Goods and virtues Book

"Good Natured" is easily among the top three nonfiction books I've read. From one perspective, it is an explanation of how human morality could be explained by evolutionary forces that would favor the reproduction of organisms who exhibited rudimentary moral behavior. From another perspective, the book is a counter-argument to the viewpoint that seemingly ethical or altruistic behavior in animals (perhaps including humans) are explained by the simple pairing of stimulus and response that happen to increase genetic fitness.

In 1976, Richard Dawkins published his seminal book "The Selfish Gene," supporting the theory, colloquially stated, that an organism is merely a gene's way of reproducing itself. With this paradigm shift, biologists were able to explain a wide variety of seemingly altruistic or self-sacrificing behaviors - for instance why so many animals will increase their offspring's chances of survival by sacrificing their own. In short time, many had attributed all animal behaviors (including human), even those that were seemingly altruistic, to strategies to maximize reproduction.

In one sense, this conclusion was correct; an animal that sacrifices it's own reproductive success will not pass on the genes that allowed that behavior. However, de Waal makes an important distinction between the evolutionary cause of a behavior's persistence and the psychological motivation for an organism acting as it does. Simply because genes causing/allowing mothers to care for their young have been favored by selection does not mean that a mother comforting her crying child is thinking about maximizing her genetic fitness when she does so. The mother's caring for her child is a genuine altruistic emotion, even if the behavior of caring has persisted or increased due to selection of genes causing/allowing it.

De Waal's is a primatologist who has spent thousands of hours observing apes (chimpanzees, bonobos, orangutans, gorillas, humans) and monkeys (many varieties) and his writing is replete with examples from his own observations that bolster his theories. De Waal takes neither the position that non-human animals lack any sense of morality nor that they possess the abstract moral reasoning of which some humans are capable. While morality has taken the form of abstract reasoning among humans, de Waal argues that the roots of morality lie with emotion rather than reason. De Waal identifies a number of behaviors with concomitant emotions in animals that lead to a sort of proto-morality.

One aspect of morality could be called "sympathy." Sympathy has its roots in the emotions that motivate mothers to care for their young - a behavior with obvious reproductive value. Helping relatives, as are found in extended families and tribes, also has clear reproductive value on a genetic level. At its most advanced levels, sympathy takes the form of empathy - an actual understanding of how another individual in a different situation might feel, think, and act.

How did human ancestors get from basic instincts to care for their offspring to an actual understanding of how others of their species might experience a different situation? Two factors are necessary to make this jump. First, the species must be social and inter-dependent on other members of their own species for survival. Solitary animals do not exhibit any behavior that approximates morality. (This is why dogs care about pleasing their people and cats don't.) Second, members of the species must be able to distinguish among individuals of their species and remember past actions of each individual (which is really two requirements).

With sociality and memory come rudimentary sharing among non-related individuals that will benefit both over the long run. For instance, bats, which die if they don't eat for more than two days, will share meals with non-related bats who were unsuccessful getting food on a particular night - provided that the recipients reciprocate in the future when the tables are turned. It works like a rudimentary insurance policy spreading risk among pairs of individuals.

Animals with more developed memories actually begin to assign a "reputation" to others of their species. Chimpanzees remember which members of their group have shared food with them in the past and which have not and reward and punish those individuals, respectively, in the future. It works much like what humans call "fairness." Chimpanzees who take but don't share are shunned much as humans shun "cheaters."

Chimpanzees also form specific alliances with others of their species. Smaller chimps will team up to prevent one of their group from being beaten by a larger, more dominant chimp. Again, chimps who try to take advantage of an alliance by reaping protection from others without protecting others when they are in trouble are shunned or worse. With the advantage that comes with alliances comes an evolutionary factor that could select for the mental capability to guess what others are thinking to generalize the expectations that others will have of one's behavior in an alliance.

Another outgrowth of sociality and memory is a dominance hierarchy. Stronger individuals have a natural advantage in competing for scarce resources (and taking those resources away from others). One way to avoid an out-and-out fight every time resources are discovered is to remember which individuals have prevailed in past competitions and to give deference to such individuals provided that the dominant individual allows the subordinate enough of the resources to make it worth the subordinate not challenging the dominant in a desperate attempt at survival. Remember, even the dominant individual depends on the subordinates for his or her survival. And as alliances can turn the table on a strong chimp, alliances can also turn the tables on an otherwise dominant chimp.

At their best, dominant chimps act as impartial arbitrators of disputes between other chimpanzees and can break up fights that are detrimental to the group. Chimps who always favor stronger or more dominant chimps in altercations (presumably to curry favor with the strongest allies) usually are overthrown in the dominance hierarchy. It's that concept of fairness coming into play again at a much more complex level. Chimpanzees even have their own complex system of making amends to bring a conflict to an end.

In some of his most daring and successful experiments, de Waal showed that a species of monkey that is typically very hierarchical and aggressive can actually learn to be more tolerant and relaxed if members of the aggressive species are raised with slightly older members of the tolerant species.

De Waal is consistently articulate; he identifies high-level trends in behavior among different species without ever making over-generalizations. And he always illustrates his theories with examples and counter-examples which may account for his ability to avoid "painting with a broad brush."

As you can probably tell if you have continued reading to this point, I was completely floored by this book in the best possible way. I hope you get a chance to read it sometime.