Article Title：Semantic and structural problems in evolutionary ethics
Abstract：
In A Defense of Evolutionary Ethics'' (1986), Robert J. Richards endeavors to explain how moral 'oughts' can be derived from the science of evolutionary biology without committing the dreaded naturalistic fallacy. First, Richards assumes that 'ought' as used in ethical discourse bears the same meaning as 'ought' used anywhere in science, indicating merely that certain results or behaviors are predicted based on prior structured contexts. To this extent, the moral behavior of animals, what they 'ought' to do, could arguably be predicted by evolutionary biology as effectively as, say, molecular behavior may be predicted by chemistry. But after acknowledging that biological inferences to this limited sense of 'ought' were never contested by Moore's naturalistic fallacy, Richard proposes to add to evolutionary ethics a decision procedure to determine which members of a set of predicted behaviors are those which truly ought to occur - in the genuinely prescriptive sense intended by ethical discourse. But the procedure which Richards fabricates for this purpose appeals to such alleged 'facts' as cultural conventions and moral opinion polling, hardly a secure foundation for the sort of scientific ethics promised by Richards at the outset.
Keywords: altruism; evolutionary ethics; naturalistic fallacy; 'ought' (semantics); Robert Richards
DOI: 10.1023/A:1006739117848
Source：BIOLOGY & PHILOSOPHY
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