A partner-choice account of morality predicts avoidant emotions dominate moral life

Evidence

Given that Baumard et al. consider that morality evolved through “partner choice” rather than “partner control,” they should predict that the key role in morality (and cooperation) will be played by emotions whose action tendency is avoidance (avoid immoral cooperators), rather than by emotions whose action tendency is punishment (punish immoral cooperators). Contempt and disgust belong to the first category – they lead us to avoid certain people – whereas anger and anger-related emotions (indignation, irritation, outrage, and righteous anger) belong to the second category – they lead us to seek revenge or make the transgressor “pay” for what he did — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 348

Categorization

• XREF: Connects directly to the reader’s analytical frame on how the fumi-e ritual uses public apostasy to destroy partner choice — the avoid/punish emotion split maps onto alternatives to the Big God mechanism. — connects to: Moral emotions are dominated by punitive anger, not avoidance — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality: The…, 346; Morality may have evolved via partner choice over partner control — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality: The…, 347

Related

• Moral emotions are dominated by punitive anger, not avoidance (similarity 0.91)
• Morality may have evolved via partner choice over partner control (similarity 0.87)
• Morality evolves from individual partner-choice competition, not group selection. (similarity 0.83)
• Mutualistic anthropology explains moral anger as an evolved fairness-restoring mechanism (similarity 0.83)
• Morality evolved because fair partners were preferred in cooperative interactions (similarity 0.83)
• Partner choice deters cheating without anyone intending to punish (similarity 0.82)
• Partner-choice cooperation theory does not explain the intrinsic moral sense. (similarity 0.82)
• Partner selection produces genuine moral feelings, not just narrow self-interested cooperation. (similarity 0.81)
• Partner choice theory shifts cooperation research away from dyadic Prisoner’s Dilemma models. (similarity 0.81)
• Fairness is not reducible to mutualistic partner choice. (similarity 0.81)
• Moral conduct serves as a costly signal that pays in partner selection. (similarity 0.81)
• Morality evolved as a propensity for fair cost-benefit sharing among cooperators. (similarity 0.80)
• Human morality is contingent rather than invariant across circumstances. (similarity 0.80)
• Morality extends beyond fairness among strangers to relational obligations (similarity 0.80)
• Morality evolves in two steps, from selfish reciprocity to intrinsic fairness. (similarity 0.80)