9.916 Morality & NormsToday’s Lecture Why do people “cooperate”? - Evolved cooperator genes “One must X” - Acquire normative beliefs self: doing X, not Y others: praising X, punishing Y “One must not Y” (1) Content of Morality What do we have moral intuitions about? Why? (2) Implementation of Morality How do we make moral judgments? i.e. proximal mechanisms. Different for 1st person (action) vs 3rd person (judgement)? How do norms interact with economic motives? (3) Origins of Morality How do human children acquire moral intuitions? How did human beings evolve moral norms?Content of Morality What do we have moral intuitions about? Standard View (1) Harm/Care: “One must not commit murder” self: avoid causing pain others: punish murders (2) Justice/Fairness: “One must reciprocate” self: inequity aversion others: 3PP in PD Fehr & Fishbacher (2004) 01234MUs to PunishCooperate DefectTarget's Action2nd P's ActionCooperateDefectFigure by MIT OpenCourseWare.Content of Morality What do we have moral intuitions about? 5 Pillars of Morality (1) Harm / Care (2) Justice / Fairness (3) Ingroup / Loyalty - Loyalty, patriotism, self-sacrifice for the group, vigilance for traitors - “People should be loyal to their family members, even when they have done something wrong” (4) Authority / Respect - Obedience, respect for authority, protection of subordinates - “If I were a soldier and disagreed with my commanding officer’s orders, I would obey anyway because that is my duty.” (5) Purity / Sanctity - Purity / pollution, contamination sensitivity, laws about food & sex - “I would call some acts wrong on the grounds that they are unnatural.” HaidtContent of Morality What do we have moral intuitions about? (1) Harm / Care (2) Justice / Fairness (3) Ingroup / Loyalty (4) Authority / Respect $0$10$100$1000$10000$100,000$1000,000NeverVeryLiberalLiberalNeutral SlightlyLiberalSlightlyConservativeConservativeVeryConservativeSelf-reported political identityAverage amount required to violate taboosHarm FairnessIngroupPurityAuthority(5) Purity / Sanctity 5 Pillars of Morality Haidt,Tetlock, Graham et al (2009) Even in liberals, elicit “taboo trade-off” response. Figure by MIT OpenCourseWare.Implementation of Morality I.What are the proximal mechanisms of moral judgements? (1) Effortful and deliberative or heuristic and intuitive? Justifications: Kohlberg (1963) External situation Reasoning Judgement External situation Judgement Reasoning 72 boys from Chicago, age 10 -16 Test: Interview, dilemmas Measured: Explicit justification - come after Js Theory: 6 developmental stages: - don’t explain Js I. Punishment & obedience (“dumbfounding”) III. Maintain others’ approval - develop slower than Js V. Contracts, laws - more culturally variable V1. Universal principles, conscience than Js Future research: what is the role of explicit reasoning? Haidt, MikhailCommunity Contempt Autonomy Anger Divinity Disgust Implementation of Morality I.What are the proximal mechanisms of moral judgements? (2) Cognitive or emotional? Moral violations elicit corresponding emotions e.g.“CAD” model Moral Pillar Emotion Authority / Respect Ingroup / Loyalty Harm / Care Fairness / Justice Purity/SanctityShweder, RozinImplementation of Morality I.What are the proximal mechanisms of moral judgements? (2) Cognitive or emotional? Haidt: First feel bad towards X, then judge X wrong Evidence: induce disgust, generate judged “wrongness” e.g. dirty desk, hypnotism External situation Emotion Judgement Reasoning Mikhail: First judge X wrong, then feel bad towards X Argument:“wrongness” ~ causality, intentionality, framing e.g.Tetlock’s External Emotion Judgement ReasoningConversion commission example:situation vacuous reasons Structural description + Norms Haidt, Mikhail,TetlockImplementation of Morality II. Is there a difference bw morality for action vs judgement? Mikhail: - Act: performance muddied by non-moral factors - Judge: moral competence Another difference: Tetlock: - Act: trade-offs are necessary - Judge: trade-offs are unthinkable Blair: - Act: primary, ontogenetic & phylogenetically - Judge: derived by generalisation - Judge: can exculpate for ignorance - Act: can’t choose based on ignoranceImplementation of Morality III. How do norms interact with economic motives? Two kinds of trade-off: (1) Sacred Values Norms & Economic motives conflict N trump E Outrage Entrenchment Disgust (2) Overjustification Norms & Economic motives concur E trump N Switch to calculated reciprocity e.g. daycare; paying pro-bono lawyers; paying blood donors Tetlock, Bowles (2008),Ariely (2008)Origins of Morality I.The language analogy External situation Moral Judgement Explicit Justification - complex processing - not introspectible - some universal principles - culture specificity - mutually comprehensible? - just evaluative? - intuitions can conflict - feedback from explicit reasoning to judgements Sentence Grammaticality Judgement Linguistics - complex processing - not introspectible - some universal principles - culture specificity - mutually incomprehensible - evaluative & generative - no conflicts? - no feedback from linguistics to judgements? Acquisition? Mikhail (2007), Dupoux & Jacob (2007) “one or both of us” is or are XDevelopment of MoralityContent of Morality What do we have moral intuitions about? Haidt’s evolutionary account: Kin selection Harm / Care Justice / Fairness Ingroup / Loyalty Authority / Respect Purity / Sanctity Direct reciprocity Indirect reciprocity Group selection Jonathan HaidtContent of Morality What do we have moral intuitions about? Mikhail’s view: (based on comparative law) Harm / Care Justice / Fairness Other stuff Future research: development of other moralitiesMIT OpenCourseWarehttp://ocw.mit.edu 9.916 Special Topics: Social Animals Fall 2009 For information about citing these materials or our Terms of Use, visit: