Book Response:

On Human Nature

by Edward O. Wilson

1-20-00
by Matt Landreman

On Human Nature by Edward O. Wilson must have been a controversial book. Wilson attacks many established institutions as proponents of lies, and takes an unforgiving stand on the side of hard science when matched with any competitor. He sees humanity as very ignorant of its nature. People believe that they are acting according to certain morals that have truth-value. We rationalize our behavior with vague systems of values that are nothing but an invention. If we want to really understand human behavior we have to approach sociology from the standpoint of evolutionary biology. Just as physics one rung of the ladder of disciplines below chemistry, so biology is just below sociology. We cannot adequately understand one level without knowing its origins in the level below. With this perspective we conclude that a person does not hold a particular value because it is somehow true in some incomprehensible way, but rather because that value is evolutionarily stable. Humans are genetically programmed to be capable of holding values because it is a survival advantage. A complicated combination of genetic and memetic evolution is responsible for choosing the particular values that become widespread. The range of values we observe among all the societies of the world today is a subset of the possible set of values that are evolutionarily stable.

While these claims are certainly ambitious, I am inclined to believe them. Just as with biological evolution and natural selection, one cannot deny that they operate. Even if values did somehow have a truth-value and there was a logically sound moral epistemology, evolution would still operate on them. Values that caused their believers to pass themselves on to others would become prevalent. A moral which hurt the survival value of a group would decline, even if that value were actually true in whatever sense a value could be true. One cannot deny that Wilson’s vision of moral evolution happens, and his theory seems largely capable of explaining the presence of many human beliefs. It is tempting to be perhaps too eager to believe, for there are a number of specific cases that still confuse me. Some beliefs seem to be present despite their seemingly awful survival value, such as the recurrence of martyrs throughout history. Why does it occur to some to take their lives for a belief? Also, there is an interesting contrast in us between what we say is good and how we actually behave. There seem to be two parallel streams of moral evolution going on: the evolution of human behavior and the evolution of how people say they ought to behave. What exactly is going on here? While I suspect my theory of the conscience (see writing section) can answer this paradox, Wilson neglects to address it. Finally, one important piece of the picture is missing. In biological evolution there is a clear cause of mutation, the process that injects new material into the genetic pool. DNA transcription errors "invent" new life forms from which natural selection can choose, but what is the analog in moral evolution? How did the first moral beings invent the idea of being moral? Where do new morals come from to inject the moral pool with new material? While I do have a few unanswered questions, I do not feel they are insurmountable, and fundamentally I think Wilson is correct.

However, I begin to run into trouble with Wilson’s book in the last chapter. The author seems to jump the is/ought barrier without a second thought. With the assumption that good beliefs are evolutionarily stable, Wilson proceeds to list a set of values that he thinks we ought to have: genetic diversity, individual rights, and things that make a person have positive emotions. Wilson claims more than he can actually show. He states that these value are how we ought to behave, when all he can really say is these values will be stable in the pool of morals. I am looking for a way to evaluate which is the most important of my various wants in a situation, so I can decide how to act. Wilson does not answer that question; I will not be convinced to choose action A over action B simply because the evolutionarily stable value system suggests choosing A. After saying that values are imaginary, he says that these specific things have value. It is hard to pin down exactly what is missing, but it seems that Wilson is not communicating something to me that he understands.

On Human Nature did not significantly change my view of the world. While I did learn of new specific case studies that supported moral evolution, I already was convinced of this origin of values before beginning the book. Clearly, Wilson’s work is an important piece of my paradigm; if there is something to value systems other than moral evolution then I am missing something important. However, Wilson did not answer my remaining question: how should I act? I was hoping to find this dilemma addressed in the book, but I do not feel I understand the question more than before I opened the cover.

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