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The Evolution of Morality
by Doris Drisgill
| Vice Presidential Candidate Joe Lieberman has stated that morality comes from God. Most believers accept this tenet of Judeo-Christian dogma without question. |
To non-believers, however, the assumption is false. The god of the Old Testament was violent, intolerant, and prone to commit genocide. His idea of justice was to wipe out a whole city because a few residents offended him, or to wipe out a family, including children, servants and livestock, because the family's head sinned against his almighty ego. |
As for sexual morality, monogamy is not stressed in the Old Testament. There are no clear references to marriage ceremonies or vows of fidelity. The terms "wife" and "concubine" seem to be used interchangeably, and a man was allowed to have as many of either as he chose. |
Our modern views of morality and justice are far in advance of those described in the Bible. And we may be sure that, even before the bible, societies had their own ideas of what was good and right. The basic concept of morality comes from within ourselves, from our need to cooperate with other individuals in a way that promotes the development of social interaction. |
In a nutshell, morality is based on the Golden Rule: treat others as you want them to treat you. It's the core concept of civilization; without it we would still all be lone wolves battling each other for each bite of food, each chance to mate. |
Social cooperation is plainly a function of evolution. In the early development of our species, individuals who sought each other's company and learned to cooperate, to build shelters or bring down game or defend the group, had an advantage over individuals who remained solitary and had only themselves to rely on. |
If there is any one characteristic that divides humans from other animals, it may well be our ability to devise concepts of right and wrong. The natural universe doesn't hold any such dichotomy; for the natural world, survival of an individual and its offspring is the only "good." But we humans have progressed in intellect to the point where we can understand our neighbors' pain; we can share it through imagination, or empathy, an ability that results in compassion and the will to treat others with kindness. |
Another important ingredient in much religious dogma is the idea that evil originates from some demonic source, that some external influence corrupts humans to commit their worst behavior. |
But to rationalists, human nature itself holds the potential for all the evil that has been perpetrated throughout history. When humans are incapable of empathy, or reject compassion, they become capable of the worst possible selfishness and cruelty. To paraphrase a Biblical quote: sufficient unto the human mind is the evil thereof. |
As a species we have no need for gods or devils to teach us good or seduce us to evil. We have vast capacities for both within ourselves, and the future of our civilization in the new millennium may well depend on which of these propensities, the evolutionarily advanced (social concern) or the evolutionarily regressive (self-concern), will dominate in our political and social life. |
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