Philosophy and the Evolution of Virtue and Vice

This volume explores what evolutionary theory can contribute to our philosophical understanding of virtue and vice.

The last twenty years have seen an uptick in philosophical discussions of the biological and cultural evolution of morality. Yet, there has been surprisingly little discussion of virtue ethics and the evolution of human character, even though human virtues are almost certainly one of the markers of our species’ distinctive sociality. This volume investigates the evolution of human character traits and its implications for moral philosophy and value theory. The chapters address central questions such as: To what extent can evolutionary theories explain virtue, vice, or specific virtues/vices? Are philosophical accounts of virtue compatible with evolutionary explanations? How might tensions between them be resolved? What implications might the evolution of virtue have concerning debates in value theory more broadly? What implications does the evolution of virtue have for living well in the digital age? And how can we re-engineer the conceptual machinery of virtue/vice to our advantage? The volume serves as a first step toward evaluating the influence of evolution on human conceptions of what kind of people we ought to be.

Philosophy and the Evolution of Virtue and Vice will appeal to researchers and graduate students working in normative ethics, virtue ethics, metaethics, moral psychology, philosophy of social science, philosophy of biology, and evolutionary theory.