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The concept of “Evolutionary Ethics” was brought to life by Charles Darwin and Herbert Spencer during the 19th century. This concept was introduced to picture how both living and dead human beings, animals, and other living organisms or species are the end product of a prolonged, laggard, and instinctive process of evolution from one form of life to another. This generates a link or a relationship between philosophy and instinct sciences which determines how the adaptation of social and moral environment is instilled within human beings and is passed on to future generations.
There are generally four main theories that are concerned with the evolution theory. They are:
Darwinism.
Mutation Theory of Evolution.
Lamarckism and
Synthetic Theory of Evolution.
We will be discussing the most famous theory of evolution I.e., Darwinism.
The theories of Charles Darwin and Herbert Spencer play a prominent role in establishing the theory of ethics behind evolution. Let’s understand them.
Charles Darwin’s Theory:
Charles Darwin’s theory is also termed “Darwinism”. It particularly emphasizes the fact that evolution is guided by the theory of “Natural Selection”.
Before we dive into the theory, we need to understand what we mean by “Natural Selection”.
According to Darwin, a single living organism will be more capable to live, finding food for themselves, avoiding diseases, reproducing, or passing on their genes to their future generation provided that they get easily adapted to the environment around them. Whereas, this capability won’t be present in those individuals who fail to adapt themselves to their surroundings. Resultantly, the ones who suit them to the environment will be able to evolve slowly. This is what is called natural selection.
Charles Darwin’s theory is based on the following three observations:
The vastness of the living things around him.
The remnants of the early organisms.
The attributes of the organisms living on the Galapagos Islands.
Darwin was unaware of the process through which the characteristic traits proceeded further to the future generations. He had no idea about “Genetics” or “Genetic Mutation” which happens to be the primary source of natural variation.
But how do variations arise?
The variation is caused by the genes that are transmitted during the reproduction process. However, when the world gradually became accustomed to the knowledge of genetics, they found that there were certain similarities between genetics and Darwin’s theory of evolution, which after a thorough study could link both the sources. In the contemporary world, this was termed as Synthetic Theory of Evolution.
Herbert Spencer’s Theory:
He framed the theory of “Social Darwinism”.
According to Spencer, there was no necessity to improve the society or surroundings, as it would be done automatically. He believed that the societies were quite similar to the organisms in respect of changes. He had discovered a resemblance between the living organisms and society in terms of the presence of three major systems. They are:
First, is the Regulatory System which would be the Central Nervous System in the living species.
Secondly, the Sustainable System which would be the give and take process of daily subsistence for the animals and would be money, job, or economy for the society.
Thirdly, the Distribution System, which would be the veins and arteries in animals and would be roads, internet-based sources, or transportation facilities for the society.
The major drawback of Spencer’s theory was that it considered Social Darwinism as the survival of the fittest which indicated that the strong ones should live in the society while the poor ones should be allowed to die which was irrational thinking. This concept led Spencer to think that the rich survived at the cost of the weaker ones.
Prevalent Drawbacks for the Evolutionary Ethics:
Although the evolution theories have significantly widened scientific understanding within us, it sustains the following drawbacks:
Inappropriate support of unethical acts which include discrimination, genocide as well as incarceration among the living species.
Misuse of the theory paved the way for Nazi beliefs.
The problem of Natural Fallacy, states an informal logical misconception that if something happens to be natural, it will stand out to be good.
Conclusion:
Thus, we see that Evolutionary Ethics play an important role in bridging the gap between philosophy and the natural sciences. However, there are certain discrepancies related to the theories propounded by Charles Darwin and Hebert Spencer. There were both positive as well as negative aspects in terms of morality in the theories. These discrepancies have been remodeled with the introduction of Neo-Classical or Synthetic Theory of Evolution which stands out to be a proper definition of evolutionary ethics.
