No Wonder So Many People are Depressed

[David]

Perhaps I do need to restate some of my earlier arguments in greater detail, K, as it seems you’re continuing to misunderstand them.

Let us consider the question of whether it is “better” for a giant asteroid capable of obliterating all life on the planet to not crash into the Earth tomorrow. Clearly, at least on one level, it doesn’t really matter if it does: it’s just an utterly mundane collision of physical objects in space (happens all the time), and the lives that it will wipe out are no more inherently significant than a colony of bacteria. To the inhabitants of the Alpha Centauri solar system, it’s not really better or worse at all if we bite the dust. And neither is it in any sense an act that can be said to be “Right” or “Wrong” or subject to any known definition of moral law. And yet, we all, I imagine, feel fairly certain that it would be better if the asteroid did not strike, because all we love and care about would be obliterated, and it would (to put it lightly) jeopardise the healthy functioning of ourselves as an organism – i.e. pretty much everything that we as organisms care about. Without any need to bring moral law into the picture, we are sufficiently motivated to not want this to happen. So we can see that, in this hypothetical, “better” and “worse” are concepts that can be wholly detached from any moral language, even while they remain purely subjective and conditional.

What I’m arguing is that this is all that any questions of “better” and “worse” amount to: you set the boundaries of whatever it is you’re trying to assess (e.g. what’s the best way to maximise societal happiness? What’s the best way to satisfy my momentary craving for Coca-Cola? What’s the best way to solve this high school maths problem?) and then work out the most efficient way of achieving that goal. And why, I’m sure you’ll ask, are we trying to maximise societal happiness and not trying to, say, devise the most fun torture devices? Simply because the first option interests us in a way that torture devices and the happiness of the population of a planet orbiting Alpha Centauri don’t and never can, and that’s because it is more relevant to our personal benefit – a topic that, as demonstrated above, is not at all dependent on moral law or objective Right and Wrong.

[K]

[K]

I note without comment yet (and after barely skimming it)...

Seeking Human Generosity’s Origins in an Ape’s Gift to Another Ape

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/11/science/generosity-apes-bonobos.html


[Well, maybe just one quick comment: People who do this type of work and those who report it invariably seem to assume from the start that it's all about the survival instinct.
Update: After reading it, I'm not convinced it is worth commenting further on this article, but I realize that in itself is a comment of sorts.]