AUG 29

2: AUG 29. Unit One. Evolution of Morality

Assigned

• Note: Typical reading loads are about 25-30 pages per class. For Thursday, you might not make through all 48 pages of reading, but note that reading for Tuesday is only 13 pages.

• Sapolsky C10 – “The Evolution of Behavior,” (329-353; 24) – Key concepts: – evolution basics, ind/kin selection, reciprocal altruism, cooperation.
• Churchland C1 – “The Snuggle for Survival,” – (19-43; 24) Key concepts: neurology of mammalian bonding

In-Class

• Everyday Ethics: Mapping Conscience
• Writing: Practice Writing and Dropbox Training starts today.

Sapolsky, Chapter 10: The Evolution of Human Behavior Part 1 328-354

• Evolution 101 — 3 steps - Inheritance - Variation - Fitness

• Some misconceptions:

• 1. Evolution is not so much about survival as reproduction. Antagonistic pleiotropy — sperm early, cancer later.
• 2. The living are not better adapted than the extinct. Fitness isn't "prospective"
• 3. Evolution is "just a “theory”

• Sexual selection and natural selection. Example of peacocks — trade offs between two forms of selection.

• Sociobiology and evolutionary psychology. Premise: Evolution selects for social and psychological traits and behaviors that improve fitness -- just like it selects for bodies that stand up to selection pressures.

• Marlin Perkins and Mutal of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom. Bad ideas about evolution of altruistic species behavior. Group selection doesn’t work that way.

• Individual Selection — 334: competitive infanticide: why langur monkeys kill babies. How females develop a false estrus to fight back. (Working against mountain gorillas these days.)

• Kin Selection — 336: Basic idea: your nearest kin has most of your genes. Haldane, “I’d gladly lay down my life for two brothers or eight cousins.” Allomothering. Grooming behaviors reflect closeness. 337: vervet monkey study - A treats B badly, then B treat A and A's kin badly. Playback studies. These studies show in various ways how warning behaviors track kinship relationships in social primates.

• problem for kin selection — avoiding inbreeding. Many species mate with 1-3rd cousins. Sperm aggregation. Malagasy giant jumping rat. 340 - women prefer smell of near relatives over unrelated.

• How do animal recognize kin? Major histocompatibility complex (MHC) gives many animals olfactory recognition of kin. Other mechanisms: songs, vaginal fluid smell, milk.

• How do we do kin selection? Pseudo-kin selection or “green beard” effects. We are not limited to actual kin, any conspicuous feature (like a green beard). Humans show green beard effects. Related to parochialism and xenophobia. It could also be that our preference for humans over non-humans is a big green bread effect.

• Reciprocal Altruism.

• Don't just think about evolution as promoting competition toward extinction. Equilibriums are important. Sustaining conditions that meet selection pressures. (problems that can be addressed by values) Maintaining a good community.

• Reciprocal altruism is a third way that evolution shapes human behavior. Unrelated individuals cooperate across nature (fish in schools, birds in formation, herds). "Geometry of the selfish herd." Also unrelated primates. Important 1971 paper by Trivers (344) on reciprocal altruism. How social species incur a fitness cost to benefit another individual with expectation of reciprocation.

• Requirements for reciprocal altruism. Social species, frequent interactions, recognition of individuals (so, also memory).

• cheating and freeriding can create a "Red Queen" situation.

• Two big questions: when is cooperation optimal, how can altruism start?

• What strategy for cooperating is optimal?

• background to Game Theory - John von Neumann. Prisoner's Dilemma connected biologists to game theorists. Short video on PD: [1] (Note: A good video, but he doesn’t quite get the implication right. It’s not really just a dilemma between individual and group, because the optimal cooperative benefit is also the optimal individual benefit. So it’s more a dilemma between counting on the group payoff being the best for you vs. getting the best individual payoff. It’s all about you, not doing something for the group.)
• Basics of a Prisoner's Dilemma payoff: A&B cooperate (hold out): 1 year: A cooperates, B defects (rats out B by confessing): B walks and A gets three years. Cooperation is best, but only if you can count on it. If not, then you have to think of average payoffs or outcomes. Some some sets of payoffs, thinking this way leads to defection, the most rational choice, but not optimal. Quite a little dilemma.

• defection is optimal for single round PD, but what about 3 rounds. Still best to defect. What about "iterated" (uncertain number of rounds)?

• Axelrod's challenge: Optimal strategy for iterated PD. Winner: Anatol Rapoport: Cooperation on 1st round and then match opponent's previous behavior. "Tit for Tat" Always works toward a draw, or slight negative outcome. Not that Tit for Tat tilts toward cooperation, but avoids being a sucker and punishes defectors. famous paper in 1981 by Axelrod and Hamilton.

• "Signal errors" can reduce Tit for Tat payoffs. Remedies: "Contrite tit for tat (retaliate after two defections) and Forgiving (forgive 1/3 of defections). Both address the signal error problem, but have other vulnerabilities.

• Mixed (genetic) strategies: You could start out with one strategy and then change to another. How do you go from punitive Tit for Tat to one incorporating forgiveness? Trust. 350-351: describes a changing environment a events signal to individuals to change strategies. Kind of a model of real life.

• Black Hamlet fish

• Stickleback fish

• But skeptical that tit for tat has been found outside humans.

Churchland C1 – “The Snuggle for Survival,”

• Agatha Christie quote. Moms are tough.

• Turtles never help salamanders, but dogs sometimes help kittens. Aren't you glad you're not a lizard?

• Altricial infancy - born dependent, long maturation period. Big Learners.

• Endothermy is "expensive". Altricial infancy and learning is "expensive".

• Meet your cortex. Very involved in social behaviors, but also other structures, like nucleus accumbens.

• Mice - 14 million cortical neurons; Monkey - 2 billion; Human - 16 billion. Yeah!!!

• "Expensive" - brain is 2% of body mass but 25% of calorie intake. Fire, cooking. Wrangham, Catching Fire!

• read at 41: What your cortex does for you that enables morality. Interpreting expections!

Everyday Ethics: Sorting Expectations by Values

• In today's roll call question, fill in the sentence, "I expect . . ." with an expectation your have of yourself or others. For example, "I expect zags to be kind, I expect drivers to avoid distractions, I expect others to obey the law". (Notice how easy it is for you to generate these.) As you listen to each student's statement, try to decide whether it is an expectation related to morality or not ("I expect the light to turn green" is not). Also, try to identify the value or values associated with the expection.

Everyday Ethics: Mapping Conscience

• One of the remarkable things about morality in humans is how we already know many "objective" things about norms even if we can't say exactly where we learned them. Consider the following list:

• 1. You are not obligated to forgive the murderer of your father.
• 2. Harming a child is one of the worst things you can do.
• 3. You should not accept a gift, favor, or benefit from someone if you are not prepared to reciprocate in some way.
• 4. It’s ok to tell a friend that their partner is cheating on them.
• 5. If you feel someone is disrespectful to you, it is ok to share your experience with others.
• 6. If a stranger asks you a very personal question, it’s ok to avoid answering, or even not tell them the truth.
• 7. It’s okay to defend yourself.
• 8. If your country is attacked, it’s okay to strike back.
• 9. You shouldn’t complain if your friend chooses to help their family members over you.
• 10. You should help your family over friends and strangers.
• 11. Strangers in your community have a greater expectation of help from you than distant strangers.
• 12. No one is obligated to be your friend.
• 13. If your friend asks you for help, you shouldn’t ignore them.
• 14. Some of the things you learn about an intimate partner should not be disclosed to others.
• 15. If someone is your friend, they are obligated to some degree of loyalty, cooperation, and sympathetic interpretation of your motives and actions.
• 16. If you are cooperating with someone as a partner, you should avoid disparaging them to others.
• 17. If you choose to cooperate with someone, you need to make yourself answerable to them about things related to your cooperative tasks.

• In your group discussion of this list, pick items and ask each other if they are true statements. Then, assuming it is, consider whether you learned this truth explicitly or implicitly. For example, is it something you were taught, learned by example, or implied by more general understandings you have of humans and human reality?

1st Writing and Dropbox practice (not due on today’s class)

• Please write a 250-300 word maximum answer to the following question by Sept 4, 2024, 11:59pm. This assignment will give us some initial writing to look at and give you practice with the dropbox protocol for turning in pseudonymous writing in the course. For this assignment, the writing itself is ungraded, but you will receive 15 points for following the instructions accurately.

• Topic: Do you have to tell the truth to everyone? In preparing your answer, take some time to generate cases on which the obligation varies. Why does it vary? Can you offer a theory about the obligation to tell the truth?

• Writing Advice: Try to make your position clear (the "what") and the reasons clear (the "why"). Good arguments also try to respond to objections and consider the most reasonable opposing views. Your position is likely to be stronger if it is qualified in various ways. I strongly encourage you to draft your answer the night before it is due and return to it on the night that it is due.

• Advice about collaboration: Collaboration is part of the academic process and the intellectual world that college courses are based on, so it is important to me that you have the possibility to collaborate. I encourage you to collaborate with other students, but only up to the point of sharing ideas, references to class notes, and your own notes, verbally. Collaboration is also a great way to make sure that a high average level of learning and development occurs in the class. The best way to avoid plagiarism is to NOT share text of draft answers or outlines of your answer. Keep it verbal. Generate your own examples.

1. To assure anonymity, you must remove your name from the "author name" that you may have provided when you set up your word processing application. For instructions on removing your name from an Word or Google document, [click here].
2. Format your answer in double spaced text, in a typical 12 point font, and using normal margins. Do not add spaces between paragraphs, but do indent the first line of each paragraph.
3. Do not put your name in the file or filename. You may put your student ID number in the file. Always put a word count in the file. Save your file for this assignment with the name: TruthTelling.
4. To turn in your assignment, log into courses.alfino.org, click on the “0 - 1st Writing and Dropbox practice" dropbox.
5. If you cannot meet a deadline, you must email me about your circumstances (unless you are having an emergency) before the deadline or you will lose points.