{"id":370,"date":"2010-08-06T09:18:00","date_gmt":"2010-08-06T09:18:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2\/"},"modified":"2012-04-10T21:19:09","modified_gmt":"2012-04-11T01:19:09","slug":"optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html","title":{"rendered":"Optimized and Arbitrary (part 2)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

This post is part of a series on math and morality. You can see all previous posts in this sequence at the index<\/a><\/em>
\n
\n<\/em>
\nLooks like it\u2019s time for a clarification for yesterday\u2019s post<\/a>.<\/p>\n

I think David B. is oversimplifying when he says:<\/p>\n

If a lot of offspring get genes for cooperation and together they are hard-wired build an equilibrium better for all (i.e. what morality does), that would in fact out compete another population without those genes.\u00a0<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I think it\u2019s important to remember that two opposite strategies can both succeed in different niches. I don\u2019t think you\u2019re justified in thinking the in-group dynamics prompted by the morality we value would necessarily be sufficient, let alone dominant. Consider our close relatives the chimpanzees. Although chimps have a complex social dynamic, that has certainly been evolutionarily successful thus far; I think we\u2019d hesitate to call it moral. Chimpanzee mating is founded on the routine beating and brutalization of chimpanzee females, to insure they copulate with any willing male while in heat. Nothing about this is automatically inferior to the human social system from an evolutionary perspective.<\/p>\n

Hendy added:<\/p>\n

Also, relative values don\u2019t mean nothing matters. This is the whole point of society. Many people wish to respond to relativism by slapping the relativist in the face and saying, \u201cSo, I don\u2019t believe in not slapping people in the face. What are you going to do about it?\u201d But that\u2019s not how it works. We gather as intelligent beings to decide what best supports the society and enact prohibitions for violations of these rules.\u00a0<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What I was trying to get at with my discussion of Nash Equilibria was the idea that \u201cwhat best supports the society\u201d may not actually be desirable. Evolution and relativism as described by Hendy above are both systems that promote stable and resilient societies. Neither of them necessarily optimizes moral attitudes or outcomes, as the chimp example suggests. So what is the basis for our strong preference for our society over that of chimps?<\/p>\n

Crowhill is correct that \u201cThe hard thing to face is the possibility that there may be no justification for our moral statements.\u201d I\u2019m still inclined to give weight to experiential evidence here that suggests our standards are moral and true. Given that I know that stability\/social cohesion is an insufficient criterion for proper action, I couldn\u2019t act or evaluate proposed actions unless I posit some alternate, valid metric.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post is part of a series on math and morality. You can see all previous posts in this sequence at the index Looks like it\u2019s time for a clarification for yesterday\u2019s post. I think David B. is oversimplifying when he says: If a lot of offspring get genes for cooperation and together they are […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":127,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[68,48],"tags":[82,148,138],"class_list":["post-370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-epistemologyphilosophy","category-morality-in-practice","tag-evo-psych","tag-game-theory","tag-math-and-morality"],"yoast_head":"\nOptimized and Arbitrary (part 2)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"This post is part of a series on math and morality. You can see all previous posts in this sequence at the index Looks like it\u2019s time for a clarification\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Optimized and Arbitrary (part 2)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This post is part of a series on math and morality. You can see all previous posts in this sequence at the index Looks like it\u2019s time for a clarification\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Unequally Yoked\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-08-06T09:18:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2012-04-11T01:19:09+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/blogger.googleusercontent.com\/tracker\/4256452356987023523-8669197992055971438?l=www.unequally-yoked.com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Leah Libresco\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Leah Libresco\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html\",\"name\":\"Optimized and Arbitrary (part 2)\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2010-08-06T09:18:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2012-04-11T01:19:09+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#\/schema\/person\/17ee17592b35b40040d5f5f7ea5ab464\"},\"description\":\"This post is part of a series on math and morality. You can see all previous posts in this sequence at the index Looks like it\u2019s time for a clarification\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Optimized and Arbitrary (part 2)\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/\",\"name\":\"Unequally Yoked\",\"description\":\"\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#\/schema\/person\/17ee17592b35b40040d5f5f7ea5ab464\",\"name\":\"Leah Libresco\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/20e1e6a3a94c4e7928687804a41d888d?s=96&d=mm&r=r\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/20e1e6a3a94c4e7928687804a41d888d?s=96&d=mm&r=r\",\"caption\":\"Leah Libresco\"},\"description\":\"Leah is the author of Arriving at Amen and Building the Benedict Option. Her further writing can be found at leahlibresco.com.\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/author\/leahlibresco\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Optimized and Arbitrary (part 2)","description":"This post is part of a series on math and morality. You can see all previous posts in this sequence at the index Looks like it\u2019s time for a clarification","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Optimized and Arbitrary (part 2)","og_description":"This post is part of a series on math and morality. You can see all previous posts in this sequence at the index Looks like it\u2019s time for a clarification","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html","og_site_name":"Unequally Yoked","article_published_time":"2010-08-06T09:18:00+00:00","article_modified_time":"2012-04-11T01:19:09+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"https:\/\/blogger.googleusercontent.com\/tracker\/4256452356987023523-8669197992055971438?l=www.unequally-yoked.com"}],"author":"Leah Libresco","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Leah Libresco","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html","name":"Optimized and Arbitrary (part 2)","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#website"},"datePublished":"2010-08-06T09:18:00+00:00","dateModified":"2012-04-11T01:19:09+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#\/schema\/person\/17ee17592b35b40040d5f5f7ea5ab464"},"description":"This post is part of a series on math and morality. You can see all previous posts in this sequence at the index Looks like it\u2019s time for a clarification","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/2010\/08\/optimized-and-arbitrary-part-2.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Optimized and Arbitrary (part 2)"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/","name":"Unequally Yoked","description":"","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#\/schema\/person\/17ee17592b35b40040d5f5f7ea5ab464","name":"Leah Libresco","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/20e1e6a3a94c4e7928687804a41d888d?s=96&d=mm&r=r","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/20e1e6a3a94c4e7928687804a41d888d?s=96&d=mm&r=r","caption":"Leah Libresco"},"description":"Leah is the author of Arriving at Amen and Building the Benedict Option. Her further writing can be found at leahlibresco.com.","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/author\/leahlibresco"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/127"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=370"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/370\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/unequallyyoked\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}