influences. As Fitzpatrick says:

Even if we grant that evolution gave our ancestors dispositions that influenced the content of their judgments, nothing follows about how deeply or widely this influence pervades our current moral beliefs. As we’ve seen, unless we have already rejected moral realism, it remains an open possibility that at least many of our moral beliefs—like many of our beliefs in other domains—have been arrived at quite independently of evolutionary influences.30

If our moral beliefs are formed independently from evolutionary (and other rationally irrelevant)

factors, that does not mean our moral thinking proceeds at random. Rather, our beliefs can be

formed “according to developed, learned standards internal to intelligent moral inquiry.”

I will refer to the sort of independence discussed so far as Strict Independence, and the

corresponding sort of influence as Strict Influence. The hallmark of these concepts is that if a

moral belief is formed on the basis of reasons and according to developed, learned standards

internal to intelligent moral inquiry, then that belief possesses Strict Independence from Strict

Influence.

29 That does not mean, of course, that every internal/rational explanation for a person’s beliefs will characterize her as acting for good reasons or in accordance with normative standards for rational thinking.30 Fitzpatrick, “Debunking Evolutionary Debunking” 3.4.

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In his response to evolutionary debunking, Fitzpatrick seems to assume that everything

turns on the question of whether some of our current beliefs possess Strict Independence from

Strict Influence. But even if we grant that some of our moral beliefs possess Strict Independence

from Strict Influence, it is possible to ask a different question, or set of questions, about

evolutionary influence. Granted that some of our beliefs are formed on the basis of reasons, to

what extent has evolution shaped what we take to be reasons, and what counts as a good reason

for us? Granted that our moral thinking proceeds according to developed, learned standards

internal to moral inquiry, to what extent has evolution influenced the character of those

standards? Can we shed light any light on how our moral thinking operates, and what counts as

practically rational for us, by reflecting on the fact that our moral capacities are the evolved

capacities of a particular type of organism?

This set of questions points to the possibility of a different kind of evolutionary influence,

which I will call Wide Influence. The basic idea of Wide Influence is that evolution has left us as

creatures of a certain kind, with particular needs, wants, capacities, and a characteristic pattern of

development. In other words, it has left us with a particular nature. And our human nature

provides the essential context in which standards of intelligent moral inquiry can be developed

and take root. Our nature is what makes it possible for anything to count as a reason for us, and it

shapes what our reasons are.

Crucially, to say that our moral beliefs are subject to Wide Influence is consistent with

regarding those beliefs as formed on the basis of reasons and according to developed, learned

standards internal to intelligent moral inquiry. That is the key difference between Wide Influence

and Strict Influence. As we have seen, Strict Independence is incompatible with Strict Influence.

For a belief to have Strict Independence means that it is free from Strict Influence. In contrast,

Strict Independence is compatible with Wide Influence, because Wide Influence is not a claim

about an external/causal mechanism for a given belief. It is not a claim about an explanation that

bypasses our rational capacities. Rather it is a claim about how those capacities work.

If we accept Wide Influence, does that mean that evolutionary explanations apply to the

content of our current moral beliefs? Yes. But only by explaining that content at a very general

level, and not in such a way as to compete with an internal/rational explanation of particular

beliefs. The explanatory role of Wide Influence can be brought out with the following analogy.

Suppose we set out in a sailboat without a particular destination in mind. We decide where to

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land once we are at sea. However, our range of options is limited by our initial choice of which

direction to sail. In one scenario, we set out for the South Pacific and land in Fiji. In another

scenario, we set out for the Mediterranean and settle on Crete. In a third scenario we set out for

the Indian Ocean and end up at Grand Canmore. And so on. In the first scenario, someone might

ask “Why did you choose to land in Fiji?” Depending on the context, the best answer to that

question might be the various features of Fiji that we recognized that made it a good place to

land – i.e. our reasons for landing there. At the same time, a complete explanation of why we

landed at Fiji will make reference to our initial decision to set out for the South Pacific. Because

once that decision was made it shaped the options available to us and focused our practical

thinking on a particular set of factors. However, recognizing the influence of that initial decision

will not compete with, or displace, an explanation in terms of our reasons for picking Fiji. 31

Analogously, if we suppose our moral thinking is subject to Wide Influence by evolutionary

forces, we can maintain both (a) that the best explanation for the content of some of our current

beliefs is an internal/rational explanation, and (b) that evolutionary forces are a part of a

complete explanation of why our moral thinking has the shape that it does.

3.3. Resisting wide influence?

As I understand Fitzpatrick, he aims to shield some of our significant moral beliefs from

both Strict Influence and Wide Influence. This is most clear, I think, in his response to Sharon

Street. As part of her own evolutionary attack on moral realism, Street argues that “one

enormous factor in shaping the content of human values has been the forces of natural selection,

such that our system of evaluative judgments is thoroughly saturated with evolutionary

influence.’’32 This claim is based on two other claims: (1) that evolution has profoundly shaped

our basic evaluative tendencies, and (2) that these tendencies in turn shape the content of our

full-fledged normative judgments.33 Our basic evaluative tendencies are tendencies to experience

certain things as ‘‘called for,’’ or to see something as ‘‘counting in favor of’’ something else.

Such tendencies are found in non-human animals, as when a mother grizzly feels a motivational

31 If someone asks, “Why did you choose to land in Fiji rather than Crete?” then our initial decision to sail for the South Pacific will be especially relevant to explaining how we ended up one place rather than another.32 Sharon Street “A Darwinian dilemma for realist theories of value” Philosophical Studies 127(1):109-166, 114.33 Street sometimes speaks about “evaluative judgments” and at other times “normative judgments.” In this context, I treat these terms as equivalent. Moreover, I assume that moral judgments/moral beliefs are a sub-category of normative judgments/normative beliefs.

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“pull” to defend her cubs, or when a squirrel perceives an approaching dog as “to be avoided”

and flees. Street’s examples of full-fledged normative judgments include: ‘‘The fact that

something would promote one’s survival is a reason to favor it’’; ‘‘We have greater obligations

to help our own children than we do to help complete strangers’’; ‘‘The fact that someone is

altruistic is a reason to admire, praise, and reward him or her.’’34

Street points out that humans from various times and cultures tend to accept fundamental

normative judgments like these. And she argues that the best explanation for this convergence is

an evolutionary one. In the course of human evolution, ‘‘the capacity for full-fledged evaluative

judgment was a relatively late evolutionary add-on, superimposed on top of much more basic

behavioral and motivational tendencies.’’35 It is because these basic tendencies continue to shape

the our current beliefs that we find widespread human acceptance normative judgments like the

ones listed above. Moreover, it is reasonable to suppose that the content of our basic evaluative

tendencies has been shaped by evolutionary pressures. And thus we can conclude that

evolutionary forces help to explain the content of our current system of normative judgments.

Street’s claim is a version of what I have called Wide Influence. Importantly, she does

not claim that evolution completely explains the content of our current judgments. Nor does she

claim that evolutionary explanations of our beliefs can replace internal/rational explanations.

Street acknowledges the role of culture and history in moral thinking. She recognizes that we can

‘‘step back’’ from our evaluative tendencies and reflect upon them. However, Street insists that

our reflection must start from our basic evaluative attitudes. And as starting points for reflection,

our basic evaluative attitudes in turn shape the results of reflection. As she says: ‘‘had the general

content of our basic evaluative attitudes been very different, then the general content of our full-

fledged evaluative judgments would also have been very different, and in loosely corresponding

ways.’’36 And because evolution has significantly shaped those attitudes, we can conclude that

evolutionary forces have exerted a significant influence on the content of our views about what is

good and bad, what makes sense, and what is a reason for what.

Fitzpatrick rejects Street’s claim about evolutionary influence on our judgments. He

points out that even if evolutionary forces were responsible for the development of our moral

capacities, this does not tell us how deeply or widely those forces shape our current beliefs. And

34 Ibid., 115.35 Ibid., 118.36 Ibid., 120.

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even if evolutionary forces have shaped some of our current moral beliefs to some extent, it

remains possible that “many of our current moral beliefs do not reflect such evolutionary shaping

of their content at all, but instead spring from more recent belief-forming dispositions shaped

independently by ongoing experience and reflection.”37 In contrast to Street’s claim about

evolutionary influence, Fitzpatrick insists that we might be able to “engage in largely

autonomous moral thinking—that is, thinking that transcends the micromanaging influences of

natural selection in the distant past, proceeding independently of such evolutionary shaping of

the content of our thinking, following standards internal to developed methods of inquiry.”38

This reply makes sense if we interpret Street as making a claim about Strict Influence.

But in fact she is best interpreted as making a claim about Wide Influence. Street’s evolutionary

account of our beliefs is not offered as an external/causal explanation that will compete with an

internal/rational explanation. Rather Street is giving us a picture of how our moral thinking

operates – a picture of what moral reasoning involves for creatures like us. And according to this

picture, our answers to questions about what is valuable or reasonable are profoundly shaped by

our basic evaluative attitudes, which are themselves the products of evolutionary processes.

If we understand Street this way – as making a claim about Wide Influence rather than

Strict Influence – then it is clear that Fitzpatrick’s response to Street is insufficient. It is not

enough to say that some of our beliefs might well be formed “independently,” based on ongoing

experience and reflection. For that is claim about Strict Independence from evolutionary factors,

and that is compatible with a claim about the Wide Influence of evolution on our moral thinking.

Likewise, Wide Influence need not endorse the “micromanaging influences of natural

selection.” Here we can distinguish two ways to interpret Street’s idea that our system of

normative judgments is “thoroughly saturated with evolutionary influence.” One interpretation of

such saturation is micromanaging, which says that all the details of our full-fledged normative

judgments can be explained by an external/casual evolutionary explanation. On this view,

evolution saturates by going down to the “micro” level, leaving no explanatory room for

internal/rational explanations of our judgments. But the notion of Wide Influence calls for a

different interpretation of saturation. Recall the earlier sailboat analogy. Once we have set out for

the South Pacific, then our range of options has become significantly constrained. In that way,

wherever we decide to land, we can say that the choice was “thoroughly saturated” by our initial 37 Fitzpatrick, “Why There is No Darwinian Dilemma” 243. 38 Ibid., 242.

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decision, insofar as that decision leaves it mark on all later decisions. Analogously, we can say

that evolution has thoroughly saturated our system of judgments by leaving us as creatures with a

certain nature, and that nature both makes possible our moral thinking and constrains its content.

3.4. Conclusion

I have not argued that evolutionary actually has exerted Wide Influence on our moral

thinking. Nor have I defended Street’s arguments in favor of Wide Influence, or her particular

picture of how moral thinking operates. Rather I have argued that we should distinguish Strict

Influence from Wide Influence; that Street’s argument is best understood in terms of Wide

Influence; and that therefore Fitzpatrick’s reply to Street is insufficient.

That said, I think it is very likely that some version of Wide Influence is true. So is Wide

Influence a threat to the moral realist’s claim to moral knowledge? I believe the answer is: No.

But explaining and justifying that answer is beyond the scope of this paper.39

39 I consider this issue in detail in “Must Realists be Skeptics? An Aristotelian Reply to a Darwinian Dilemma” Philosophical Studies 2017.

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