Abstract
Standard evolutionary explanations seem unable to account for inclusivist shifts that expand the circle of moral concern beyond strategically relevant cooperators. Recently, Allen Buchanan and Russell Powell have argued that this shows that that evolutionary conservatism – the view that our inherited psychology imposes significant feasibility constraints on how much inclusivist moral progress can be achieved – is unjustified. Secondly, they hold that inclusivist gains can be sustained, and exclusivist tendencies curbed, under certain favorable socio-economic conditions. I argue that Buchanan and Powell concede too much to the evolutionary conservative, because their second point shows that conservatives are right about the first: inclusivist shifts are unrealistic where it matters most, namely under harsh social, political and economic conditions. I suggest two promising strategies for solving this problem. One is to focus on different forms of moral progress to secure the same moral gains. The other is to look beyond possible extensions of our psychological capacities altogether, by providing institutional support that renders them irrelevant. We should bypass, rather than further stretch, the constraints of our evolved psychology to make moral progress possible.
Highlights
When it comes to furnishing an explanation of the building blocks of our moral psychology, evolutionary theory holds a lot of promise
Buchanan and Powell (2015, 2016) have recently proposed the outlines of a naturalistic theory of moral progress. They claim, firstly, that standard evolutionary explanations cannot account for inclusivist shifts that expand the circle of moral concern beyond strategically relevant cooperators. This is supposed to show that evolutionary conservatism – the view that our inherited psychology imposes significant feasibility constraints on how much inclusivist moral progress can be achieved – is unjustified
I argue that Buchanan and Powell concede too much to the evolutionary conservative, because their second point shows that evolutionary conservatives are right about the first: inclusivist shifts are unrealistic where moral progress matters most, namely under harsh social, political and economic conditions
Summary
When it comes to furnishing an explanation of the building blocks of our moral psychology, evolutionary theory holds a lot of promise. Buchanan and Powell (2015, 2016) have recently proposed the outlines of a naturalistic theory of moral progress They claim, firstly, that standard evolutionary explanations cannot account for inclusivist shifts that expand the circle of moral concern beyond strategically relevant cooperators. This is supposed to show that evolutionary conservatism – the view that our inherited psychology imposes significant feasibility constraints on how much inclusivist moral progress can be achieved – is unjustified. This focus in individual psychology, I aim to show, is misleading, and should be replaced with a focus on how to secure social cooperation institutionally These two strategies complement each other, and together offer a more promising response to the challenge to moral progress posed by evolutionary conservatism than the one suggested by Buchanan and Powell. In (4), I sketch an institutionalist solution to the overall problem that is based on the idea that in many cases, smart institutional kludges allow us to economize on moral motivation in a way that bypasses issues of psychological feasibility altogether. (5) situates the argument developed here in a wider context of cumulative moral learning and its evolutionary role
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