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The Evolutionary Roots of Moral Responsibility

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 March 2023

Marcelo Fischborn Open the ORCID record for Marcelo Fischborn [Opens in a new window]
Marcelo Fischborn*
Affiliation:
Farroupilha Federal Institute of Education, Science, and Technology, Uruguaiana, RS, Brazil.
*
Email: marcelofischborn@gmail.com
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Abstract

Judging a person as morally responsible involves believing that certain responses (such as punishment, reward, or expressions of blame or praise) can be justifiably directed at the person. This paper develops an account of the evolution of moral responsibility judgment that adopts Michael Tomasello’s two-step theory of the evolution of morality and borrows also from Christopher Boehm’s work. The main hypothesis defended is that moral responsibility judgment originally evolved as an adaptation that enabled groups of cooperative individuals to hold free riders responsible more safely by acting in a coordinated way.

Type
Article
Information
Philosophy of Science , Volume 90 , Issue 4 , October 2023 , pp. 817 - 835
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Philosophy of Science Association

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