The Origin And Evolution Of Human Values

Human values are innate, a product of man's evolution and genetics. This is the unorthodox thesis of this major work, which for the first time places the study of values on a firm scientific foundation. Drawing on biological findings which indicate that the fundamental behavioral motivations of each species are inherited, the author looks at the human brain as a biological decision system in which innate values in the form of human motivations serve as the decision criteria.

The best-selling author of Why the West Rules—for Now examines the evolution and future of human values Most people in the world today think democracy and gender equality are good, and that violence and wealth inequality are bad. But most people who lived during the 10,000 years before the nineteenth century thought just the opposite. Drawing on archaeology, anthropology, biology, and history, Ian Morris explains why. Fundamental long-term changes in values, Morris argues, are driven by the most basic force of all: energy. Humans have found three main ways to get the energy they need—from foraging, farming, and fossil fuels. Each energy source sets strict limits on what kinds of societies can succeed, and each kind of society rewards specific values. But if our fossil-fuel world favors democratic, open societies, the ongoing revolution in energy capture means that our most cherished values are very likely to turn out not to be useful any more. Foragers, Farmers, and Fossil Fuels offers a compelling new argument about the evolution of human values, one that has far-reaching implications for how we understand the past—and for what might happen next. Originating as the Tanner Lectures delivered at Princeton University, the book includes challenging responses by classicist Richard Seaford, historian of China Jonathan Spence, philosopher Christine Korsgaard, and novelist Margaret Atwood.

Initiated by Robert Wesson, Evolution and Human Values is a collection of newly written essays designed to bring interdisciplinary insight to that area of thought where human evolution intersects with human values. The disciplines brought to bear on the subject are diverse - philosophy, psychiatry, behavioral science, biology, anthropology, psychology, biochemistry, and sociology. Yet, as organized by co-editor Patricia A. Williams, the volume falls coherently into three related sections. Entitled Evolutionary Ethics, the first section brings contemporary research to an area first explored by Herbert Spencer. Evolutionary ethics looks to the theory of evolution by natural selection to find values for human living. The second section, Evolved Ethics, discusses the evolution of language and religion and their impact on moral thought and feeling. Evolved ethics was partly Charles Darwin's subject in The Descent of Man. The last section bears the title Scientific Ethics. A nascent field, scientific ethics asks about the evolution of human nature and the implications of that nature for ethical theory and social policy. Together, the essays collected here provide important contemporary insights into what it is - and what it may be - to be human.

"Over the course of history, Fraser argues, human values have served primarily not as conservative influences that promote permanence, continuity, and balance - as commonly believed - but as revolutionary forces that, in the long run, promote change by generating and sustaining certain unresolvable conflicts."--BOOK JACKET.

The whole universe is organized on patterns that are set by the Lord of the Worlds. Nothing is chaotic or astray, even when they appear to be so. We perceive these patterns as mysterious when we do not understand them, but as soon as their reality is revealed, they become as easy and as definite as simple mathematics. The matter has to do with our perception. Before Newton, falling apples from trees, was a mysterious phenomenon that could not be explained, but would be easily referred to spirits and ghosts wars! When Newton discovered gravity and derived its governing laws, the mystery became as obvious as simple math. In social matters, the patterns are more complicated to experiment and to conclude. In spite of the good progress that we may claim, we are far beyond, and are still inexperienced beginners. Most, if not all, of what we unanimously agree upon today, was preached to our ancestors by a humanity leader who was tutored by a prophet or was himself a prophet. What we experiment ourselves are just confirmations to what was revealed and preached earlier. The Koran offers an easy but definite guide to social prosperity and happiness, and stands unchallenged and incomparable as the only intact Holy Book since the creation of Adam. It documents all social patterns that humanity would need for prosperous and happy life journey on earth and joyful eternal destination in the life after. These patterns stand perfect, either to be embraced or to be derived.

This book develops and tests an ecological and evolutionary theory of the causes of human values—the core beliefs that guide people’s cognition and behavior—and their variation across time and space around the world. We call this theory the parasite-stress theory of values or the parasite-stress theory of sociality. The evidence we present in our book indicates that both a wide span of human affairs and major aspects of human cultural diversity can be understood in light of variable parasite (infectious disease) stress and the range of value systems evoked by variable parasite stress. The same evidence supports the hypothesis that people have psychological adaptations that function to adopt values dependent upon local infectious-disease adversity. The authors have identified key variables, variation in infectious disease adversity and in the core values it evokes, for understanding these topics and in novel and encompassing ways. Although the human species is the focus in the book, evidence presented in the book shows that the parasite-stress theory of sociality informs other topics in ecology and evolutionary biology such as variable family organization and speciation processes and biological diversity in general in non-human animals.