Skip to main content

Thought for the Day: The Tragedy of Thinking We Evolved

I saw the most unbelievable nonsensical report last night.  That's going some, given the nonsense that gets reported.  It was an article in New Scientist, which I only mention because that is known in the world as a reasonably reliable and sensible source science current events and how they relate our daily life.  Here's the article (link included so you don't think I am making this up adn... with a couple of juicy outtakes.
The Tragedy of Common-Sense Morality
  1. Morality is essentially a suite of psychological mechanisms that enable us to cooperate. But, biologically at least, we only evolved to cooperate in a tribal way.
  2. Going through that reasoning process [taking a more global view] can allow our moral thinking to do something it never evolved to.
Can you spot the obvious problems here?  I'll elaborate just because it's so fun.  First, he declares that there really is no morality; it's just an evolutionary trick that engenders cooperation.  Since cooperation obviously (yes; dripping with sarcasm) makes a species more fit, that explains morality.  This sort of statement is what we used to call, "Proof by blatant assertion."  Questioning it is met with blank stares and/or looks of derision.  Add some facts... for example that cockroaches and mice seem to have done quite well without much cooperation, thank you; and they get belligerent.  Part of the proof by blatant assertion, of course, is to explain it louder and with more disdain each time a contradictory real fact is presented.  (As an aside: My Florida progeny have just gone through rousting a group of recalcitrant cockroaches from their van.  So far so good, but even with lots of cooperation and superior intellect, the jury is still out on who won.)

But let's suppose we accept his premise and say that morality is just a happy accident that these smart monkeys we call human happened to hit upon.  So... his #2 point... uhh... why in the world would he want to re-purpose this evolutionary gem to do something else?  Wouldn't that be, by the very nature of the game, less survivable?  Moreover, even if he is willing to take that hit to be more moral... umm... didn't he just say there is no higher morality?  At this point, of course, they are about bust a vein; the loud belligerence has turned into shouting red face.

That's why I became an Orthodox Jew.  Everything else has way too much screaming and blind faith for my taste.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Thought for the Day: Pizza, Uncrustables, and Stuff -- What Bracha?

Many years ago (in fact, more than two decades ago), I called R' Fuerst from my desk at work as I sat down to lunch.  I had a piece of (quite delicious) homemade pizza for lunch.  I nearly always eat at my desk as I am working (or writing TftD...), so my lunch at work cannot in any way be considered as sitting down to a formal meal; aka קביעת סעודה.  That being the case, I wasn't sure whether to wash, say ha'motzi, and bentch; or was the pizza downgraded to a m'zonos.  He told if it was a snack, then it's m'zonos; if a meal the ha'motzi.  Which what I have always done since then.  I recently found out how/why that works. The Shulchan Aruch, 168:17 discusses פשטיד''א, which is describes as a baked dough with meat or fish or cheese.  In other words: pizza.  Note: while the dough doesn't not need to be baked together with the meat/fish/cheese, it is  required that they dough was baked with the intention of making this concoction. ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Thought for the Day: What Category of Muktzeh are Our Candles?

As discussed in a recent TftD , a p'sak halacha quite surprising to many, that one may -- even לכתחילה -- decorate a birthday cake with (unlit, obviously) birthday candles on Shabbos. That p'sak is predicated on another p'sak halacha; namely, that our candles are muktzeh because they are a כלי שמלאכתו לאיסור and not  מוקצה מחמת גופו/intrinsically set aside from any use on Shabbos. They point there was that using the candle as a decoration qualifies as a need that allows one to utilize a כלי שמלאכתו לאיסור. Today we will discuss the issue of concluding that our candles are , in fact, a כלי שמלאכתו לאיסור and not מוקצה מחמת גופו. Along the way we'll also (again) how important it is to have personal relationship with your rav/posek, the importance of precision in vocabulary, and how to interpret the Mishna Brura.  Buckle up. After reviewing siman 308 and the Mishna Brura there, I concluded that it should be permissible to use birthday candles to decorate a cake on Sha...
Post a Comment
Read more

Thought for the Day: אוושא מילתא Debases Yours Shabbos

My granddaughter came home with a list the girls and phone numbers in her first grade class.  It was cute because they had made it an arts and crafts project by pasting the list to piece of construction paper cut out to look like an old desk phone and a receiver attached by a pipe cleaner.  I realized, though, that the cuteness was entirely lost on her.  She, of course, has never seen a desk phone with a receiver.  When they pretend to talk on the phone, it is on any relatively flat, rectangular object they find.  (In fact, her 18 month old brother turns every  relatively flat, rectangular object into a phone and walks around babbling into it.  Not much different than the rest of us, except his train of thought is not interrupted by someone else babbling into his ear.) I was reminded of that when my chavrusa (who has children my grandchildrens age) and I were learning about אוושא מילתא.  It came up because of a quote from the Shulchan Aru...
Post a Comment
Read more