Evolutionary Ethics and Contemporary Biology

Evolutionary Ethics and Contemporary Biology
Author: Giovanni Boniolo
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 189
Release: 2006-07-03
Genre: Science
ISBN: 1139458418

How can the discoveries made in the biological sciences play a role in a discussion on the foundation of ethics? This book responds to this question by examining how evolutionism can explain and justify the existence of ethical normativity and the emergence of particular moral systems. Written by a team of philosophers and scientists, the essays collected in this volume deal with the limits of evolutionary explanations, the justifications of ethics, and methodological issues concerning evolutionary accounts of ethics, among other topics. They offer deep insights into the origin and purpose of human moral capacities and of moral systems.

Evolution and Ethics

Evolution and Ethics
Author: Philip Clayton
Publisher: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing
Total Pages: 354
Release: 2004-08-04
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 9780802826954

Certain to engage scholars, students, and general readers alike, Evolution and Ethics offers a balanced, levelheaded, constructive approach to an often divisive debate.

Biology and the Foundations of Ethics

Biology and the Foundations of Ethics
Author: Jane Maienschein
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 348
Release: 1999-02-28
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 9780521559232

This collection of essays focuses on the connection between biology and questions in ethics.

Evolutionary Ethics

Evolutionary Ethics
Author: Matthew H. Nitecki
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 382
Release: 1993-07-16
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9780791415009

This volume analyzes the biological and philosophical disagreements in evolutionary ethics and points out difficulties with the interpretations. The book is divided into four sections. The first is an historical introduction to the origin of evolutionary ethics, showing how different evolutionary ethics was a hundred years ago, and how distant Huxley is from most of us now. The second section argues for a sociobiological interpretation of evolutionary ethics. The third section presents the view opposite to that of the second section and rejects the sociobiological interpretation. The fourth section deals objectively with many complex and fundamental issues from diverse perspectives.

Contemporary Debates in Philosophy of Biology

Contemporary Debates in Philosophy of Biology
Author: Francisco J. Ayala
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 440
Release: 2009-11-19
Genre: Science
ISBN: 9781444314939

This collection of specially commissioned essays puts top scholarshead to head to debate the central issues in the lively and fastgrowing field of philosophy of biology Brings together original essays on ten of the most hotlydebated questions in philosophy of biology Lively head-to-head debate format sharply defines the issuesand paves the way for further discussion Includes coverage of the new and vital area of evolutionarydevelopmental biology, as well as the concept of a unified species,the role of genes in selection, the differences between micro- andmacro-evolution, and much more Each section features an introduction to the topic as well assuggestions for further reading Offers an accessible overview of this fast-growing and dynamicfield, whilst also capturing the imagination of professionalphilosophers and biologists

Philosophy After Darwin

Philosophy After Darwin
Author: Michael Ruse
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Total Pages: 593
Release: 2009
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 0691135533

An anthology of essential writings that cover some of the most influential ideas about the philosophical implications of Darwinism, since the publication of "On the Origin of Species".

Evolutionary Biology

Evolutionary Biology
Author: R. Paul Thompson
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 257
Release: 2014-03-13
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 1107027012

This volume explores the philosophical and biological richness of twenty-first-century evolution: its concepts, methods, structure and religious implications.

The Temptations of Evolutionary Ethics

The Temptations of Evolutionary Ethics
Author: Paul Lawrence Farber
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 228
Release: 1994-10-11
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9780520920972

Evolutionary theory tells us about our biological past; can it also guide us to a moral future? Paul Farber's compelling book describes a century-old philosophical hope held by many biologists, anthropologists, psychologists, and social thinkers: that universal ethical and social imperatives are built into human nature and can be discovered through knowledge of evolutionary theory. Farber describes three upsurges of enthusiasm for evolutionary ethics. The first came in the early years of mid-nineteenth century evolutionary theories; the second in the 1920s and '30s, in the years after the cultural catastrophe of World War I; and the third arrived with the recent grand claims of sociobiology to offer a sound biological basis for a theory of human culture. Unlike many who have written on evolutionary ethics, Farber considers the responses made by philosophers over the years. He maintains that their devastating criticisms have been forgotten—thus the history of evolutionary ethics is essentially one of oft-repeated philosophical mistakes. Historians, scientists, social scientists, and anyone concerned about the elusive basis of selflessness, altruism, and morality will welcome Farber's enlightening book.

Empirically Engaged Evolutionary Ethics

Empirically Engaged Evolutionary Ethics
Author: Johan De Smedt
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 223
Release: 2021-05-04
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 303068802X

A growing body of evidence from the sciences suggests that our moral beliefs have an evolutionary basis. To explain how human morality evolved, some philosophers have called for the study of morality to be naturalized, i.e., to explain it in terms of natural causes by looking at its historical and biological origins. The present literature has focused on the link between evolution and moral realism: if our moral beliefs enhance fitness, does this mean they track moral truths? In spite of the growing empirical evidence, these discussions tend to remain high-level: the mere fact that morality has evolved is often deemed enough to decide questions in normative and meta-ethics. This volume starts from the assumption that the details about the evolution of morality do make a difference, and asks how. It presents original essays by authors from various disciplines, including philosophy, anthropology, developmental psychology, and primatology, who write in conversation with neuroscience, sociology, and cognitive psychology.

Evolution and Human Values

Evolution and Human Values
Author: Robert Wesson
Publisher: Rodopi
Total Pages: 268
Release: 1995
Genre: Ethics, Evolutionary
ISBN: 9789051838305

Initiated by Robert Wesson, Evolution and Human Values is a collection of newly written essays designed to bring interdisciplinary insight to that area of thought where human evolution intersects with human values. The disciplines brought to bear on the subject are diverse - philosophy, psychiatry, behavioral science, biology, anthropology, psychology, biochemistry, and sociology. Yet, as organized by co-editor Patricia A. Williams, the volume falls coherently into three related sections. Entitled Evolutionary Ethics, the first section brings contemporary research to an area first explored by Herbert Spencer. Evolutionary ethics looks to the theory of evolution by natural selection to find values for human living. The second section, Evolved Ethics, discusses the evolution of language and religion and their impact on moral thought and feeling. Evolved ethics was partly Charles Darwin's subject in The Descent of Man. The last section bears the title Scientific Ethics. A nascent field, scientific ethics asks about the evolution of human nature and the implications of that nature for ethical theory and social policy. Together, the essays collected here provide important contemporary insights into what it is - and what it may be - to be human.