Evolution of Freedom
Part I: Evolution of cooperation - Chapter 2
COOPERATION
Humans and our ancestors have lived in social groups for the past 50 million years. Because the most consistent element in the environment we evolved in was the presence of other humans, and because our survival is so deeply dependent on others, getting along with other people has been an evolutionary necessity for our species.
Over millions of years, our ancestors confronted recurring problems and settled on specific solutions in their attempt to resolve them. Some of these solutions are so deeply ingrained in us that they appear to be instinctual, whereas others are norms, social innovations and cooperative institutions. Together, they form the basis for human morality, which, according to Dr. Oliver Scott Curry, is the social framework we use to promote cooperation.
Morality is a collection of rules and principles a culture uses to define how its members ought to behave. Morality is a reflection of our collective value system and defines what we consider to be right and wrong. Successful human cooperation is invariably built on a strong moral foundation.
In his lectures and in his paper, Morality as cooperation: a problem-centered approach, Curry uses insights from evolutionary biology, genetics, neuroscience, anthropology, moral psychology and game theory to propose his theory that morality is ultimately a collection of cooperative rules that promote the common good. What makes Curry’s work on the subject so fascinating is that he is able to take ideas that for thousands of years were confined to the pages of moral philosophy, or ethics, and infuse them with the rigor of hard sciences.
According to Curry, moral problems are cooperative problems. In the theory he lays out, the purpose of morality is to unlock the benefits of cooperation through mutually beneficial interactions. When we are faced with a moral dilemma, we should ask: How should we cooperate in this situation? He suspects that the best answer to moral problems is the most cooperative solution available.
If Curry’s insights are correct, this provides an added perspective to our quest. Not only are we searching for the ideal way to cooperate, but we are also looking for the moral principles that will resolve most human conflicts and lead to shared well-being. As morality can now be studied from a purely scientific perspective, a central task of this book is to delve into the science behind cooperation. This begins with a deep dive into evolution and game theory.
As we study the science, the question becomes whether we can find cooperative principles that are universally shared by all of humanity. After we peel away all the idiosyncratic cultural customs and legal traditions, could we find cooperative solutions that unite us all? This book is built on the belief that we can, and Curry’s work bears this out.
If the principles we look for are truly universal, we should be able to find validation for them not only in the pages of moral philosophy and sprinkled all around our culture, but also in the mathematical proofs provided by game theory. By building our cooperative institutions around these universal principles, we could potentially resolve and bypass many of our persistent conflicts and create a path for large-scale cooperation that benefits all of humanity.
This offers a hopeful vision of the future.
Curry started his study by applying game theory to moral dilemmas, but instead of using zero-sum games as his source, he focused on non-zero-sum games, which can produce win-win situations essential to successful cooperation. Curry has identified at least seven universal tenets of cooperation that virtually all cultures adhere to:
Over millions of years, our ancestors confronted recurring problems and settled on specific solutions in their attempt to resolve them. Some of these solutions are so deeply ingrained in us that they appear to be instinctual, whereas others are norms, social innovations and cooperative institutions. Together, they form the basis for human morality, which, according to Dr. Oliver Scott Curry, is the social framework we use to promote cooperation.
Morality is a collection of rules and principles a culture uses to define how its members ought to behave. Morality is a reflection of our collective value system and defines what we consider to be right and wrong. Successful human cooperation is invariably built on a strong moral foundation.
In his lectures and in his paper, Morality as cooperation: a problem-centered approach, Curry uses insights from evolutionary biology, genetics, neuroscience, anthropology, moral psychology and game theory to propose his theory that morality is ultimately a collection of cooperative rules that promote the common good. What makes Curry’s work on the subject so fascinating is that he is able to take ideas that for thousands of years were confined to the pages of moral philosophy, or ethics, and infuse them with the rigor of hard sciences.
According to Curry, moral problems are cooperative problems. In the theory he lays out, the purpose of morality is to unlock the benefits of cooperation through mutually beneficial interactions. When we are faced with a moral dilemma, we should ask: How should we cooperate in this situation? He suspects that the best answer to moral problems is the most cooperative solution available.
If Curry’s insights are correct, this provides an added perspective to our quest. Not only are we searching for the ideal way to cooperate, but we are also looking for the moral principles that will resolve most human conflicts and lead to shared well-being. As morality can now be studied from a purely scientific perspective, a central task of this book is to delve into the science behind cooperation. This begins with a deep dive into evolution and game theory.
As we study the science, the question becomes whether we can find cooperative principles that are universally shared by all of humanity. After we peel away all the idiosyncratic cultural customs and legal traditions, could we find cooperative solutions that unite us all? This book is built on the belief that we can, and Curry’s work bears this out.
If the principles we look for are truly universal, we should be able to find validation for them not only in the pages of moral philosophy and sprinkled all around our culture, but also in the mathematical proofs provided by game theory. By building our cooperative institutions around these universal principles, we could potentially resolve and bypass many of our persistent conflicts and create a path for large-scale cooperation that benefits all of humanity.
This offers a hopeful vision of the future.
Curry started his study by applying game theory to moral dilemmas, but instead of using zero-sum games as his source, he focused on non-zero-sum games, which can produce win-win situations essential to successful cooperation. Curry has identified at least seven universal tenets of cooperation that virtually all cultures adhere to:
1) We love and care for our relatives and offspring
2) We form groups and are loyal to them.
3) We feel obligated to return favors and get angry when others don’t.
4) We reward acts of heroism and altruism with social status, which we use to resolve conflicts without resorting to violence.
5) We defer to and respect our superiors.
6) We expect to be treated equally.
7) We respect prior ownership.
2) We form groups and are loyal to them.
3) We feel obligated to return favors and get angry when others don’t.
4) We reward acts of heroism and altruism with social status, which we use to resolve conflicts without resorting to violence.
5) We defer to and respect our superiors.
6) We expect to be treated equally.
7) We respect prior ownership.
These seven rules of cooperation are so ubiquitous that in the meta-analysis Curry and his partner conducted of ethnographic accounts from 60 different cultures from all over the world, 99.9 percent of them adhered to them.
These seven rules of cooperation are so ubiquitous that in the meta-analysis Curry and his partner conducted of ethnographic accounts from 60 different cultures from all over the world, 99.9 percent of them adhered to them.
While these seven forms of cooperation appear to be universal, this doesn’t mean that all cultures or value systems are the same. Each culture emphasizes different values over others depending on the circumstances in which they developed. As in biological evolution, the specific environments these values developed in have left a permanent mark on that particular culture and its morals. Whatever moral principles we propose, however, they shouldn’t be in conflict with any of these seven rules.
What is fascinating is that Curry has been able to confirm that certain cooperative impulses have a genetic basis, acting either as a single mechanism or possibly being individually activated by specific genes. The moral sense for fairness, for example, can be detected in babies as young as four months old, making it unlikely that this could be a learned behavior. If our moral sentiments do have a genetic basis, it may be possible to find a cooperative framework the great majority of the world’s population could embrace. This could mean that many of the social conflicts we grapple with are ultimately superficial and could be eventually overcome.
The need to identify a universal cooperative principle is important because the problems we face are global. If we intend to solve them, we will have to work together. For global cooperation to work, we have to forge a new win-win strategy that benefits everybody. The cooperative principles I identify in this book go far beyond those proposed by Curry and their veracity will ultimately be proven or disproved by the outcomes they generate once adopted.
These seven rules of cooperation are so ubiquitous that in the meta-analysis Curry and his partner conducted of ethnographic accounts from 60 different cultures from all over the world, 99.9 percent of them adhered to them.
While these seven forms of cooperation appear to be universal, this doesn’t mean that all cultures or value systems are the same. Each culture emphasizes different values over others depending on the circumstances in which they developed. As in biological evolution, the specific environments these values developed in have left a permanent mark on that particular culture and its morals. Whatever moral principles we propose, however, they shouldn’t be in conflict with any of these seven rules.
What is fascinating is that Curry has been able to confirm that certain cooperative impulses have a genetic basis, acting either as a single mechanism or possibly being individually activated by specific genes. The moral sense for fairness, for example, can be detected in babies as young as four months old, making it unlikely that this could be a learned behavior. If our moral sentiments do have a genetic basis, it may be possible to find a cooperative framework the great majority of the world’s population could embrace. This could mean that many of the social conflicts we grapple with are ultimately superficial and could be eventually overcome.
The need to identify a universal cooperative principle is important because the problems we face are global. If we intend to solve them, we will have to work together. For global cooperation to work, we have to forge a new win-win strategy that benefits everybody. The cooperative principles I identify in this book go far beyond those proposed by Curry and their veracity will ultimately be proven or disproved by the outcomes they generate once adopted.
