Conscience evolved to supply immediate rewards that bridge the gap to future moral payoffs

Evidence

The authors argue that moral values must be “real” rather than opportunistically feigned because people are not very good simulators and will eventually be unmasked unless their values are genuine. However, if there were a fitness benefit from dissimulation of morality, humans would have doubtless evolved the ability to dissimulate morality. … Moreover, because humans generally suffer from excessively short time horizons (often called “weakness of will”), agents will behave inappropriately when the gains to moral behavior lie in the future, unless there is an immediate benefit from acting morally. Conscience supplies that immediate benefit for moral behavior (Durkheim 1915, cf. Boehm 2011). — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 423

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The ‘hijacking’ of self-regarding virtue mechanisms for social preferences, combined with conscience as a time-consistency device solving weakness of will, is a dense two-part mechanism for how internalized morality evolved.
• XREF: Connects to the reading purpose: conscience as an internalized moral reward mechanism parallels the Big God omniscient-observer mechanism that disciplines Rodrigues’ behavior. — connects to: Humans hold systematic moral intuitions about proportionate sharing, helping, and punishment. — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality: The…, 6; A genuine moral sense evolved to secure reputation as a cooperator — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality: The…, 67; Morality evolved as a propensity for fair cost-benefit sharing among cooperators. — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality: The…, 266 (+2 more)

Related

• A genuine moral sense evolved to secure reputation as a cooperator (similarity 0.84)
• Morality is an evolved sense of fairness, not a late intellectual achievement (similarity 0.82)
• Morality evolved as a propensity for fair cost-benefit sharing among cooperators. (similarity 0.82)
• Humans hold systematic moral intuitions about proportionate sharing, helping, and punishment. (similarity 0.81)
• Morality evolved because fair partners were preferred in cooperative interactions (similarity 0.81)
• Morality evolves in two steps, from selfish reciprocity to intrinsic fairness. (similarity 0.80)
• Conscience lets society externalize reward costs onto the individual (similarity 0.79)
• Moral consistency can be learned rule-following rather than an innate disposition (similarity 0.79)
• Moral intuitions evolved as flexible, context-sensitive responses rather than a single universal faculty. (similarity 0.78)
• Mutualistic cost-benefit logic may explain transcendent moral sentiment. (similarity 0.78)
• Morality serves a self-directed ego function of constructing moral identity. (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• A genuine moral sense evolved to secure reputation as a cooperator #qualifies (0.82) — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 67
• Costly sentiments like guilt persist because they confer evolutionary gain #corroborates (0.78)
• Morality evolved as a propensity for fair cost-benefit sharing among cooperators. #expands (0.75) — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 266
• Morality evolved because fair partners were preferred in cooperative interactions #corroborates (0.72) — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 4