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UBC : IS+H : Lecture 11 : Herbert Gintis

359 Views Length: 43:22 Herbert Gintis, "Behavioral Ethics: Other-regarding Preferences and Character Virtues" :

Homo sapiens is a social species. We are differentiated from other social species by our being a product of gene-culture co-evolution. Morality is a prominent… Herbert Gintis, "Behavioral Ethics: Other-regarding Preferences and Character Virtues" :

Homo sapiens is a social species. We are differentiated from other social species by our being a product of gene-culture co-evolution. Morality is a prominent and unique product of this evolutionary dynamic. Like language and the social emotions (shame, contempt, considerateness, empathy), is a human universal, although like language, it specific form is culturally specific. This view suggests that the proper study of morality is as a science that, like linguistics, strives to reveal the logical structure and empirical instantiation of human moral regularities. Traditional philosophical approaches to ethics, including utilitarian, deontological and virtue approaches are correct in isolating important regularities in human morality, and incorrect in considering themselves as complete, and hence mutually inconsistent, approaches. More