ZYGO Zygon® 0591-2385 1467-9744 10.1111/j.1467-9744.2007.00860.x Beyond the Sociobiological Dilemma: Social Emotions and the Evolution of Morality Rosas Alejandro 02 09 2007 42 3 10.1111/zygo.2007.42.issue-3 685 700

Is morality biologically altruistic? Does it imply a disadvantage in the struggle for existence? A positive answer puts morality at odds with natural selection, unless natural selection operates at the level of groups. In this case, a trait that is good for groups though bad (reproductively) for individuals can evolve. Sociobiologists reject group selection and have adopted one of two horns of a dilemma. Either morality is based on an egoistic calculus, compatible with natural selection; or morality continues tied to psychological and biological altruism but not as a product of natural selection. The dilemma denies a third possibility—that psychological altruism evolves as a biologically selfish trait. I discuss the classical treatments of the paradox by Charles Darwin ([1871] 1989) and Robert Trivers (1971), focusing on the role they attribute to social emotions. The upshot is that both Darwin and Trivers sketch a natural‐selection process relying on innate emotional mechanisms that render morality adaptive for individuals as well as for groups. I give additional reasons for viewing it as a form of natural, instead of only cultural, selection.

 altruism Charles Darwin group selection morality selfish‐gene theory social emotions sociobiology Robert Trivers Alexander, Richard.1987. The Biology of Moral Systems. New York : Aldine de Gruyter. Batson, Daniel, and LauraShaw.1991. Evidence for altruism: Towards a pluralism of pro‐social motives. Psychological Inquiry  2 (2):107–22. Blair, R. J. R.2001. Neuro‐cognitive models of aggression, the antisocial personality disorders and psychopathy. Journal of Neurology Neurosurgery and Psychiatry  71:727–31. Blair, R. J. R.2003. Neurobiological basis of psychopathy. British Journal of Psychiatry  182:5–7. Brosnan, Sarah F., and Frans de Waal2003. Monkeys reject unequal pay. Nature  425 (18 September): 297–99. Darwin, Charles. [1871] 1989. The Descent of Man. The Works of Charles Darwin, ed. Paul H.Barrett and R. B.Freeman, Vol. 21. New York : New York Univ. Press. Dawkins, Richard. [1976] 1989. The Selfish Gene. Oxford : Oxford Univ. Press. De Waal, Frans.1996. Good Natured: The Origins of Right and Wrong in Humans and Other Animals. Cambridge : Harvard Univ. Press. Ekman, Paul.1999. Basic Emotions  . In Handbook of Cognition and Emotion, ed. T.Dalgleish and M.Power, 45–60. Sussex : John Wiley. Fehr, Ernst, and UrsFischbacher2003. “The nature of human altruism. Nature  425:785–91. Fehr, Ernst, and SimonGächter2002. “Altruistic punishment in humans. Nature  415:137–40. Flack, Jessica, and FransDe Waal2000. Any animal whatever. Darwinian building block of morality in monkeys and apes. Journal of Consciousness Studies  7: 1–29. Frank, Robert.1988. Passions within Reason: The Strategic Role of the Emotions. New York : W. W. Norton. Gintis, Herbert, SamuelBowles, RobertBoyd, and ErnstFehr2003. Explaining altruistic behavior in humans. Evolution and Human Behavior  24:153–72. Griffiths, Paul E.2002. What is innatenessThe Monist  85:70–85. Gould, Stephen Jay.2002. The Structure of Evolutionary Theory. Cambridge : Harvard Univ. Press. Hamilton, William D.1964. “The genetical evolution of social behavior. Journal of Theoretical Biology  7:1–52. Hobbes, Thomas.1651. Leviathan. Ed. C. B.Macpherson. London : Penguin. Huxley, Thomas Henry. [1894] 1995. “Evolution and Ethics  .” In Issues in Evolutionary Ethics, ed. PaulThompson, 111–50. Albany : State Univ. of New York Press. Nichols, Shaun.2001. Mindreading and the cognitive architecture underlying altruistic motivation. Mind & Language  16:425–55. Richards, Robert.1987. Darwin and the Emergence of Evolutionary Theories of Mind and Behavior. Chicago : Univ. of Chicago Press. Rosas, Alejandro.2002. Psychological and evolutionary evidence for altruism. Biology & Philosophy  17:93–97. Ruse, Michael.1980. Charles Darwin and group selection. Annals of Science  37:615–30. Sheldon, Kennon M., MelanieSkaggs Sheldon, and RichardOsbaldiston2000. Prosocial values and group‐assortation within an N‐person prisoners dilemma game. Human Nature  11 (4): 387–404. Sober, Elliot.1993. Philosophy of Biology. Boulder , Colo. : Westview. Sober, Elliot, and DavidSloan Wilson1998. Unto Others: The Evolution and Psychology of Unselfish Behavior. Cambridge : Harvard Univ. Press. Trivers, Robert.1971. The evolution of reciprocal altruism. The Quarterly Review of Biology  46:35–57. Williams, George C.1988. Huxley's Evolution and Ethics in Sociobiological Perspective. Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science  23:383–407. Wilson, David Sloan.1997. Introduction: Multilevel selection theory comes of age. American Naturalist  150:S1–S4.