Sunday School

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

I have atheistic tendencies to debate theists but some have lost any respect I ever had for their arguments.

I am finding more and more articles about “the rise of atheism” in Africa.

This weeks’ report of large scale child sex abuse by Catholics comes from Germany.

Nuns in a Vermont Catholic orphanage could face murder charges.  I have recently spoken with a woman who saw an 8 year old being murdered by a nun at her orphanage in Ireland.

This weeks’ Woo: The Myers-Briggs personality-indicator. I was once cautioned by an old employer, in front of everyone, for refusing to take the test at a “staff bonding” day and for claiming not to agree with what I called “management by magic”. Apparently “people like me need to be more open minded”. I hope her old email address is still valid so I can teach her not to stereotype me! Now, I am off to make a voodoo doll of her!

I know the science behind 10,000 steps a day smacks of woo but I do that many at a minimum.

Climate Change: Six years ago North Carolina passed a climate change denial bill. Will Donal Trump help the situation there improve for the future? I think Harrison Ford has the right idea.

When and why do people become atheists?

A new test for the Big Bang theory.

A look at the evolutionary roots of sharing.

Bipedal walking evolved long before humans did.

If goodness is natural then what of the parents who don’t vaccinate their children for the greater good?

Why are false beliefs hard to shake and did the 9/11 attacks usher in the post-truth age?

What does Quantum Theory tell us about Reality? So what if the Universe does not care?

This week I am reading this book: Three dreams in the key of G.

We pause to remember: Richard Sipe.

Some photographs taken last week.

While you are waiting for the kettle to boil…..

Coffee Break Video:  Christian Science debunked. How much information is in the Universe? Stephen Fry speaks antidisestablishmentistically.

[Reg the Fronkey Farmer]

Have a great week everyone!!
If religious instruction were not allowed until the child had attained the age of reason, we would be living in a quite different world.

Christopher Hitchens.

[Strega]

Thanks, Reg!

[Simon Paynton]

“A look at the evolutionary roots of sharing.”

– bonobos are much more prosocial than chimpanzees, and it may well be because their food supply is more dense and they don’t have a need to monopolise food.  So this would account for their tendency to share food.

Humans share within the context of cooperation, and we cooperate in the context of obtaining food and necessaries.  Cooperation is two-way helping; hence: we are a helpful species.

[JadeBlackOlive]

Love Stephen Fry!

[Clearsky]

Simon Paynton wrote:

“A look at the evolutionary roots of sharing.” – bonobos are much more prosocial than chimpanzees, and it may well be because their food supply is more dense and they don’t have a need to monopolise food. So this would account for their tendency to share food. Humans share within the context of cooperation, and we cooperate in the context of obtaining food and necessaries. Cooperation is two-way helping; hence: we are a helpful species.

Interesting comment!

I was thinking is it all just biology? Or is there a role for culture?

[Simon Paynton]

Clearsky wrote:

is there a role for culture?

You could say there are cultures of proud sharing around the world.  Humans will readily share the best they have with guests, for example.  In practical terms it’s a way for people to even out a periodic lack of availability of food, by having sharing arrangements with neighbours.

[Clearsky]

Hi Simon,

• Thanks for your reply, I’ve been thinking of Altruism and Cooperation. Sharing of material resources.
• Why do Humans share, donate to Charity?
• Is it purely so that in times of personal need the debt will be repaid in kind? Reciprocity?
• I mean why do we donate to charity like Oxfam, when there is zero chance of reciprocity?
• In personal experience, at moment of targeted helping. Is the person actually thinking ” I am going to help them so that when I need help, they can return the favour?”
• You could argue that if one is religious. Charity will give you a better after life or is favoured by God.
• But a lot of people who are non believers still do a lot of charity.
• I am not sure that atheist are doing charity for some sort of future reciprocity.
• Not too sure What do you think?

• This reply was modified 7 years, 7 months ago by Clearsky.

[Clearsky]

I was watching this also!

 

[Simon Paynton]

Clearsky wrote:

Is the person actually thinking ” I am going to help them so that when I need help, they can return the favour?”

I think you’re mixing up “ultimate” (evolutionary) and “proximate” (present-day psychological) motivations.  Once upon a time, on the savannah, we helped our fellows because we depended on them for survival, so we needed them in good shape.  Also, we were cooperating with them closely in life-or-death situations, and this involves helping on both sides.  So, interdependence was the original evolutionary scenario.  This provided the ultimate motivations for helping non-relatives (see The Selfish Gene for helping relatives).

In the present day, we just have an instinct, “it is good to help people”.  When we deny someone help, we have to justify it, even if we think we are correct not to do so.

[Simon Paynton]

There is also the thing called our “moral identity” which we have to please, but everyone’s seem to be different: somebody may not pay their debts but is smart in other ways.

So we may feel good about ourselves if we give to charity, or bad if we don’t help “this” person we care about in need.

There is a personal and a social moral identity.  Reputation and shame are part of the social moral identity.  Guilt is part of the personal one.

[Davis]

Clearsky wrote:

Thanks for your reply, I’ve been thinking of Altruism and Cooperation. Sharing of material resources

There are many reasons and no single reason why humans are kind/helpful. As Richard Dawkins said On a purely biological level (the replication of genes) its totally to ones advantage to help members of the family. For example if you are in a social mammalian group and are unsuccessful with mating, looking after your nieces and nephews is the next best thing. Two nephews are (to an extent) equivalent to one of your own children. In theory the amount of genetic material you have in common should be about the same as with your own child. Helping them grow and survive both ensures more endless and often pointles genetic replication (the ultimate biological pressure) and passes on your genes at home level. Also, frequently with mammals for example, working together is by far in the interest of most per resources, safety, successful child rearing etc. And it fulfills the need of social interaction like play fighting and developing strong skills as an adult.

All of these things are part of the human condition. The childless aunt who spoils her nieces and nephews, the family unit who maintain a burden on their family (though when civilization starts this can be surpressed).

 

[Davis]

But of course that cannot explain what happens when civilization grows. As Desmond Morris point out in the Naked Ape and The human Zoo, when a small troop of humans become an enormous megopolis. In this case many human traits are suppressed (though certainly not always). For many reasons:

• Its painful to watch a person suffering
• We feel a sense of accomplishment when we do so
• You fulfill emotional needs (closer bonding)
•  It is a long term kind of insurance
• It allows larger projects for a greater quality of life
• It often has you respected by the community and opens up new doors
• And its good to repeat the fact that its painful to watch people suffer.
• Survival
• And many other reasons…

But as I’ve said, when we start to settle in more permanent groups larger than the kind of group humans lived in for thousands of years, some of these pressures and needs can become partially suppressed, especially in totalitarian and oppressive societies, with the biggest toxifier usually being religion or cult-like politics (a semi-religion). It is nothing short of remarkable that the Western welfare state has developed, emerged and is still strong in Europe, Canada, Japan, Australia and to a lesser extent in the USA and some Latin American countries. Its hard to find many societies throughout the world throughout history that applies familiar pre-civilization human pressures onto a large scale groups of strangers you’ll never meet. Though we shouldn’t over exaggerate it. Its hardly the case that in totalitarian societies that people outright abandon charity, egalitarianism and support. It can be found in North Korea, Somalia, Nazi Germany, Soviet block, by people who took great risks to help others.

There are many factors involved in why we care about others but it is Myra important to know what is suppressed depending where you live and how support/egalitarianism/charity is significantly altered and/or suppressed.

 

 

[Clearsky]

Simon,

 

Thanks for your detailed and considered reply, I was analysing your comment below.
“ In practical terms it’s a way for people to even out a periodic lack of availability of food, by having sharing arrangements with neighbours”

I have a basic understanding of proximate & ultimate goals. Hypothesis ( by Prof De Walls ) which you are using.

 
The argument that human act and think according because of “ what happened a long time on the Savannah!”
Qoute from a paper by

de Waal’s
Empathy evolved as the main proximate mechanism for directed altruism. (Empathy viewed as an emotional rather than a cognitive mechanism.)
Likely origin= in parental behavior

“Once evolved, behavior often assumes motivational autonomy:
its motivation becomes disconnected from its ultimate goals”

 
He then uses the example of sex, he argues that people engage in sexual activity without thinking about having children.
If that hypothesis is “true”  that ALL our proximate psychological motivations has an “ ultimate hidden evolutionary goal” of thriving. Then there are no truly altruistic acts.

 

Then it creates problem for morality with purely biological deterministic theories for human behavior.

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Because they leave no room for autonomy or agency. To choose right from wrong.
OK some human behavior can be explained this way. Like basic life preserving one’s hunger & seeking food.

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But these homeostatic mechanism are at the level of lower functions located in more primitive structures like the brain stem/ midbrain etc. Sexual arousal is also located there.

 

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Those motivations do not really involve agency. You don’t really have a choice to feel hungry, thirsty.

 

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I think Fortunately humans have more evolved brain structures like the frontal cortex,(also temporal & cingulate cortex for morality).

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Which humans have the most largest and complex of all animals.

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It is here that we have agency. Where people can choose above primal motivations.
For example even though someone might feel hunger if they are overweight, they might diet.

.
I am not saying that evolution is not true, what I think is that because of natural selection we developed complex brains.
But once those human brains got to a certain level of sophistication.

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(The cognitive revolution or  Behavioral modernity ) Self awareness, cognition, culture occurred.
With the ability to think also came the ability to have moral evaluation.

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Evolution is a necessary component of morality, because it developed the human brain with complex cognitive abilities. But it is NOT the only sufficient factor.

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There are other equally powerful factors like culture for example.
Take the cultural factor of being able to produce fire. That’s not biological that’s cultural.
Richard Dawkins writes about this in his books. You know he writes about cultural evolution as memes. (Davis)

.
If you look at what factors have improved the lot of humans. In the last 200 years its  mostly culture, like technology, democracy, science, social morality. There’s not enough evolutionary time for it to be biological.

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If the brain is the “ evolved hardware” then culture & technology science is the software.

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Software is by definition easier to change than material hardware.
I would argue that I agree with you the human brain is a product of Evolutionary process. But what humans think and act to some degree is free from the constraints of the hardware.

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Just as you can put new software on your PC. We do have autonomy & agency to make moral choices.

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So if a theist says to me “ I act according to God’s will what do you as a non believer  act upon?”
I would say based on reason and autonomy, I would choose choices which result in the least amount of personal & social suffering. And the greatest amount of personal and social well-being.

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The material substrate of those choices is the evolved human Brain. Which has some biological constraints, but which by its very nature also has a degree of freedom.

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Behavioral_modernity. ( explains cognitive revolution in human evolution)

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prefrontal_cortex

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thinking,_Fast_and_Slow

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https://youtu.be/NNnIGh9g6fA ( introduction to Human Behavioural Biology Stanford,  Robert Salposky)

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https://academic.oup.com/brain/article/135/7/2006/350263

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Control_of_fire_by_early_humans

• This reply was modified 7 years, 7 months ago by Clearsky.
• This reply was modified 7 years, 7 months ago by Clearsky.

[Simon Paynton]

@clearsky – don’t you think the same is true of any behaviour?  We evolved to have certain instincts and behaviours, but we still have choices in how we act.

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