Sunday, January 28, 2007

How Does Darwinism Matter to Me?

The Link "Why Darwinism Matters?" really made me think about the implications of Darwinism and evolutionary psychology and what it all means.

Here is an excerpt:
"in a recent book called The Moral Animal, Robert Wright says that for the Darwinist, morality is merely an illusion produced by natural selection. As he writes, "There is definitely no reason to assume that existing moral codes reflect some higher truth apprehended via divine inspiration." Instead, the reason we believe certain moral ideas is that they make us adopt behaviors that help our genes survive--like taking care of our children. "What is in our genes' best interest is what seems 'right'--morally right, objectively right."

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If that's right, that means nothing is objectively right or wrong, because the factors that determine what is the good for our genes can change so easily. In fact, historically, many moral standards were promoted by groups of people who only had THEIR BEST INTERESTS in mind, not the whole species. The other link "Origin of Life Q&A" illustrated this very nicely.

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