Objection · Case 05 · Relativism
The “illusion fobbed off on us by our genes” line is quoted by every apologist, but many evolutionary ethicists reject the illusion framing and argue that evolution explains how we track real moral facts.
One objection from the free evidence repository at apologetics.pro.
Response
The quotation is accurate but represents one wing. Evolutionary ethics includes realist versions in which evolution equipped us to perceive moral truths, roughly as it equipped us to perceive physical ones. The reply to those versions is that tracking moral facts requires there to be moral facts to track, which is the point at issue; evolution explains the perceiving, not the existence of what is perceived. That is a friendlier exchange than the illusion quote suggests, and it lands at the same place: what are moral facts, and what makes them binding?
About this exhibit
This objection is to Evolution, or evolutionary ethics, as in Ruse and Wilson.
The evolutionary account says our moral sense is a survival tool. We feel that fairness is binding because ancestors who cooperated left more descendants. Michael Ruse and E. O. Wilson state the…