Was Darwin a Social Darwinist? What is a Proper Evolutionary View of Human Culture and Morality?(Sacred Bovines) (Charles Darwin‪)‬

Are humans inherently selfish brutes? Skeptics and critics of evolution routinely denounce the ghastly specter of society "red in tooth and claw" as an unacceptable consequence of Darwin's concept of natural selection. They equate Darwinism with so called "Social Darwinism," a belief in ruthless social competition and unmitigated individualism. Many evolutionists, too--even staunch defenders of Darwinism, from Thomas Henry Huxley (1894/1989) to Michael Ruse (1986)--seem to concur that the natural history of humans leaves an ethical void. Darwin himself, by contrast, had a well developed interpretation of the evolution of morality (Richards, 1987). Others since have deepened our biological understanding of human and cultural origins. Perhaps, then, we are ready to challenge this entrenched assumption, this sacred bovine: that belief in evolution entails forsaking any foundation for morality. Many scientists disavow any role for biology in addressing ethics. They retreat behind the shield of the fact/value distinction or invoke the threat of the naturalistic fallacy. Yet morality is an observable behavior, a biological phenomenon (Stent, 1978). We might well document it in other species. For example, a group led by Jeffrey Mogil recently reported on empathy in mice. When mice observe cagemates (but not strangers) in pain, they exhibit heightened responses to pain themselves (Langford et al., 2006; Ganguli, 2006). Morality deserves a biological explanation, especially for students who wonder about the status of humans in an evolutionary context.