Evolutionary debunking arguments hold that because human moral beliefs and dispositions arose through evolutionary processes selected for their contribution to survival and reproduction rather than for tracking any independent moral truth, those beliefs cannot be trusted as reliable guides to objective moral facts, if any such facts exist. Proponents argue that the causal explanation evolutionary biology gives for why people hold the moral beliefs they do makes no reference to those beliefs actually being true, so the correlation between what people believe and what is genuinely right or wrong would be mere coincidence, undermining confidence in moral realism, the view that objective moral facts exist independently of human attitudes. Critics have replied that this reasoning proves too much or rests on a flawed picture of how evolutionary and rational influences on belief can be distinguished, and the soundness of the debunking strategy remains a live topic in metaethics.
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Position KindSourced to the subject's own account Sources
1. Evolutionary Debunking Argument (Wikipedia)
WikipediaEvolutionary debunking argument (Wikipedia), introductionQuote, Evolutionary debunking argument (Wikipedia), introduction
An evolutionary debunking, sometimes referred to as an evolutionary debunking argument or evolutionary debunking thesis, is a philosophical argument which holds that, because humans (like all organisms) have an evolutionary origin, the principles of ethics and morality that we have devised are invalid and cannot be considered objective knowledge.
2. Moral Epistemology (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Stanford Encyclopedia of PhilosophyStanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Moral Epistemology, section 4.2 The Debunking Argument from Moral ObjectivismQuote, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Moral Epistemology, section 4.2 The Debunking Argument from Moral Objectivism
Sharon Street (2006) presses this dilemma with careful attention to possible replies.
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