theolduvaigorge:Frans de Waal’s Bottom-Up Morality: We’re Not...

theolduvaigorge:

Frans de Waal’s Bottom-Up Morality: We’re Not Good Because Of God




by BARBARA J. KING

“In a book coming out next week called The Bonobo and the Atheist,primatologist Frans de Waal argues that morality is built into our species. Rather than coming to us top-down from God, or any other external source, morality for de Waal springs bottom-up from our emotions and our day-to-day social interactions, which themselves evolved from foundations in animal societies.

(Source: NPR)

I heard Frans De Waal speak at Hunter College a few years ago with my friend Kaitlyn who was researching her novel.  He was presenting his findings on the emergence of empathy and co-operation in higher order animals and making the argument that altruism has been selected in to our population.