Partner selection produces genuine moral feelings, not just narrow self-interested cooperation.

Evidence

Although individual selection is often thought to lead to a very narrow kind of morality, we have suggested that partner selection can also lead to the emergence of a full-fledged moral sense that drives humans to be genuinely moral, to help one another, and to demand the punishment of wrongdoers. This full-fledged moral sense may explain the kind of cooperative behavior observed in economic games such as the Ultimatum Game, the Dictator Game, and the Public Goods Game. Indeed, in economic games, participants’ behavior seems to aim at treating others in a fair way, distributing the benefit of cooperation according to individuals’ contribution, taking others’ claims to the resources into account, compensating them for previous misallocations, or sharing the costs of mutual help. — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 202

Categorization

• XREF: Reframes the tension between sacrificial altruism and strategic moral feeling — connects to the reader’s Big God/partner-choice framework and to pure-altruism debates. — connects to: Morality may have evolved via partner choice over partner control — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality: The…, 347; Moral conduct serves as a costly signal that pays in partner selection. — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality: The…, 534; Morality evolves from individual partner-choice competition, not group selection. — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality: The…, 605 (+6 more)
• QUESTION: If partner selection produces ‘genuinely moral’ feelings, how does the fumi-e’s forced apostasy interact with the felt moral sense versus the strategic incentive? Worth clarifying when distinguishing performance from conviction.

Related

• Morality evolves from individual partner-choice competition, not group selection. (similarity 0.92)
• Morality may have evolved via partner choice over partner control (similarity 0.88)
• Partner-choice cooperation theory does not explain the intrinsic moral sense. (similarity 0.87)
• Morality evolved because fair partners were preferred in cooperative interactions (similarity 0.87)
• Partner choice predicts fair cooperation while group selection predicts utilitarian cooperation. (similarity 0.87)
• Moral conduct serves as a costly signal that pays in partner selection. (similarity 0.85)
• Fairness is self-interested because stingy partners get abandoned. (similarity 0.85)
• Fairness is not reducible to mutualistic partner choice. (similarity 0.85)
• Genuinely moral partners signal higher reliability than strategically moral ones. (similarity 0.85)
• Morality evolved as a propensity for fair cost-benefit sharing among cooperators. (similarity 0.84)
• Fairness evolves from partner choice, not partner control (similarity 0.84)
• Natural selection favors both the disposition to reciprocate and to volunteer help proactively. (similarity 0.84)
• Partner choice selects among folk-theorem equilibria just as group selection does. (similarity 0.84)
• A preference for fairness can directly favor equalitarianism in cooperation. (similarity 0.83)
• Morality evolves in two steps, from selfish reciprocity to intrinsic fairness. (similarity 0.83)

Broader Connections

• Morality evolved because fair partners were preferred in cooperative interactions #corroborates (0.85) — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 4
• Opening with cooperation is rational self-interest, not mere morality #contradicts (0.82) — Russell Hardin, Trust and Trustworthiness, 544
• Natural variation among partners drives selection toward greater cooperation. #expands (0.80) — Nicolas Baumard, A mutualistic approach to morality, 619