Evolutionary ethics as a study of the population-genetic mechanisms of the formation of altruism in nature. Evolutionary ethics in the Russian and Western European philosophical traditions Evolutionary ethics, its main provisions and directions

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1. Morality and morality in the socio-cultural dimension

Ethics can be called science, area, knowledge, intellectual tradition, and "morality" or "morality", using these words as synonyms - that which is studied by ethics, its subject.

Thinking about morality turns out to be different images of morality itself is not at all accidental. Morality is not just what is. She is what she should be. Morality in relation always acts as moderation, it is closer to antiquity, the ability of a person to limit himself, to impose, if necessary, a ban on his natural desires.

Morality cannot be equated with arbitrariness. It has its own logic, no less strict and obligatory than the logic of natural processes. It exists in the form of law, does not allow exceptions. But this is such a law, which is established by the personality itself, by its free will. In morality, man is subject, in the precise words of Kant, "only to his own and yet universal legislation."

Morality and morality are intertwined. The rule of morality is, in fact, a thought experiment designed to reveal the reciprocity of mutual acceptance of norms for the subjects of communication.

The term "ethics" comes from the ancient Greek word "ethos" ("ethos"). Initially, ethos was understood as a habitual place of living together, a house, a human dwelling, an animal lair, a bird's nest. Subsequently, it began to predominantly denote the stable nature of a phenomenon, custom, disposition, character; so in one of the fragments of Heraclitus it is said that the ethos of man is his deity. The change in meaning is instructive: it expresses the relationship between a person's social circle and his character. Starting from the words "ethos" in the meaning of character, Aristotle formed the adjective "ethical" in order to designate a special class of human qualities, which he called ethical virtues. Ethical virtues are properties of the character, temperament of a person, they are also called spiritual qualities. They differ, on the one hand, from the dianoetic virtues as properties of the mind. For example, fear is a natural affect, memory is a property of the mind, and moderation, courage, generosity are properties of character. To designate the totality of ethical virtues as a special subject area of meaning and to highlight this knowledge itself as a special science, Aristotle introduced the term "ethics".

For an accurate translation of the Aristotelian concept of ethical from Greek into Latin, Cicero constructed the term "moralis" (moral). He formed it from the word "mos" (mores - the Latin analogue of the Greek "ethos", denoting character, temperament, fashion, tailoring, custom. Cicero, in particular, spoke of moral philosophy, understanding it as the same field of knowledge that Aristotle In the 4th century AD, the term “moralitas” (morality) appears in Latin, which is a direct analogue of the Greek term “ethics”.

Both of these words, one of Greek, the other of Latin origin, are included in the new European languages. In a number of languages, their own words appear, denoting the same reality, which is generalized in terms of "ethics" and "morality". This is “morality” in Russian. As far as one can judge, they repeat the history of the emergence of the terms "ethics" and "morality": from the word "nature" (sitte) the adjective "moral" (sittlich) is formed, and from it already - a new noun "morality" (Sittlichkeit).

In the original meaning, "ethics", "morality", "morality" are different words, but one term. Over time, the situation is changing. In the process of cultural development, in particular, as the identity of ethics as a field of knowledge is revealed, different meanings begin to be assigned to different words: ethics mainly means the corresponding branch of knowledge, science, and morality (morality) - the subject studied by it. There are also various attempts to breed the concepts of morality and ethics. According to the most common of them, dating back to Hegel, morality is understood as the subjective aspect of the corresponding actions, and morality is the actions themselves in their objectively expanded completeness: morality is what the actions of an individual see in his subjective assessments, intentions, feelings of guilt, and morality What are the actual actions of a person in real experience life of the family, people, state. It is possible to single out a cultural and linguistic tradition, which understands morality as high fundamental principles, and morality as mundane, historically changeable norms of behavior; in this case, for example, the commandments of God are called moral, the instructions of a school teacher - moral.

On the whole, attempts to assign a different substantive meaning to the words "ethics", "morality", "morality" and, accordingly, to give them a different conceptual and terminological status, have not gone beyond the scope of academic experiments. In general cultural vocabulary, all three words continue to be used interchangeably. For example, in living Russian, what is called ethical standards, with the same right can be called moral norms or moral norms. In a language that claims scientific rigor, significant meaning is given mainly to the distinction between the concepts of ethics and morality (morality), but even this does not fully withstand. Sometimes ethics as a field of knowledge is called moral (moral) philosophy, and the term ethics (professional ethics, business ethics) is used to refer to certain moral (moral) phenomena.

Ethics should be called a science, a field of knowledge, an intellectual tradition, and "morality" or "morality", using these words as synonyms, - that which is studied by ethics, its subject.

What is morality (morality)? This question is not only the original, the first in ethics; throughout the history of this science, covering about two and a half thousand years, it has remained the main focus of its research interests. Different schools and thinkers give different answers to it. There is no single, indisputable definition of morality, which is directly related to the originality of this phenomenon. Reflections on morality turn out to be different images of morality itself not by chance. Morality is more than a collection of facts to be generalized. It acts simultaneously as a task that requires, among other things, also theoretical reflection. Morality is not just what is.

She is what she should be. Therefore, an adequate relationship between ethics and morality is not limited to its reflection and explanation. Ethics is also obliged to offer its own model of morality: moral philosophers in this respect can be likened to architects, whose professional vocation is to design new tasks.

These definitions are largely consistent with commonly held views of morality. Morality appears in two interrelated, but nevertheless different differences: a) as a characteristic of a person, a set of moral qualities, virtues, for example, truthfulness, honesty, kindness; b) as a characteristic of relations between people, a set of moral norms (requirements, commandments, rules), for example, “do not lie”, “do not steal”, “do not kill”.

1.1 Moral dimension of personality

Morality, starting from Greek antiquity, was understood as a measure of a person's dominance over himself, an indicator of how much a person is responsible for himself, for what he does.

There is such evidence in Plutarch's Biographies. When during the competition a certain pentathlete accidentally killed a man with a dart, Pericles and Protagoras - the great ruler of Athens and the famous philosopher - spent the whole day arguing about who was to blame for what happened - the dart; the one who threw it, or the one who organized the competition. This example shows that ethical reflection is stimulated by the need to understand the issues of guilt and responsibility.

The question of man's dominance over himself is first and foremost the question of the dominance of reason over passions. Morality, as can be seen already from the etymology of the word, is associated with character, temperament. If a person distinguishes the body, soul and mind (spirit), then it is a qualitative characteristic of his soul. When they say about a person that he is sincere, they usually mean that he is kind, sympathetic. When someone is called soulless, they mean that he is evil, cruel. The view of morality as a qualitative certainty of the human soul was substantiated by Aristotle. At the same time, under the soul, he understood such an active, active-volitional principle in a person, which contains a reasonable and unreasonable part and represents their interaction, interpenetration, synthesis.

Human affects (passions, desires) can be carried out taking into account the instructions of the mind or contrary to them.

Morality in relation always acts as moderation, it is closer to asceticism, the ability of a person to limit himself, to impose, if necessary, a ban on his natural desires. It is opposed to sensual unbridledness. At all times and among all peoples, morality has been associated with restraint. Of course, about restraint in relation to affects, selfish passions. Among the moral qualities, one of the first places was certainly occupied by such qualities as moderation and courage - evidence that a person knows how to resist gluttony and fear, these most powerful instinctive urges of his animal nature, knows how to rule over them.

Mastery over the passions, to control the passions, does not mean to suppress them. After all, the passions themselves can also be enlightened, namely, tuned to follow the correct judgments of the mind. They, to use the images of Aristotle, can oppose reason, just as obstinate horses oppose a charioteer, but they can also obey reason, just as a son obeys his father. In a word, two questions must be distinguished: what is the optimal ratio of reason and feelings (passions, inclinations) and how such a ratio is achieved.

“Rather, the rightly directed movement of the senses, and not reason, is the beginning of virtue,” says Aristotle in the Great Ethics. If the feelings are directed correctly, then the mind, as a rule, follows them. If reason is the source of virtue, then the senses most often oppose it.

Where does the mind direct the feelings (passions), or, to put it another way, what does it mean to follow the instructions of the mind? Isn't a seasoned, cold-blooded villain carrying out a well-thought-out, intellectually rich crime guided by reason?

Reasonable behavior is morally perfect when it is directed to a perfect goal - a goal that is considered unconditional (absolute) is recognized as the highest good.

Reasonableness of behavior coincides with its expediency. This means that a person foresees the possible course and outcome of events and in advance, ideally, in the form of a goal, formulates the result that he has to achieve. Purposeful connection of events reverses the causal relationship. Here, the consequence (final result), acquiring the ideal form of a goal, becomes a cause that triggers the mechanism of activity.

Human activity, however, is diverse; accordingly, the goals that are realized in it are diverse. At the same time, various goals are interconnected hierarchically, and what in one respect is an end, in another respect becomes a means.

The chain of purposeful connections that govern human activity tends to go to infinity, which makes senseless and makes the activity itself impossible as expedient. To prevent this from happening, it is necessary to assume the existence of some final goal, a kind of goal of goals. Such an assumption must be made on the basis that only the presence of an activity goal gives the latter a reasonable-meaningful character, launches its very mechanism. And the various ends, each of which becomes a means in relation to the other, form a single hierarchical system, and thus a single activity.

The last goal is the absolute starting point of human activity. In this sense, it is a postulate necessary for it to be possible at all to think of human activity as expedient. Nothing can be said about the last goal except that it is the last. It is desirable in itself, it is an end in itself. Everything else is undertaken for its sake, but it itself can never be a means to anything else. It cannot be the subject of praise, because praise presupposes the presence of a higher criterion, it causes unconditional respect. The last goal is there at the same time the highest goal, only in its perspective do all other goals become meaningful and can be assessed.

The goal at the same time acts as a blessing for a person, since it is what he lacks and strives for. Since every goal is good, i.e. good, at least relatively, for someone and for something, then the latter goal can be called the highest good. The highest good is unconditional (absolute), it gives meaning to human activity as a whole, expresses its general positive direction.

The same idea can be expressed in another way. Man always strives for the good. However, it turns out that good things have a downside, often becoming bad. For example, a person wants to become rich. On becoming rich, he discovers. That he became an object of envy, that he had a new basis for anxiety - the fear of losing wealth. Man is drawn to knowledge. But the further he moves along this path, the more confusion and doubts arise in him (as it is said in Ecclesiastes, there is much sorrow in much wisdom). This is what happens in everything. The question arises: “Is there something that would be good in itself, always, that can never become bad”? If there is such a thing, then it will be called the highest good. Man, insofar as he lives a conscious life, proceeds from the assumption of the existence of a higher good.

People decipher the highest good for themselves in different ways. Philosophers understand it differently. Some call pleasure the highest good, others - benefit, others - love of God, fourth - the joy of knowledge, etc. However, they all converge in an explicitly or implicitly expressed conviction that it is natural for a person to strive for the highest good, that he must have some absolute point of support in his conscious life.

The infinity of the purposeful series, as well as the need to complete it with a certain self-sufficient goal, orientation towards the highest good are essentially related to the specifics of a person, his special place in the world.

The vital activity of all living beings, including the highest primates most related to man, is pre-programmed. It contains its norm in itself. Man is an exception. In his behavior there is no predestination, no predetermined program. He himself formulates the norms by which he lives. Individual variations in behavior, sometimes more, are also observed in animals. However, they are just fluctuations around a certain, permanent, reproducing type of behavior. A person can and even has to choose the type of behavior. Different people and the same person at different times can do different, mutually exclusive actions. Animals have an innate prohibition against fratricide, emotional mechanisms by virtue of which the manifestations of life are a source of pleasant sensations, and the manifestations of death (the sight of blood, a grimace of horror, etc.) give rise to disgust. A person is “free” to the extent that he cultivates fratricide and is able to rejoice in suffering (phenomena of sadism, masochism). Man is an unfinished being and, in his incompleteness, left to himself.

A person is not identical to himself to such an extent that he perceives this non-identity as a disadvantage. He is driven by the desire to become different and at the same time seeks to be free from this desire to become different. Philosophy and other forms of culture in the early stages were dominated by spatial images of the universe. The universe was presented in the form of a complete structure, where the lower tier is the mortal world, and the upper one is some kind of ideal, eternal state equal to itself, which was most often placed in heaven. The man himself was somewhere in the middle. He is neither below nor above. He is on a staircase that leads from the bottom up. He's on his way. It connects earth and sky. When describing human existence in the philosophy of Neoplatonism, the image of a person who is waist-deep in water was used. Man occupies a middle position in space. In modern times, temporary images of the Universe prevailed, the latter began to be considered in development. Man appeared as the main source and subject of development. In this case, he finds himself in the middle, but now already in the middle of the path between the past and the future. Progress, the desire to break into the superhuman reality of the ideal future became his main passion.

The orientation of the mind to the highest good is found in good will. The concept of good will as a specific sign of morality was substantiated by Kant. He saw goodwill as the only absolute good. Only good will has value in itself; it is called good because it can never become evil, turn against itself. All other goods, whether bodily (health, strength), external (wealth, honor), spiritual (self-control, determination), mental (memory, wit), no matter how important they are for a person, nevertheless, in themselves, without a good wills can be used for vicious purposes. Only good will has absolute value.

By good will, Kant understood pure will - pure from considerations of profit, pleasure, worldly prudence, in general, any empirical motives. The absence of self-loving motives becomes an independent motive in it. An indicator of goodwill can be considered the ability to act, which not only does not promise any benefit to the individual, but even involves obvious losses for him. For example, out of two options business behavior, one of which can bring a benefit of one million rubles, and the second - ten times more, a person will naturally choose the second. Nevertheless, there are actions (for example, betrayal of a friend, treason to the Motherland) that a person who considers himself moral and wants to be moral will not do it for any money. Good will is selfless will. It cannot be exchanged for anything else. It has no price in the sense that it is priceless.

By good will is meant what is usually called a pure heart. The concept of good will is designed to distinguish between what a person does from a pure heart, from what he does with some specific purpose. In essence, we are talking about the source, the final cause of actions - more specifically, whether the will is free in choosing actions or not, whether the will can act from itself or it always mediates external influences, is only a special link in an endless chain of causal relationships. Will, only by becoming good will, becomes the cause of itself. Good will is something that completely depends on the individual, the area of its undivided dominance and undivided responsibility. It differs from all other motives in that it is unconditional, primordial and can remain impenetrable to external causes in relation to it - natural, social, psychological. Through good will, actions are drawn to the individual as to their final foundation.

Thus, you see that the moral dimension of a person is associated with his rationality, his rationality is associated with orientation to the highest good, orientation to the highest good is associated with good will. Thus, a circle is obtained, as it were: from the assertion that a person is moral to the extent that he is rational, we have come to the conclusion that a person is reasonable to the extent that he is moral. Reason is the basis of morality as moral reason.

Good will, inasmuch as it is will, cannot remain a fact of self-consciousness of the individual and be verified only in the course of self-analysis. Morality as a volitional attitude is the sphere of actions, practical and active positions of a person. And actions objectify internal motives and the thoughts of the individual, put him in a certain relation to other people. The key question for understanding morality is the following: how is the moral perfection of a person related to the nature of his attitude towards other people?

Morality characterizes a person in terms of his ability to live in a human hostel. The space of morality is the relationship between people. When a person is said to be strong or smart, these are the properties that characterize the individual in and of themselves; he does not need other people to discover them. But when they say about a person that he is kind, generous, amiable, then these properties are found only in relations with others and describe the very quality of these relations.

Relationships between people are always very specific. They are built every time for a specific reason, for specific purposes. Such a goal can be the reproduction of life - and then we have the area of marriage and family relations. It can be health - and then we have a healthcare sector. It can be life support - and then we have an economy. This may be protection from crime - and then we have a judicial-repressive system. Relationships are built on the same principle not only on the scale of society, but also in the personal sphere: there is always something third between a person and a person, thanks to which their relations acquire dimension. People enter into relationships with each other insofar as they do something together: write an article, dine in a restaurant, play chess, gossip, etc. Let us ask ourselves the question: what will remain in the relations between them if we completely subtract from them this “something”, everything concrete, all those things, interests, needs, about which these relations are built? What will remain is what makes these relations possible - their social form, the very primordial need of people for living together as natural and unique. possible condition their existence. This will be the moral.

Morality is such an orientation of people towards each other, which is conceived to exist prior to any concrete, diversely dismembered relations between them and makes these relations themselves possible. Of course, the experience of cooperation determines morality in the same way that hostility destroys it. But without morality, neither the experience of cooperation nor the experience of hostility could take place. All divisions of relations, including their division into relations of cooperation and enmity, are divisions within the space of human relations that is set by morality.

Morality can be called a social form that makes possible the relationship between people in all their concrete diversity. It seems to connect people to all ties, outlines that ideal universe within which only human existence can unfold as human. Human relations and humanity of relations are very close concepts. Morality is that very humanity without which human relations would never have acquired a human (social) character.

The unity of free will and universality (objectivity, general validity, necessity) is salient feature morals. Morality should never be equated with arbitrariness. It has its own logic, no less strict and obligatory than the logic of natural processes. It exists in the form of law, does not allow exceptions. But this is a law that is established by the individual himself, by his free will. In morality, man is subject, in the precise words of Kant, "only to his own and yet universal legislation." Morality embodies the unity of the individual, personal and universal, objective. It represents the autonomy of the will, its self-legislation.

At the same time, it is believed that morality can be explained from the special conditions of human life and be interpreted as an expression of certain social interests, a kind of pleasure, a stage of biological evolution. In everyday life, this approach is expressed in the view that each person and group of people has its own morality. The other extreme is the denial of personal autonomy and the interpretation of morality as an expression of divine will, cosmic law, historical necessity, or other supra-individual power. The most productive on this path is the formulation of the golden rule of morality: "(Do not) act towards others as you (not) would like others to act towards you."

Golden Rule- the fundamental rule of morality, most often identified with morality itself. It arises in the middle of the first millennium BC, in the so-called "axial time" (K. Jaspers), and most clearly embodies the humanistic upheaval that took place at that time, under the sign of which humanity lives to this day. It appears simultaneously and independently in various cultures - ancient Chinese (Confucius), ancient Indian (Buddha), ancient Greek (Seven Sages) - but in strikingly similar formulations. Once having arisen, the golden rule firmly enters the culture, both in the philosophical tradition and in the public consciousness, and among many nations it turns into a proverb.

This rule was most often thought of as the fundamental, most important moral truth, the focus of practical wisdom.

It received its name of gold in the 18th century. in the Western European spiritual tradition.

The golden rule of morality requires a person in his relations with other people to be guided by such norms that could be applied to himself, norms about which he could wish that other people were guided by them in their relation to him. In other words, it requires a person to obey universal norms and offers a mechanism for revealing their universality. The essence of this mechanism is as follows: in order to test a certain norm for universality and thereby find out whether it can really be considered moral, a person needs to answer the question whether he would accept, would he sanction this norm if it were practiced by other people according to in relation to himself. To do this, he needs to mentally put himself in the place of another (others), i.e. the one who will experience the action of this norm, and put the other (others) in their own place. And if, with such an exchange of dispositions, the norm is accepted, then it means that it has the quality of a moral norm.

The golden rule of morality is the rule of reciprocity. It, in fact, is a thought experiment designed to reveal the reciprocity, mutual acceptability of norms for the subjects of communication. Thus, the danger is blocked, which consists in the fact that the universality of the norm can be a cover for the selfish interest - both of the person himself and of other people, and that some individuals can impose it on others.

To understand the golden rule of morality, it is essential to note that its content is given in two different modalities (modality here means a mode of existence). In the part in which it relates to others and affirms universality as a sign of morality, it has an ideal character: what do you not like in another; how you want (would like) people to treat you.

Thus, the marked inconsistency of morality, which consists in the fact that it is generated by the personality itself and has a universal (generally significant) character, is removed if we assume that the universal moral law has a different modality for the personality itself, the product of whose rational will it is, and for others. people who fall within its scope.

Summarizing all that has been said, morality can be briefly defined as: 1) the dominance of reason over affects; 2) striving for the highest good; 3) good will, unselfishness of motives; 4) the ability to live in a human hostel; 5) humanity or the social (human) form of relations between people; 6) autonomy of will; 7) reciprocity of relations, expressed in the golden rule of morality.

These definitions refer to different aspects of morality. They are interrelated with each other in such a way that each of them presupposes all the others. In particular, such intercorrelation is characteristic of definitions that fix, on the one hand, the moral qualities of a person, and, on the other hand, the moral qualities of relations between people. A moral (virtuous, perfect) person knows how to restrain himself, to rule over passions. Why is he doing this? In order not to collide with other people, to harmoniously build his relations with them: figuratively speaking, he understands that he cannot occupy a common bench alone, and feels obliged to move in order to make room for others. moral man aimed at the highest good. But what is the highest good? This is such an unconditional goal, which, by virtue of its absoluteness, is recognized by all people, allowing them to unite in society, and the path to which lies through such a connection. A moral person is disinterested, has good will.

In a word, a morally perfect person receives an active embodiment and continuation in morally perfect relations between people.

The multidimensionality of morality is one of the reasons for its various interpretations. In particular, the difference between the morality of the individual and the morality of society provides great food for this. Some thinkers associated morality primarily with the self-improvement of the individual (a typical example is the ethics of Spinoza).

Philosophers such as Hobbes, for example, saw morality mainly as a way of streamlining the relations of people in society. In the history of ethics, synthetic theories are also widely represented, which sought to combine individual morality with social morality. It can be noted, however, that they also repelled either from the individual or from society. So, Shaftesbury, Hume and other English sentimentalists of the XVIII century. proceeded from the belief that a person by nature has special social feelings of benevolence, sympathy, which induce him to solidarity, altruism in relations with other people. K. Marx, on the contrary, believed that only the transformation of social relations is the basis for the moral elevation of the individual.

The multidimensionality of morality as a phenomenon turns into its ambiguity as a concept not only in ethics. The same is true in everyday experience. People very often do not even realize what morality is. Then, when they think about this question, they come to conclusions, which, as a rule, are very subjective, one-sided, and not strict.

Because morality is ambiguous, people with different, including conflicting, economic, political and other interests can appeal to it. Thanks to this, it keeps conflicting, often polar forces within the framework of a single space of human mutual respect and promotes social communication between them.

Summing up General characteristics morality, we can say that it outlines the internal semantic boundary of human activity, set by the person himself. It allows and obliges a person to consider own life and surrounding activities as if they depended on his choice. It should be emphasized that morality is not identical with the highest meaning, the ultimate goal of the existence of man and society. Its purpose is different - to connect personal meaning with the highest meaning, to aim a person at the last goal. At the same time, it does not matter in principle whether there really is a higher meaning, the last goal or not. Morality comes from the fact that they exist. If she does not accept them as a fact, she accepts them as a postulate. Even in those deformed cases when life is viewed as meaningless fuss, this very fussiness is given a binding, moral-imperative meaning (“live one day”, “seize the moment”); meaninglessness becomes a kind of meaning. Through morality, the life of a person and society acquires integrity, internal meaningfulness. Or rather: integrity, inner meaningfulness of life is morality.

1.2 Features of the functioning of morality

morality morality ethics rationality

From the understanding of morality, a number of its features follow as an effective factor in the life of a person and society. First, it acts as a practical, active consciousness. In morality, the ideal and the real coincide, form an inseparable whole. Morality is the ideal, but such an ideal, which at the same time is the real beginning of a person's conscious life. This idea L.N. Tolstoy put it this way. Just as one cannot move without this movement being a movement in certain direction You can't live without life having no meaning. The meaning of life, coinciding with the very consciousness of life, is morality.

Moral statements must be taken in their binding meaning. Of course, morality does not exist outside of what a person says, but even less does it come down to this.

Moral statements can be considered moral and taken in their direct meaning only when the one who formulates these statements formulates them in order to try them on for himself. The truth of morality coincides with its effectiveness. Morality is a game in which a person puts himself on the line. Ordinary consciousness formulates the same thought when it identifies the moral goal with the holy, sacred. The holy does not allow trampling and, as a special case of this, it does not allow vainglory. A holy man cannot be renounced without renouncing himself. You can't just speculate, be witty about a saint; the words in which the holy is clothed are carved into the heart.

Morality is not confined to some particular area or particular aspect of human and social life - say, labor Relations, on sexual relations, on borderline life situations. It covers all the diversity of human existence. Morality is omnipresent, it has the right to vote everywhere and everywhere where a person acts as a person, as a free rational being.

A certain basis of human existence, morality exists not as a state, but as a vector of conscious life. It acquires reality as an obligation. Must cannot be opposed to being. It is a special - purely human - form of being.

Morality cannot fit into any content-specific, positive demand, nor can it fit into their totality, no matter how complete this totality may be. Since morality considers the life of a person as a finite being in the perspective of infinite perfection, since further this perspective is also infinite, then its requirements can only fix the imperfection of a person, his distance from the goal. Therefore, moral demands in the proper sense, as demands that claim to be absolute, unconditional, can only be negative.

Since moral requirements claim to be absolute, unconditionally obligatory, the only possible positive moral requirement is the requirement to be moral. What does it mean? We know that a person and human (social) relations begin with morality, that morality sets the inner semantic boundary of the proper human mode of existence, and in this sense it is identical to humanity. It follows that to be moral means to recognize the unconditional value, the holiness of man.

The human personality is more than what it does. She is intrinsically valuable. Actually, defining the human personality as a morally responsible being, we define it as a being that has intrinsic value and is worthy of respect.

The idea, according to which the unconditional obligatory nature of the requirements of morality is found in the requirement that affirms the intrinsic value of the human personality, has been deciphered in the history of culture in different ways: as love for one's neighbor, brotherhood of people, human solidarity, incense before life. However, its most strict and adequate form is a categorical ban on violence, first of all and mainly on killing a person.

Violence is the usurpation of free will, such a relationship between people in the course of which some by force, by coercion, impose their will on others. A person commits violence when he deprives another of the opportunity to act according to his own will, destroying him or reducing him to the position of a slave. Such forms of coercion do not fall under violence when one will dominates another with its consent, as, for example, in the relationship: teacher - students, legislators - citizens. Violence is directly opposed to morality: to act morally means to act with the consent of those whom these actions concern; to commit violence is to commit acts that are not acceptable to those against whom they are directed.

Non-violence is a principled abstinence from putting one's will above the will of another (behind the forced imposition of one's will on the will of another there is always the belief that it is higher, better than the latter). It is the recognition of the will of another of the same capacity for free, reasonable, morally responsible decisions that I myself possess. Non-violence means a categorical refusal to place oneself in human terms above another, to be his judge. This is a real recognition that each person is valuable in himself.

The prohibition on violence is the first and basic moral prohibition. Its most famous formulations are “Thou shalt not kill” Moses, non-resistance to the evil of Jesus Christ, ahimsa (literally - non-violence, non-harming) of ancient Indian culture (especially the religion and philosophy of Jainism); new life the principle of non-violence found in the XX century. thanks to the spiritual and practical efforts of L. N. Tolstoy, M. Gandhi, M.-L. King. The requirements of non-violence, in essence, are a ban on what is obviously opposed to morality, to goodness. It is in this content that it has an unconditional, categorical meaning.

We can say definitely only about what is not morality. The principle of non-violence is just a ban on what is opposite to morality - a ban on violence. Only he can claim unconditional obligatoriness, absoluteness.

The requirement of non-violence is a concretization of the golden rule of morality. The golden rule is a formula by which a person can calculate whether his actions are moral or not, just as, for example, speed is determined by dividing distance by time. Are there any human actions that are always moral in themselves, without any verification, and which in this sense can be considered an indicator of a person's responsible attitude to the golden rule? Is there, continuing the analogy, in morality something similar to the speed of light? Yes there is. This is non-violence. The golden rule requires you to act as a person would like others to act towards him. But a person cannot want (will) violence against himself, because violence denies him this very right to want (will) anything.

The peculiarity of morality as an effective factor in life is determined by the fact that it is the starting point of the value world. This is the last, highest authority in regard to norms, assessments, value ideas that express the internal predetermination of the meaning of human life. But a syllogism cannot consist of one general premise. It also needs a small package.

The actions of people, their relationships, as already emphasized, are always concrete, have their own private, special content, behind them are certain and quite sufficient empirical motives for committing these actions. The most difficult and most important question of human practice is the question of how the objectively diverse, historically changeable, each time concrete, causally determined content of human actions is combined with their moral assessment.

First of all, let us ask ourselves the question: on what does a historically concrete, qualitatively unique form of morality depend? It depends decisively on the understanding of the highest good. After all, morality is not the highest good itself, but such a focus on the highest good, when the latter is recognized as an unconditional value priority. different people in different societies, in different eras understood the highest good in different ways. It could be a religious idea, a social idea, a national idea, a clan idea, an individual idea, and so on. Moreover, each idea - in the form of Christianity, Islam and other confessions, the national idea - in the form of diverse nationalisms, the idea of personality - in the form of reasonable egoism, human rights and other varieties of individualism. How these ideas are formed, interact, rise and degrade is the subject of the sciences that study society. Ethics are interested in them only to the extent that they need moral approval and condemnation.

War as a certain social relation puts a person in front of the need to overcome the horror associated with death. When he learns to do this, develops the appropriate skill in himself, he is called courageous. Accordingly, courage is considered a moral virtue. Other types of behavior in the same situation, and above all cowardice as the inability to rise above the horror of death, are considered as gunpowder. Having exhaustively analyzed this issue in Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle emphasizes that behavior similar to courageous can be caused by random and external motives (experience, arrogance, ignorance of danger, etc.), but it will not be courageous. Truly courageous should be considered only one who is such only for the reason that he considers courage a virtue, a worthy way of behavior. Thus, courage as a certain quality of a person and a type of behavior is given a moral value in itself. Many historically existing moral codes read courage as a predominant moral quality.

Disputes about which ideas can be considered the highest good and have an absolute value priority, which qualities of the human character are virtues, which mores, customs, social habits, norms of behavior are morally justified and which are not, the struggle against established moral shrines, in the place of which other, tireless searches for perfect forms of human relationships, accompanied from time to time by crises of values, all this constitutes the main line and inner nerve of moral life in its historical development.

The functioning of morality in the real experience of social life gives rise to specific difficulties associated with the fact that morality affirms the self-worth of the individual, and in the course of practical activity people become hierarchical, in which some control others. These difficulties find expression in a number of paradoxes, the most typical and widespread of which are the paradoxes of moral evaluation and moral behavior.

The paradox of moral assessment is connected with the question of who can administer a moral judgment, who has the right to make moral assessments. It would be logical to assume that such a function can be assumed by people who stand out from the general mass in terms of moral qualities, just as it happens in all other areas of knowledge and practice in which the word of a specialist is decisive (the musician has the right to make an authoritative judgment about music, on legal issues - a lawyer, etc.). However, one of the undoubted moral qualities of a person is modesty, more precisely, the awareness of one's imperfection. Moreover, the higher a person is morally, the more critical he is of himself. Therefore, a truly moral person cannot consider himself worthy of judging someone. On the other hand, people who willingly take on the role of teacher and judge in matters of morality reveal such a quality as complacency, which is organically alien to morality and unmistakably indicates that these people have taken up the wrong job. Real-life observations show that such a false role is most often played by people who occupy higher levels in social-hierarchical structures (leaders in relation to subordinates, teachers in relation to students). It turns out: those who could administer a moral judgment will not do it; those who would like to exercise moral judgment cannot be trusted to do so. Moral judgment in this context is understood broadly - as moral teaching, moral condemnation and praise.

"Do not judge others" means the unity of the subject and object of moral evaluation as a condition for its normal functioning in society. This condition is especially strict and indisputable when it comes to moral condemnation of others. As for the moral praise of others, the question of its justification and specific forms needs special detailed consideration. However, it is clear that, at least in certain cases praising others can be a covert form of self-praise. One must have the right not only to condemn others, but also to praise them. And to whom is it given?

The paradox of moral behavior in its classical formulation is usually traced back to Ovid: “I see the good, I praise it, but I am attracted to the bad.”

It is human nature to strive for what is better, to prefer the good to evil, he cannot be an enemy to himself. In Ovid's situation (and this is its paradox), everything happens the other way around: a person chooses the worst, the bad, harms himself. It turns out: a person knows what is good (good), but does not follow it; it has no binding meaning for him. Is it possible in this case to consider that he really sees and approves the best, has the knowledge that he claims to have?

In the case of moral, as in any other, statements, a distinction must be made between what a person actually knows and what he thinks he knows. The criterion for such a breeding of true and false statements is experimental verification, practice. Such an experiment in morality, as already emphasized, is the extent to which moral judgments are obligatory for the one who makes them. We have no other criterion to test whether a person really sees the best than his efforts to condemn what he considers the best. In morality, knowing and choosing are one and the same; the truth of morality is tested by the willingness to experience its beneficial power.

If we are guided by what people approve of and in what moral light they want to appear before themselves and others, then we would have to transfer them all, and above all the most notorious villains, to the category of angels. It is not necessary to suffer from excessive suspicion in order not to believe the moral self-certification of a person. Joint human life, the social atmosphere would be much cleaner if individuals did not think, and in any case, did not each say about themselves that they are good, honest, conscientious people.

The first of the considered deformations of morality (the paradox of moral evaluation) arises from the false assumption that some individuals have full morality, while others are completely devoid of it, some are good, others are evil. The second deformation (the paradox of moral behavior) is also associated with the dilution of good and evil, but on a different basis, namely, with the false assumption that intentions can be exclusively good, and actions - exclusively evil. In fact, morality is the inalienable fundamental principle of conscious life, its real meaning. Therefore, any moral posture, when someone speaks on behalf of morality, portraying himself as its interpreter, bearer, guardian, is a false posture.

Literature

1. Lachugina Yu. N. Ethics business relations: tutorial/ Yu. N. Lachugina; Ulyan. state tech. un-t. - Ulyanovsk: UlGTU, 2010. - 96 p.

2. Popova L.L. Modern technologies communication: study guide [ electronic resource] / L.L. Popova - Tomsk: Publishing House of the Tomsk Polytechnic University, 2009. - 180 p.

3. Fionova L.R. Ethics business communication: Tutorial. - Penza: Publishing House of PGU, 2010. - 126 p.

4. Gorbatov A.V., Eleskina O.V. Business ethics: Tutorial. - Kemerovo: Kuzbassvuzizdat, 2007. - 142 p.

5. Gromova L.A. Ethics of management: Educational and methodical manual. - St. Petersburg: Publishing house of the Russian State Pedagogical University im. A.I. Herzen, 2007. - 183 p.

6. Dedyulina M.A., Papchenko E.V. Etiquette: Educational and methodical manual. - Taganrog: Publishing House of TTI SFU, 2008. - 174 p.

7. Myakushkin D.E. The Art of Talking on the Phone: A Study Guide. - Chelyabinsk, SUSU Publishing House, 2007.

8. Nazarenko O.G. Business Russian language: textbook. - Vladivostok: Publishing House of Moscow State University. Admiral G.I. Nevelskoy, 2008. - 41 p.

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The ideas that became the basis of evolutionary ethics were expressed by Charles Darwin, who devoted two chapters of his fundamental work The Origin of Man and Sexual Selection (1859) to the problems of morality and its emergence, where he substantiated the position on the natural, biological prerequisites for morality. In his understanding of the essence of morality, Darwin was not original, remaining within the framework set by D. Hume, A. Smith and J.S. Mill. However, he tried to give a natural-scientific explanation of such well-known ethical ideas as "moral feeling", "public emotions" and "sympathy".

The main provisions of Darwin regarding the conditions for the emergence and development of morality are as follows:

society exists due to the social instincts that the animal (and man) satisfies in the society of his own kind. From this flow both sympathy and services that turn out to be neighbors. At the same time, services in animals “do not apply to all individuals of the species, but only to members of one community”;
social instinct is transformed into morality due to the high development of mental faculties. Therefore, not only instincts, but also “images of all past actions and love” arising on their basis, play a controlling role, prompting a person to actions aimed at maintaining a joint (social) life, and preventing the dominance of any other instincts over social ones;
thanks to the development of human speech, it became possible to formulate requirements public opinion(requirements of the community), reflecting the needs of cohabitation, and express through approval or disapproval of the attitude towards the actions of members of the community;
sympathy as an expression of a social instinct "is greatly enhanced by exercise or habit."

Modern evolutionary biology expands this Darwinian list. Now it is important to pay attention to the fact that Darwin, well understanding the specificity of morality for a person, speaks not about the development of morality in the course of evolution, but about the evolutionary premises of morality as a phenomenon inherent in human relations, human society. Morality has a natural basis - the so-called social instincts - developed in the process of evolution of the ability to live together, long-term care for offspring, self-restraint and self-sacrifice for the good of the community and its individual members. Being combined with a high (compared to animals) development of the psyche and intellectual functions, the ability to articulate speech and social mechanisms (traditions, management, education, interaction), these instinctive abilities turn out to be the basis for the emergence and existence of morality.

Struggle for existence- one of the main ideas of the classical theory of evolution. Along with natural selection and hereditary variability, it was considered by Darwin and some of his followers as one of the main driving factors in the change of biological species. The struggle for existence is waged within a species, between species, and also with unfavorable conditions. environment. According to this point of view, the struggle for existence leads to the death of the weak individuals and the survival of the strong. Win those who are distinguished by physical endurance, speed, intelligence, cunning, resistance to all sorts of hardships (hunger, cold, disease, natural disasters, etc.). This ensures biological progress.

Transferred to the sphere of social relations, the idea of the struggle for existence became a means of "scientific" substantiation of the naturalness and beneficence of social antagonisms and wars.

Although Darwin called the struggle for existence the main factor in evolution, the data of field studies he cited testified to the presence in nature, along with the struggle for existence, of numerous and regularly repeated facts of cooperation not only within a species, but also between individuals of different species.

One of the first who paid special attention to the theoretical limitations of the principle of the struggle for existence was Karl Fedorovich Kessler, who pointed out the important role in the animal world mutual assistance which is based on parental feelings (Darwin already recognized their importance in the development of sociability, sympathy and moral feeling). Kessler's ideas were accepted by Pyotr Alekseevich Kropotkin, who had extensive experience in scientific field observations of wildlife. Kropotkin not only demonstrated, using a variety of logical* material, how mutual assistance works, but also developed the very understanding of mutual assistance. Mutual-help relationships are largely driven by the shared, or social, way of life of animals and the "social instinct". Parental feelings, family relationships, affection play a significant role in wildlife, and it is the greater, the longer the period of feeding and raising young animals. But mutual aid is widely found in various forms in animals whose concern for reproduction is limited to laying eggs and providing food for the larvae, as in insects, or to spawning, as in amphibians; at these levels of development of life there is no reason to speak of feelings of sympathy and affection. The instinct of sociability appears in the early stages of evolution. Gradually developing, it does not immediately receive the form of sympathy and is embodied not only in sympathy.

An analysis of the vast material of observations of animals in their natural environment, carried out by Kropotkin himself and other researchers in different parts of the world, allowed him to draw a number of important conclusions.

the struggle for existence is waged mainly for vital resources in shared ecological niches; in this struggle, community or social organization constitutes a great advantage, the most important factor in survival and adjustment. The main agent of survival is not an individual, but a union (association);
life in communities is inherent in the animal world. A joint way of life most effectively ensures security, obtaining food, reproduction, preservation of experience, transfer of skills, and is found in the animal world at all stages of evolution;
thanks to the community, not only the strongest survive. The weakest individuals - the sick, the wounded, the aged - also get a chance to survive. The higher the stage of evolutionary development, the more widely practiced care for the weak, which implies in one form or another the ability to recognize someone else's need and sensitivity to it in the form of a negative experience from the sight of someone else's suffering;
in higher vertebrates, the compatibility of actions is due not only to social instinct, but also to situationally arising needs, which is especially clearly seen under emergency conditions that arise in the environment;
associations in the animal world, especially among higher animals, are hierarchical - family, group, association of groups. high forms

associations can create conditions for greater individual and family autonomy within the group;

one of the manifestations of sociability are games that perform the function of educating young animals and at the same time represent a manifestation of excess vital energy, as well as communication that is valuable in itself, in whatever way it manifests itself;
social organization is an order maintained in different ways at different stages of evolution and consisting in the differentiation of social statuses and the distribution of benefits (including food). Violators of order and relations of mutual assistance inevitably become objects of intra-group aggression.

Thus, in classical evolutionary ethics, the genesis of morality is directly associated with biological evolution, and moral feelings are derived from the experience of relationships between animal individuals. Darwin and some of his followers, most notably Thomas Huxley, saw the main factor of evolution in the struggle for existence, in which biological progress was ensured by the strongest and most successful individuals. Darwin's opponents within evolutionary theory, in particular Kropotkin, associated the main factor of evolution with skills. public organization and considered mutual assistance as its main mechanism.

Some of Darwin's statements can be interpreted as follows: he considered morality as a specifically human phenomenon that has only prerequisites in biological evolution. Huxley and Kropotkin distinguished elements of morality at the stages of biological evolution preceding man, understanding moral actions aimed at maintaining social order, the good of the group, mutual assistance relations - everything that ensures the fitness and survival of the group.

Speaking of morality, evolutionary ethics primarily mean mutual assistance, altruism and selflessness, as well as the corresponding communicative and social mechanisms that provide, as one of the first theorists of evolutionary ethics Herbert Spencer said, "the greatest duration, breadth and fullness of life" .

Kropotkin P.A. Mutual assistance as a factor of evolution. M. : Self-education, 2007.S. 51-68.

2 Spencer G. Foundations of ethics. T. II. Part IV. St. Petersburg: Publisher, 1899. S. 5.

EVOLUTIONARY ETHICS- a kind of ethical theory, according to which morality is rooted in human nature and morally positive is such behavior that contributes to "the greatest duration, breadth and fullness of life" (G. Spencer). The evolutionary approach in ethics was formulated by Spencer, however, the main ideas of evolutionary ethics were proposed by Ch. sentimentalism ethical . The main ideas of Darwin, developed by evolutionary ethics, are as follows: a) society exists due to social instincts that a person (like social animals) satisfies in a society of his own kind; from this flow both sympathy and services that turn out to be neighbors; b) social instinct is transformed into morality due to the high development of mental abilities; c) speech has become the strongest factor in human behavior, thanks to which it was possible to formulate the requirements of public opinion (demands of the community); d) social instinct and sympathy are strengthened by habit.

1) the concept of "cumulative fitness" by W.D. Hamilton. According to this concept, the fitness of an individual certainly takes place, but it is subordinated to the fitness of relatives, i.e. cumulative fitness, to which natural selection is directed and which is due not to the survival of the individual, but to the preservation of the corresponding set of genes, the carrier of which is a group of relatives. Thus, the meaning of what evolutionists call altruism is clarified: it is such an individual behavior that increases the opportunities for adaptation and reproduction of a kindred group (even if the corresponding chances of an individual decrease);

2) the concept of "selfish gene" R. Dawkins allows us to give an alternative interpretation of the theory of inclusive fitness. The latter refers exclusively to a group of relatives, but the main "agent" of selection in the process of evolution is not a population or group, but a certain set of genes characteristic of a given related group. An individual is, according to Dawkins, a machine for the survival of a gene, a genetic set. Altruism at the level of individual behavior turns into genetic egoism - and as such turns into an appearance;

3) the concept of "mutual altruism" by R. Trivers, in which helps behavior is explained both within the group and between representatives of different, i.e. unrelated, groups, as well as between representatives various kinds. The essence of the concept is as follows: one individual assists another, believing that in turn she will be repaid in the same way. Difficulties of an ethological nature are possible here: for example, how to maintain balance and what guarantees can be provided against deceivers. As observations show, there are undoubted signs in the behavior of animals that allow them to judge the intentions and goals of "counterparties"; 4) the theory of epigenetic rules (Ch. Lumsden and E. Wilson) or mechanisms that arise in the human psyche (and have an appropriate physical substrate in the brain) in the process and as a result of the interaction of the organism and the environment. These rules have a decisive influence on the thinking and behavior of a person. Epigenetic rules are divided into two classes: a) automatic processes that mediate connections between sensations and perceptions; b) processes arising within and about perceptions and operating on cultural data. According to this theory, morality is encoded in epigenetic rules (primarily in secondary ones); moreover, Mill's utilitarian principle (cf. "Utilitarianism" ) and categorical imperative Kant are rooted in secondary epigenetic rules. In other words, the environment, incl. social, turns out to be a factor in the formation of organic and functional structures, in particular those responsible for moral behavior; then. sociobiologists remove reproaches addressed to them in genetic determinism.

With the absolute significance of the scientific results of the evolutionary theory of human behavior, it is precisely as an explanatory concept that evolutionary ethics is insufficient: remaining at the level of general anthropological definitions, it is impossible to give an adequate theory of morality. The conceptual apparatus borrowed by evolutionary ethics from moral philosophy is being despecified. Evolutionary ethics rejects the theoretical legacy of ethical-philosophical thought and justifies morality as a form of expedient or adaptive behavior. It is characteristic that when describing morality, behavior in general, it dispenses with the concepts of intention, freedom, creativity, universal requirement, does not consider the antithesis between what is due and what is fundamental for understanding morality. Morality in evolutionary ethics is suprapersonal, and to the extent that it is portrayed as the functioning of certain genetic mechanisms oriented towards organismic, population, but not personal goals, it is also unspiritual. An analysis of the fundamental moral imperatives shows that they are aimed at man curbing his passionate nature and spiritualizing his sensuality, i.e. of their “nature”, and presuppose the ability of a person to control his needs, consciously subordinate his interests to the interests of other people, based both on social institutions and on the highest spiritual values.

Literature:

Darwin Ch. The origin of man and sexual selection. SPb., [b. G.];
Kropotkin P.A. Ethics. M., 1991, p. 45–81;
Reuse M., Wilson E. Darwinism and ethics. - "VF", 1987, No. 1;
Efroimson V.P. Genealogy of altruism (Ethics from the standpoint of human evolutionary genetics). - In the book: Genius and ethics. M., 1998, p. 435–466;
Dowkins R. The Selfish Gene. Oxf., 1976;
Lumsden Ch.J., Wilson E.O. Genes, Mind & Culture. The Coevolutionary Process. Cambr., 1981.

evolutionary ethics- The idea that the evolutionary process contains the basis for a full and adequate understanding of the moral nature of man is an old and disreputable idea. In the 19th century it was popularized by the English encyclopedist Herbert Spencer, who began to advocate an evolutionary approach to understanding ethics even before Charles Darwin published his On the Origin of Species in 1859. It began to transform itself into a coherent sociopolitical doctrine, known by the somewhat inaccurate name "social Darwinism" . In our century, however, evolutionary ethics in any of its versions causes much less enthusiasm. Undoubtedly, this is partly due to the fact that the traditional evolutionary ethics, i.e., social Darwinism, has degenerated into a barely disguised justification for the crudest money-grubbing in business practice. Partly evolutionary ethics fell out of favor due to deadly criticism from both biologists and philosophers. On the one hand, a scientist like Thomas Huxley, who, being a great supporter of Darwin, had great authority among evolutionists, argued that there was no reason to conclude ethical principles from the evolutionary process. On the contrary, Huxley argued, our moral obligations are such that with every fiber of our being we have to fight the evolutionary process. On the other hand, a philosopher like J. E. Moore has shown that the Spencerian approach to moral philosophy was full of inconsistencies, contradictions, and unforgivable errors. Because of these various reasons, evolution was rejected as a possible source of understanding of morality, and eyes turned to more plausible directions. . Scholars such as Julian Huxley 2 and Theodosius Dobzhansky 3 , the two leading architects of our modern understanding of the evolutionary process, have always held the view that there must be some connection between our evolutionary animal nature and our own highest moral aspirations. Although, in fairness, we note that these scientists often had to admit that they did not fully understand what kind of proof of connections could be discussed. It would remain in this position. evolutionary ethics- as an idea discredited, but the rejection of which, however, caused a vague feeling of discomfort among its few supporters - if it were not for the support given to it in recent years by the Harvard sociobiologist (researcher of the evolution of social behavior) Edward O. Wilson. In his many publications over the past fifteen years, he has vigorously argued that the links between evolution and ethics are much wider and stronger than most people admit or admit. That, in fact, much of what is of real value to the student of human morality can be found in the evolutionary process. Indeed, Wilson has even gone so far as to argue that the moral philosophy that modern professional philosophers are producing is, for the most part, simply misdirected, and that perhaps the time has come to take the ethical problematic out of philosophers and "biologize" it. Nevertheless, there are philosophers who now feel that the challenge to biology should not and cannot be eliminated so simply. It is true that the work of Wilson in particular, and of other biologists in general, arguing that evolution holds the key to an adequate understanding of ethics, is replete with miscalculations and obvious errors. But just to defend or rush into a critical attack means to miss a lot of what can be of great value even for a professional philosopher. In the end, it cannot be denied that we humans are not a special creation of God - God, who wished to create us in his own image and likeness several millennia ago. Rather, we are the end product of a long, slow, gradual natural process. We are intelligent animals, but we are animals nonetheless. This fact we must bear in mind even then—and especially then—when we think of the most human of all human attributes, which is our moral sense.

I am convinced that modern evolutionary biology shows that this understanding of the evolutionary process is completely wrong. In fact, success in the struggle for existence is often achieved more by means of cooperation and morality than by aggressiveness. In embarking on the development of this provision, I want there to be no ambiguity in the understanding of one point. I am not going to suggest that we are really instinctive animals or that we are always selfish and aggressive - even if we sometimes hide such traits. (Although, of course, I would agree that in us, as it seems obvious to me, these qualities are often present to a greater or lesser extent.) My thesis is that people are by nature not hypocritical, sincere, moral - and this not in spite of, but because of the evolutionary process. To use a term that is often used in this kind of discussion, I would say that, as a result of evolution, people are naturally altruistic. They think, intend, and act in light of the criteria of good and evil. I start from the fact that evolutionary biologists, especially sociobiologists, now know that cooperation plays a huge role in the animal kingdom, and that this is the result of natural selection. Simply put, working together with other organisms is often much more beneficial than trying to fight against everyone and everything. There are various mechanisms by which this interaction is supposed to be explained, the most famous of which is probably "kin selection", where relatives help each other, thus increasing their own reproductive prospects, and "mutual altruism", where not Relatives cooperate because they can count on the reciprocal help of partners in return. This kind social interaction finds wide confirmation from Hymenoptera (ants, bees and wasps) down to primates, and although much remains to be studied here, no one today doubts either its important evolutionary significance or its origin from a selective process. This interaction is more commonly known under the aforementioned name "altruism". It is important, therefore, to note that in this sense and in this usage the term is used metaphorically. When biologists talk about "altruism," they mean social interaction that expands evolutionary possibilities, where such opportunities usually translate into increased reproductive success. It does not yet follow from this that every corresponding action is preceded by a conscious intention, or that such an action is in any sense guided by a sense of good and evil. In other words, it does not follow that when a biologist speaks of "altruism" he is referring to manifestations of genuine altruism. Ants are "altruists". But we have absolutely no reason to think that they are altruists. The second empiric point I would like to make is that human beings are very much animals in need of "altruism" and at the same time very adept at forging "altruistic" relationships. That we need "altruism" is obvious. We are not particularly quick-footed, not particularly strong or physically developed. We achieve biological success only because we work together. As people became more and more skilled at "altruism," they increasingly resorted to it. As they began to resort more and more often to it, they further refined their ability to use it. I proceed from the fact that whatever the true connection between the human in man and his biology, we, of course. are by no means as hardwired as ants. I do not completely deny that some elements of human altruism could arise from such a form - for example, some bonds between parents and children are programmed in us, but as general principle it seems clear that humans have the property of freedom, which ants lack. We simply cannot afford not to take care of our offspring - at least because biologically they are completely dependent and unable to cope with life's difficulties. Therefore, despite the fact that we are "altruists", this first option, associated with blind biological determinism, does not seem to be the main path that evolution has taken us. We need to find some mechanism that brings us into interaction, but not in a thoughtless and blind way, but at least for sufficiently effective and pragmatic motives. I believe that morality is this third way. In other words, what I'm trying to say is that genuine altruism may well be an evolutionary response to the human being's need for "altruism." According to modern evolutionary concepts, the way we think and act is subtly influenced, on a structural level, by our biology. The specificity of my understanding of social behavior can be expressed in the assertion that these innate dispositions impel us to think and act in a moral way. I believe that since it is in our evolutionary interests to act together and be "altruists", biological factors lead us to believe in the existence of unselfish love. That is: biological factors have made altruists out of a pass. We are free to commit morally responsible acts or to abstain from them. Sometimes we do what we think is right, and sometimes we do what we don't think is right; but just because sometimes we do not do what we think is right, it does not follow that we have ceased to consider it right. Finally, there is one more point on which I would like to dwell. Genuine altruism only works if we believe in it. If I know that there really is no such thing as morality - morals, which in a certain sense enters into my flesh and blood, or, if you like, morality, which is “objective,” then I, perhaps, will give up everything and will live only by my momentary selfish interests. , I believe that our biology seems to have conditioned not only the capacity for moral thinking, but also the conviction that morality is, in a certain sense, the essence of ourselves. As for Wilson, he, in collaboration with the young physicist Charles Lumsden, put forward the concept of "epigenetic rule". It is supposed to be some kind of predisposition, determined by genes and guiding the growing organism, manifesting itself in a mature being in the form of abilities and inclinations to think and act in one way or another. Speaking of circumstantial evidence, I would refer to the growing body of arguments supplied by the study of the social behavior of animals, especially such higher primates as chimpanzees and gorillas. We now know that we humans are very close (in a biological sense) to chimpanzees and diverged from their lineage only six million years ago. Thus, chimpanzee behavior is to be expected to be at least quasi- or proto-moral. And in-depth research by primatologists is providing more and more reliable evidence that this is indeed the case. Nevertheless, it is still found that in animals the oldest individuals (in particular) play a peacemaking and regulating role, which, of course, is something more than a mere compatibility with the picture that I have outlined, if the latter is true. . We are ultimately moral because natural selection found it beneficial. Life is a balance between the desire to do as much as possible for oneself and the interests of a social community. Selection encourages us to be unfeigned, literal, non-metaphorical selfishness, to look after our own interests. Interestingly, since we also benefit from social interaction, we have also developed a balancing mechanism, thanks to which we become truly moral beings, or altruists. there are many cases in which the need to struggle with the results of natural selection and with itself is obvious. For example, when World Organization Health announces the fight against disease-causing viruses, then it is directed against the forces of nature. However, only a complete cynic would argue that such an action is immoral. The whole point of the evolutionary ethics that I advocate is that the substantive ethics works because and only because it has such an additional property as a sense of duty, which encourages us to step over the barrier of our selfish motives and go to help our neighbor. Precisely because we consider it our duty to help a starving child, and not just want to help him or believe that sometimes it is not bad to help a starving child - that is why our desire to go to the aid of starving children has a solid foundation. Without this sense of duty that permeates and rises above our desires, social cooperation and development, and ultimately "altruism", could not exist at all. One thing we've learned since Darwin's time is that evolution is not a meaningful upward branching process going in some special direction towards beings of higher worth, in other words, towards humans. Evolution is not a progressive process directed towards the heavens, like a staircase or an escalator. Rather, evolution is a slow, tortuous process that, by its very nature, leads nowhere. The correct metaphor here is not a chain, but a tree or coral.

EVOLUTIONARY ETHICS - a kind of ethical theory, according to which morality is rooted in human nature and morally positive is such behavior that contributes to "the greatest duration, breadth and fullness of life" (G. Spencer). The evolutionary approach to ethics was formulated by Spencer. However, the main ideas of E.e. were suggested Ch. Darwin, who, in fact, tried to substantiate the principles adopted from philosophical empiricism and ethical sentimentalism in a natural-scientific way ( Hume, A. Smith). The main ideas of Darwin regarding the conditions for the development and existence of morality, developed by E.E., are as follows: a) society exists due to social instincts that a person (like any social animals) satisfies in a society of his own kind; from this flow both sympathy and services rendered to one's neighbor; b) social instinct is transformed into morality due to the high development of mental abilities; c) speech has become the strongest factor in human behavior, thanks to which it was possible to formulate the requirements of public opinion (demands of the community); d) social instinct and sympathy are strengthened by habit.

In a modified form, modern biological theories of morality accept all these postulates, the main of which is that humanity in its development underwent a group selection for morality, in particular altruism. In the XX century. Thanks to the achievements of evolutionary genetics and ethology, a number of ideas and concepts have been put forward that seem to make it possible to show the biological conditionality, the evolutionary predestination of human behavior, in particular moral. If classical E.e. (K. Kessler, P.A. Kropotkin, J. Huxley and others) spoke about the qualities necessary for the survival or reproduction of individuals or groups that are selected in the course of evolution, then ethology (C.O. Whitman, K. Lorenz, N. Tinbergen and others), based on the genetic conditioning of the behavior of animals and humans, strives for a thorough, detailed study of the psychophysiological mechanisms of behavior; sociobiology (E. Wilson, M. Rews, V.P. Efroimson, etc.) reveals specific genetic concepts of “total fitness” (W.D. Hamilton), “selfish gene” (R. Dawkins), “mutual altruism ”(R. Trivers), epigenetic rules (C. Lumsden, E. Wilson), explaining the mechanisms of evolutionary selection. The significance of the scientific results of the evolutionary theory of human behavior is generally unconditional. However, it is precisely as an explanatory concept of E.e. insufficient: remaining at the level of general anthropological definitions, it is impossible to give an adequate theory of morality. Borrowed E.e. from moral philosophy, the conceptual apparatus is deprived of its usual characteristics. E.e. refuses the theoretical heritage of ethical and philosophical thought and substantiates morality as a form of expedient or adaptive behavior. It is characteristic that when describing morality, behavior in general, E.e. does without the concepts of intention, freedom, creativity, universal demand; E.e. is not interested in the fundamental antithesis for understanding morality between what should be and what is. In E.e. morality is transpersonal, and to the extent that it is depicted as the functioning of certain genetic mechanisms oriented towards organismic, population, but not personal goals, it is also unspiritual. An analysis of the fundamental moral imperatives shows that they are aimed at man curbing his passionate nature and spiritualizing his sensuality, i.e. of their “nature”, and presuppose the ability of a person to control his needs, consciously subordinate his interests to the interests of other people, based both on social institutions and on the highest spiritual values.

Literature:

Darwin Ch. Origin of man and sexual selection. SPb. (b.g.);

Kropotkin P.A. Ethics. T. 1. The origin and development of morality / He. Ethics. M., 1991;

Reuse M., Wilson E. Darwinism and Ethics // Questions of Philosophy. 1987. No. 1;

Efroimson V.P. Pedigree of altruism (Ethics from the standpoint of human evolutionary genetics) / Genius and ethics. M., 1998;

Dowkins R. The Selfish Gene. Oxford, 1976;

Lumsden Ch.J., Wilson E.O. Genes, Mind & Culture. The Coevolutionary Process. Harvard U.P., 1981.

Dictionary of philosophical terms. Scientific edition of Professor V.G. Kuznetsov. M., INFRA-M, 2007, p. 683-684.