Atheist psychologist Steven Pinker uncovers one of the inherent fault lines in that conclusion. He points out that if virtue is equated with “sacrifices that benefit one’s own group in competition with other groups . . . then fascism would be the ultimate virtuous ideology.”32 Pinker describes our innate moral sense like this: “Whatever sense of empathy nature bequeathed us by default applies to a very narrow circle of individuals: pretty much, our family and close allies within the clan or village.”33 A convinced secular humanist, Pinker believes that universal human rights can be grounded in
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