10.20.08
Wilson essay now online: The Biological Basis Of Morality
Atlantic has just published E.O.Wilson’s essay from 1998 on the web, The biological basis of morality
Do we invent our moral absolutes in order to make society workable? Or are these enduring principles expressed to us by some transcendent or Godlike authority? Efforts to resolve this conundrum have perplexed, sometimes inflamed, our best minds for centuries, but the natural sciences are telling us more and more about the choices we make and our reasons for making them
From Obsidian Wings, we have a good commentary:
E. O. Wilson On Biology And Morality
by hilzoy
Via Andrew Sullivan, I see that The Atlantic has put E. O. Wilson’s article ‘The Biological Basis Of Morality’ online. I had repressed all memory of this article, but it really annoyed me at the time, so much so that I wrote a letter to the editors about it. For some, um, unfathomable reason they declined to publish it, but now (heh heh) I can, and so I have put it below the fold. (Why should perfectly good snark go to waste?)I am reliably informed that E. O. Wilson is a brilliant biologist. I would read anything he wrote about ants with interest. But it does not follow from that that he knows anything about philosophy. Of course, that’s no reason why he can’t write intelligently on it. But it is a reason why someone at the Atlantic should have gone over what he wrote to make sure it was accurate, as I’m sure they would have done had I submitted an article on insects. Apparently, no one did.
Wilson’s bottomless foolishness raises so many questions, one is almost struck dumb. I will comment in the next post.