On Genes, Gods and Tyrants

 

 

Professor Cela-Conde's approach to the question of biological determinants in ethics differs from that of the sociobiologists and ethologists who, in recent years, have challenged the predominance of the human sciences in explaining the moral phenomenon. In assessing the importance of biological facts, he rejects a simple equation of ethics with altruism and insists on the need to define the often too general sense of what is moral. His analysis is centred around four levels of the moral, and, drawing on work from Darwin onwards, he seeks to trace the role of biological factors at each of these levels. In his final chapter he moves on from his formal scheme to test its application to two empirical questions: the right to excellence and distributive justice. On Genes, Gods and Tyrants is not an addition to a battle between disciplines, but an attempt to take a fresh look at what light the work of the natural sciences can shed on classical problems of moral philosophy.

Audience
The book should be read by all philosophers, biologists, anthropologists, sociologists and psychologists who are interested in the biological foundations of the ethics debate.