The Neurobiology of Morality

“Given the chance to get food by pulling a chain that would also deliver an electric shock to a companion, rhesus monkeys will starve themselves for several days.

Biologists argue that these and other social behaviors are the precursors of human morality.”

I’ve used this blog-space to talk about the neurology of free choice, politics, creativity and other topics that I find interesting. Yesterday a fascinating article appeared in the New York Times about the biology of Morality that I thought I would share.

Traditionally, morality has been the heavily guarded dominion of theologians and philosophers. It is also thought by most people to be a uniquely human quality. Not so, according to this article. After studying primates it seems we share with them the amazing gift of empathy, and so the place of morality in the realm of religion and philosophy could be shifting to a more biological perspective.

Here is another excerpt:

“Social living requires empathy, which is especially evident in chimpanzees, as well as ways of bringing internal hostilities to an end. Every species of ape and monkey has its own protocol for reconciliation after fights, Dr. de Waal has found. If two males fail to make up, female chimpanzees will often bring the rivals together, as if sensing that discord makes their community worse off and more vulnerable to attack by neighbors. Or they will head off a fight by taking stones out of the males’ hands.

Dr. de Waal believes that these actions are undertaken for the greater good of the community, as distinct from person-to-person relationships, and are a significant precursor of morality in human societies.”

The deeper you dive into it, the more mysterious and ambiguous the subject of Morality becomes. Even looking at it through the lens of biology, there are many unanswered questions. For example, monkeys will kill those who act or look different than them – something they are genetically programmed to do, for the better of the group – yet still something we as humans would find horrifying and certainly not moral.

The NYT article hinted at a part of the brain dedicated to morality, similar to the neural areas of Broca and Wernicke for language. But I wonder what triggers this area. What stimulus triggers the “moral consciousness” in our brains. For years the phenomenon of road rage has been studied. In the enclosed confines of a car, morality seems to deteriorate significantly, allowing people to behave in a way that they would never do were they face to face with someone. More recently, the decline of online etiquette is becoming a huge problem. Behind a screen, without a human face in front of you, seeing their emotions, seeing how they react to what you are saying to them – all of this leads to a sharp decline in moral behavior. Conversely, it has been proven that theft can be reduced by putting up posters of human eyes (you know, the kind of pictures that seem as though they are always looking at you no matter where you are in the room).

Many of you also may have heard of the famous Milgram Experiment, which studied the effects of authority on morality. It seems that if there is an evolutionary system for morality, it can break down or become transferred to a person of higher social authority.

Here is a link to the NYT article:  http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/20/science/20moral.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5090&en=84f902cc81da9173&ex=1332043200&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

Also, here is an interesting morality game you might enjoy: http://www.philosophersnet.com/games/morality_play.htm

- Adam

Written by admin on March 21st, 2007 with 2 comments.
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