Reactions to papers/books on evolution~morality

This is an organiser or to-do linkpost page for reading and reacting to  the following books, papers, and ideas regarded morality-in-broad-terms in relation to evolution.

It's a gap I am trying to fill. As reactions I won't dig too scholarly into to the intertextual background, and just say where I differ and why. When I get bored or repetitive I stop the reaction and say how far I got into the paper.

My basic position is that 'morality' is an outcome and trying to find direct selection for it is maybe possible but there ain't nothing to find as yet. It’s a wild goose chase, despite all the reasonable arguments.

If there is anything to be selected for in terms of "morality" it is an urge to world the self among others doing the same. I.E. some urge to engage with a subjective or inersubjective soft realities that is prosocially generative and thus 'adaptive'.  Selection for soft realities is very hard to do. So we ended up feeling something should be done, and various outcomes ensure, and that all there is.

Like many of these papers and books listed below.

See also for more general reaction to readings on evolution at Posts on Human Evolution

The ones in bold will have reaction piece. See further comment on my process below the list.

Excerpt (introduction) Giovanni Boniolo and Gabriele De Anna (eds.), Evolutionary Ethics and Contemporary Biology, Cambridge University Press, 2006, 220pp., $75.00 (hbk), ISBN 0521856299. PDF included with William J. FitzPatrick’s review of ‘Giovanni Boniolo and Gabriele De Anna (eds.), Evolutionary Ethics and Contemporary Biology’, Cambridge University Press, 2006, 220pp., $75.00 (hbk), ISBN 0521856299. [via academia.org by Gabriele De Anna]

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Arvan, Marcus. “Morality as an Evolutionary Exaptation.” 1 Jan. 2021. preprint chapter from Empirically Engaged Evolutionary Ethics, Springer – Synthese Library.  https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-68802-8_5 2021 Via  academia.edu. Web.

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Babich, Babette. 2012. ‘“What Makes Human Beings Into Moral Beings?” The Significance of Ethics in the Process of Evolution:’, Revista Voluntas: Estudos Sobre Schopenhauer 2(2): 03–30. [via academia.edu]

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Babette Babich. “The Significance of Ethics in the Process of Evolution: ‘What Makes Human Beings Into Moral Beings?’” Revista Voluntas: Estudos sobre Schopenhauer 2.2 n. pag. Web. 4 Feb. 2026.

Batson D. C., Thompson, E. R. and Chen, H. (2002). 'Moral Hypocrisy: Addressing Some Alternatives' Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 83( 2): 330–339.

Reaction & substackCrosspost: Bejarano, Teresa. “The Most Demanding Moral Capacity: Could Evolution Provide Any Base?” Isidorianum 31, no. 2 (November 24, 2022): 91–126. https://doi.org/10.46543/ISID.2231.1056.

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Berkman, John R. “The Evolution of Moral Wisdom: What Some Ethicists Might Learn from Some Evolutionary Anthropologists.” from Evolution of Wisdom: Major and Minor Keys. Notre Dame, Indiana: Center for Theology, Science, and Human Flourishing, 2018. 183–199.[PDF via academia.edu. Accessed 2 Sept. 2024.]

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Bertini, Daniele. 2020. ‘Introduction The Evolutionary Approach to Ethics: From Animal Prosociality to Human Morality’, European Journal for Philosophy of Religion 12(3). DOI:10.24204/EJPR.V12I3.3411 [via academia.edu or philarchive.org]

Reaction & substackCrosspost: Gerald J. Beyer. “Solidarity by Grace, Nature or Both? The Possibility of Human Solidarity in the Light of Evolutionary Biology and Catholic Moral Theology.” The Heythrop Journal 54.5 (2013): [via academia.edu or https://doi.org/10.1111/heyj.12030 ]


REACTION & substackCrosspost: Broom, Donald Maurice. “The Evolution of Morality.” Applied Animal Behaviour Science 100.1–2 (2006): 20. Print. via academia.edu web.

REACTION & substackCrosspost and also a FOLLOW-UP & substackCrosspost on the expanding circle for: Caso, Juan Manuel Rodríguez, and Ricardo Noguera Solano. “Biological and Cultural Evolution of Morality: The Delusion of Progress.” Revista de Filosofía Fundamental (2022): via academia.edu Web. 21 Aug. 2024.

Collier, John and Stingl, Michael ---
  • REACTION  & substackCrosspost: “Evolutionary Naturalism and the Objectivity of Morality.” Biology and Philosophy (1993) 8: 43-50  [via academia.edu]
    • REACTION & substackCrosspost: “Evolutionary Moral Realism.” Biological Theory (forthcoming 2013) [via academia.edu]

Reaction & substackCrosspost: Cartwright, John. “Naturalising Ethics: The Implications of Darwinism for the Study of Moral Philosophy.” Science & Education Vol. 19 (2009): 407–443. via academia.edu Web. [DOI 10.1007/s11191-009-9205-7]


REACTION & substackCrosspost: Copp, David. “Reflections on the Evolutionary Basis of Morality.” Metascience (2017): via academia.edu Web. 1 Aug 2024. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11016-017-0278-7

REACTION & substackcrosspost : Corradetti, Claudio. “What Makes Us Human? Evolution, Intentionality and Moral Progress.” Jus Cogens Vol. 3, no. 1 (April 1, 2021): 1–10.  [https://doi.org/10.1007/s42439-021-00034-5 via academia.edu] which is an editorial to a special issue of Jus Cogens 'Debating A. Buchanan's Our Moral Fate. Evolution and the Escape from Tribalism'.

Leda Cosmides, Rocardo Anrés Guzmán, and John Tooby. “9. The Evolution of Moral Cognition.” The Routledge Handbook of Moral Epistemology / Edited by Aaron Zimmerman, Karen Jones, Mark Timmons. New York: Routledge, 2018. 174–228.  via academia.edu

REACTION & CrosspostSubstack: Cronk, Lee. “Evolutionary Theories of Morality and the Manipulative Use of Signals.” Zygon 29, no. 1 (1994): 81.https://doi.org/10.1111/J.1467-9744.1994.TB00651.X [also via academia.edu]

Curry, Oliver Scott. “Morality as Natural History: An Adaptationist Account of Ethics. PhD, London School of Economics, London.” London School of Economics and Political Science, 2004. www.academia.edu. Web.


Dean, Timothy:
——— REACTION & substackcrosspost: “Evolution and Moral Diversity.” The Baltic International Yearbook of Cognition, Logic and Communication. Vol. 7: Morality and the cognitive sciences (2012): 1–16. https://doi.org/10.4148/BIYCLC.V7I0.1775 [and via academia.edu]
———. Evolution and Moral Ecology. Doctor of Philosophy, thesis, UNSW, 2014. [via academia.edu]

Deane–Drummond, Celia:
—— Reaction 2014. ‘Evolutionary Perspectives on Inter-Morality and Inter-Species Relationships Interrogated in the Light of the Rise and Fall of Homo Sapiens Sapiens’, Journal of Moral Theology 3(2): 72–94. [via academia.edu] 6 Aug. 2024.
—— “The Birth of Morality and the Fall of Adam through an Evolutionary Inter-Species Lens.” Theology Today 72.2 (2015): 182–193. DOI.org[via academia.org]
———“Are Animals Moral? A Theological Appraisal of the Evolution of Vice and Virtue.” Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science, vol. 44, no. 4, Dec. 2009. DOI.org (Crossref), https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9744.2009.01042.x.

Field, David N. “But Could They Tell Right from Wrong? Evolution, Moral Responsibility and Human Distinctiveness.” via academia.edu. Web. 30 Sept. 2024.

William J. FitzPatrick. (n.d.). ‘Review: Evolutionary Ethics and Contemporary Biology Edited by Giovanni Boniol & Gabriele De Anna.'

Fraser, Ben. “Adaptation, Exaptation, By-Products and Spandrels in Evolutionary Explanations of Morality.” Biological Theory, 5(3): 223-227 (2010): via academia.edu. Web. 2 Sept. 2024.
Fraser, Ben, and Sterelny Kim. [2014]. ‘Evolution and Moral Realism’, submission to The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science. via academia.edu. Web. 

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Garvey, Brian. “The Evolution of Morality and Its Rollback.” History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences 40.2 (2018): via academia.edu. Web. 31 Aug. 2024.

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Geiger, Gebhard. “Evolutionary Anthropology and the Non-Cognitive Foundation of Moral Validity.” Biology and Philosophy Vol. 8, no. 2. 1993 doi.org

Gintis, Herbert. 2008. ‘Strong Reciprocity and the Roots of Human Morality’, Social Justice Research.  via academia.edu

Ursula Goodenough and Terrence Deacon. “From Biology to Consciousness to Morality.” Zygon (2003): via academia.edu. Web. 27 Nov. 2024.

Gruen, Nicholas. 2014, April 26. ‘Nietzschean Evolutionary Psychology’, Club Troppo. Retrieved 5 August 2025 from https://clubtroppo.com.au/2014/04/26/nietzschean-evolutionary-psychology/.

Haeckel, Ernst. The Riddle of the Universe. London: Watts & Co., 1919. Translated from the original 1899 German, Die Welträthsel, by Joseph McCabe.

Reaction & substackCrosspost : Haworth, Alan. “Genes and Citizens: Can Moral Philosophy Learn From Evolutionary Biology?” Res Publica (2001): via academia.edu. Web. 10 Sept. 2024.

READING ONE Joseph Patrick Henrich:

—The Secret of Our Success: How Culture Is Driving Human Evolution, Domesticating Our Species, and Making Us Smarter. 2016. Princeton: Princeton university press.

—‘Chapter 7 The Evolution of Innovation-Enhancing Institutions’, Innovation in Cultural Systems: Contributions from Evolutionary Anthropology, Vienna Series in Theoretical Biology. 2009. Cambridge (Ma.): MIT Press.

— The WEIRDest People in the World: How the West Became Psychologically Peculiar and Particularly Prosperous. 2020. London: Allen Lane an imprint of Penguin Books.

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Hillar, Marian. “Morality Is a Principle of Nature Discovered by Philosophy and Evolutionary Sciences.” English version via academia.edu of the chapter ‘Koncepcja naturalnego prawa moralnego w świetle historycznego rozwoju filozofii etyki i jego interpretacja w świetle nowoczesnych nauk ewolucyjnych’ [pp. 137 – 159.] From Szymczyk, Paulina, and Ewelina Chodźko (eds). Dialog Filozoficzny o Człowieku. Wydawnictwo Tygiel, Lublin, 2021. [book pdf: source and local]

Lawrence M. Hinman. “The Ambiguity and Limits of a Sociobiological Ethic.” International Philosophical Quarterly, Vol. XXIII, No. 1, Issue #89 (1983): 77-89. web.


REACTION & substackCrosspost: Joyce, Richard. “Evolution and Moral Naturalism.” The Blackwell Companion to Naturalism (Forthcoming). Wiley-Blackwell, 2016. via academia.edu. Web.  ISBN9781118657607  [Chapter 26 pages 369-385]

Kamal, Raj. “Evolutionary Anthropology and the Non-Cognitive Foundation of Moral Validity.” Biology & Philosophy (1993): via academia.edu. Web. 18 Aug. 2024.

Kitcher, Philip. 1998. ‘Psychological Altruism, Evolutionary Origins, and Moral Rules’, Philosophical Studies. [Via academia.edu]

Klenk, Michael.
—— 2018. ‘Evolution and Ethics’, 1000-Word Philosophy https://1000wordphilosophy.com/2018/10/11/evolution-and-ethics/.
——2018. ‘Evolution and Moral Disagreement’, Journal of Ethics and Social Philosophy  14(2). [https://doi.org/10.26556/jesp.v14i2.476 also via academia.edu]

Reaction: Korsgaard, Christine M. 2010. Reflections on the evolution of morality. Amherst Lecture in Philosophy. The Department of Philosophy at Amherst College. http://www.amherstlecture.org/korsgaard2010 [also via academia.edu]

Krasnow, Max M. “An Evolutionarily Informed Study of Moral Psychology.” Moral Psychology (2017): 29. via academia.edu web

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Neil Levy "The Prospects for Evolutionary Ethics Today" Euramerica 40, no. 3 (September 2010): 529-71. Institute of European and American Studies, Academia Sinica http://euramerica.org [via academia.edu]

Lillehammer, Hallvard. 2003. ‘Debunking Morality: Evolutionary Naturalism and Moral Error Theory’, Biology & Philosophy, 18: 567–81.[via academia.edu]

Reaction: MacCrone, John. The Ape That Spoke. London: MacMillan, 1990. ISBN 0333537920

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Martin Nowak with Roger Highfield. Super Cooperators: Altruism, Evolution and Mathematics (or, Why We Need Each Other to Succeed). Melbourne: Text Publishing, 2011. 9781921758294


Peters, Karl E. “Reflections on the Evolution of Morality.” Zygon: Journal of Religion and Science 34.3 (1999): Web.


Reshetnyk, Olga A. “Phylogenetic History of Morality.” Матеріали міжнародної науково-практичної конференції "Україна і світ: Діалог мов та культур" (2015): via academia.edu. Web. 28 Aug. 2024.

Rolston III, Holmes. '12. The Good Samaritan and His Genes' Pages 238-252 in Philip Clayton and Jeffrey Schloss, eds., Evolution and Ethics: Human Morality in Biological and Religious Perspective Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2004

Rosas, Alejandro. “Beyond the Sociobiological Dilemma: Social Emotions and the Evolution of Morality.” academia.edu. Web. 12 Aug. 2024.

Rottschaefer, William. “Evolutionary Naturalistic Justifications of Morality: A Matter of Faith and Works.” Biology and Philosophy (1991):  via academia.edu (web) 23 Aug. 2024.

Sandler, Ronald, and Judith Crane. “On the Moral Considerability of Homo Sapiens and Other Species.” Environmental Values 15.1 (2006): 69–84. Web.


Sakin, Derya--
REACTION & substackCrosspost: “On the Evolutionary Origin of Morality.” Beytülhikme An International Journal of Philosophy (2022): via academia.edu 2 Aug. 2024.
REACTION  & substackCrosspost: The Ascent of Morality, from Non-Human to Human Animals: An Emotion-Based Account. MIDDLE EAST TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY, 2021.  via academia.edu. 31 Oct. 2024.

Scheule, Rupert. “‘Evolutionary Ethics 2.0’? New Findings about the Nature of Morality.” via academia.edu. Web. 9 Aug. 2024.

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Ben Serber. UW – Milwaukee. bserber@uwm.edu An Evolutionary Vindication of Moral Facts via academia.org [PDF].

Serrelli, Emanuele. “Traits and Functions in the Evolution of Morality.” via academia.edu Web. 14 Aug. 2024.

Severini, Eleonora. “Moral Explanation and Evolutionary Explanation of Morality.” Syzetesis (2022): via academia.edu Web. 14 Aug. 2024.

Stewart-Williams, Steve.
---The Ape That Understood the Universe: How the Mind and Culture Evolve. Cambridge, United Kingdom ; New York, NY: Cambridge University Press, 2018.
--- Reaction & substack: ---“Evolution and Morality.” International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences (2nd ed.). (2015):  https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/B9780080970868810569?via%3Dihub [via web].

Reaction & substackCrosspost: Silvertown, Jonathan. Selfish Genes to Social Beings: A Cooperative History of Life. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2024. [https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198876397.001.0001]

REACTION & substackCrosspost: Slimak, Ludovic. 2024. The Naked Neanderthal: A New Understanding of the Human Creature (First Pegasus Books cloth edition.). New York: Pegasus Books. [ISBN9781639366163] substackPostscript

Teehan, John. “The Evolutionary Basis of Religious Ethics.” Zygon 41.3 (2006): 747–773. via academia.edu Web.

Topçuoğlu, Erdi. “An Investigation of How Human Morality Evolved.” (2015): via academia.edu Web. 5 Aug. 2024.

Vladyková, Ľubov. “Evolution, Moral Network Theory and Contestation of the Rule-Based Model of Moral Reasoning.” The holistic approach to environment (2012): via academia.edu. Web. 2 Sept. 2024.


REACTION & substackCrosspost: Vlerick, Michael. “Better Than Our Nature? Evolution and Moral Realism, Justification and Progress.”  in  Ruse, Michael, and Robert J. Richards, eds. The Cambridge Handbook of Evolutionary Ethics. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2017. Print. Cambridge Handbooks in Philosophy. [Chapter via academia.edu]

Wilson, Catherine. 2010. ‘Darwinian Morality’, Evolution: Education and Outreach (3): 275–87. DOI: 10.1007/s12052-009-0162-z [via academia.edu]


REACTION & substackcrosspost Woolcock, Peter G. “The Case against Evolutionary Ethics Today.” Chap 11 in Biology and the Foundation of Ethics, 276–306. Cambridge: Cambridge Uni Press, 1999. [via https://www.academia.edu]

Wielenberg, Erik J. 2010. ‘On the Evolutionary Debunking of Morality’, Ethics  120(3): 441.[via academia.edu]

Wojciech Zaluski. “From Tit for Tat and Tribalism to the Golden Rule. Remarks on the Development of Moral Ideas.” in The Many Faces of Normativity. Kraków: Copernicus Center Press, 2012. 351-362. [via academia.org]

Peter Woolcock. “Ruse’s Darwinian Meta-Ethics: A Critique.” Biology and Philosophy 8 (1993): 423–439. [via academia.org]

 The list accretes mostly by way of suggestions on the academia.edu platform, where peeps upload their papers and chapter and excerpts. I get an email as a serving suggestion, and if appropriate I add it to this list, and then on a first reading create a reaction blogpost. They are not particularly current.

 While these are not very considered reviews, they do reveal my interests, biases, inclinations, and other partialities. As such they highlight my strengths in their weakest forms, while allowing me to limber-up mentally. If I do them regularly enough they can provide a sort of reading and thinking exercise, a warm-up practice, and as I descend into my dotage provide the itinerary of my intellectual collapse.

Already, when I read what I have written in the past couple of years I can be astounded at what I wrote (for good or ill), and while mostly I do remember writing the piece, there are times where I have not thought of it again since writing it. This is apparent while I migrate pieces I wrote on substack alone to a self-hosted version beginning early 2024.

Makes me thinks of all those essays written for high school and undergraduate studies. And all the papers post-grads must push out in order to compete.
 

BOOKS that I have to get hold of first

Batson’s Moral Hypocrisy, 

Buchanan, Allen E. Our Moral Fate: Evolution and the Escape from Tribalism. The MIT Press. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press, 2020. [see also REACTION  for Corradetti, Claudio. “What Makes Us Human? Evolution, Intentionality and Moral Progress.”]

Richard Joyce, . 2006. The Evolution of Morality. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Dennis L. Krebs, Survival of the Virtuous: How We Became a Moral Animal.
New York: Oxford University Press, 2022. 282 pp

Ruse, Michael. Taking Darwin Seriously: A Naturalistic Approach to Philosophy. Oxford: B. Blackwell, 1986. Print.

Shafik, Minouche. 2021. What We Owe Each Other: A New Social Contract. London: The Bodley Head.

________

Campbell, Roderick. 2014. Violence and Civilization: Studies of Social Violence in History and Prehistory, Joukowsky Institute Publication. Oxford Oakville, CT: Oxbow Books.

Dunbar, Robin I. M. 2022. How Religion Evolved and Why It Endures, A Pelican Book. London, UK: Pelican. Some scans in notes 2025_03

Heying, Heather. 2021. A Hunter-Gatherer’s Guide to the 21st Century: Evolution and the Challenges of Modern Life. London: Swift Press.

Joyce, Richard. The Myth of Morality. Cambridge University Press, 2001.

Locating the Sacred: Theoretical Approaches to the Emplacement of Religion. 2014. Joukowsky Institute Publication. Oxford: Oxbow Books. Some scans in notes 2025_03

Oliver, Tom. 2020. The Self Delusion: The Surprising Science of How We Are Connected and Why That Matters. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson.

Wright, Robert. 2009. The Evolution of God, New York Times Best Sellers (1st ed.). New York: Little, Brown. URL (consulted March 2025)