TY - BOOK ID - 8760885 TI - Temptations of Evolutionary Ethics PY - 1994 SN - 0585176507 052092097X 9780520920972 9780585176505 9780520087736 0520087739 0520213696 0520087739 PB - Berkeley, California : University of California Press, DB - UniCat KW - Ethics, Evolutionary KW - Ethics, Naturalistic KW - Evolutionary ethics KW - Naturalistic ethics KW - Ethics KW - Ethical relativism KW - History KW - History. KW - Philosophy KW - ETHICS, EVOLUTIONARY KW - PHILOSOPHY KW - Ethics, evolutionary UR - https://www.unicat.be/uniCat?func=search&query=sysid:8760885 AB - Evolutionary theory tells us about our biological past; can it also guide us to a moral future? Paul Farber's compelling book describes a century-old philosophical hope held by many biologists, anthropologists, psychologists, and social thinkers: that universal ethical and social imperatives are built into human nature and can be discovered through knowledge of evolutionary theory.Farber describes three upsurges of enthusiasm for evolutionary ethics. The first came in the early years of mid-nineteenth century evolutionary theories; the second in the 1920s and '30s, in the years after the cultural catastrophe of World War I; and the third arrived with the recent grand claims of sociobiology to offer a sound biological basis for a theory of human culture.Unlike many who have written on evolutionary ethics, Farber considers the responses made by philosophers over the years. He maintains that their devastating criticisms have been forgotten-thus the history of evolutionary ethics is essentially one of oft-repeated philosophical mistakes.Historians, scientists, social scientists, and anyone concerned about the elusive basis of selflessness, altruism, and morality will welcome Farber's enlightening book. ER -