Our Sentiments Exactly

by Frans de Waal

From Science & Spirit Magazine

There are some who see biology as the enemy of morality—as if accepting we are mere products of evolution means we would be absolved from the obligation to lead virtuous lives. It is a line of thought packed with assumptions, and chief among them is that before people had religions, they must have lacked ethics. But it’s difficult to imagine that our human ancestors could have existed without rules of right and wrong, and without assisting those in need. These tendencies are probably as old as humanity, likely predating our modern religions by hundreds of thousands of years.

In fact, the roots of morality may be even older than humanity. I am not claiming that monkeys and apes are moral beings, but I do believe that human morality derives from primate sociality. Charles Darwin saw it this way, writing in The Descent of Man: “any animal whatever, endowed with well-marked social instincts … would inevitably acquire a moral sense or conscience, as soon as its intellectual powers had become as well, or nearly as well developed, as in man.” It is not hard to recognize the two pillars of human morality in the behavior of other primates. These pillars are elegantly summed up by the golden rule, which transcends the world’s cultures and religions. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” brings together empathy (attention to another’s feelings) and reciprocity (if others follow the same rule, you will be treated well). Human morality could not exist without empathy and reciprocity, tendencies that are widespread in other primates.

After one chimpanzee attacks another, for example, a bystander chimp will often go over to embrace the victim; we have documented hundreds of cases. Usually, the effect of such consolation is that screaming, yelping, and other signs of distress come to a stop. In fact, the tendency to reassure others is so strong that Nadia Kohts, a Russian scientist who raised a juvenile chimp nearly a century ago, said that if her charge escaped to the roof of her house, there was only one way to get him down. Holding out food would not do the trick, nor would shouts and threats of punishment. The only way would be for her to sit down and sob, as if she were in pain. Her suffering would prompt the young ape, a worried look on his face, to rush down from the roof and put an arm around her. This indicates the strength of the empathic tendency in our closest relatives.

Reciprocity, on the other hand, can be seen in experiments with captive primates. Before giving one chimpanzee food to divide with others, we measure spontaneous grooming in the colony: who grooms whom and for how long. Grooming is a pleasurable, relaxing activity, and being groomed is much appreciated. In our experiment, we found that one chimpanzee grooming another greatly increased the chance that the first would get food from the second. In other words, the chimpanzees remembered who had groomed them and paid them back later in the day. Like humans, apes seem quite capable of keeping track of incoming and outgoing favors. Of course, these findings are not sufficient to speak of “morality,” but the tendencies observed in these primates fit what Scottish philosopher David Hume called the “moral sentiments.” Adding enforced social norms, our species turned the moral sentiments into an elaborate system that tells us how we ought to treat others and how we ought to promote the interests of the community.

This is quite different from the view that biology somehow counters morality. Despite what some popular authors have written, human nature is not all selfish and nasty, and we do not need religion to tame us into becoming moral beings. We are evolutionarily equipped with moral sentiments, which put the virtuous life within reach. In the effort to attain it, we are given an enormous helping hand from our background as social primates.

[Now this is certainly food for thought. It might explain, at least in part, where our morality comes from – or at least point to the origins of some of moralities building blocks. I am beginning to come around to accepting that there is at least some genetic component to morality and that it isn’t entirely cultural in nature. I have acquired a few books by Frans de Waal and will no doubt review them at some point probably in the New Year. I’m looking forward to having some interesting reading – maybe over the Christmas break?]