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<blockquote type=cite class=cite cite=""><font size=2><b>Please note that
next week's STS Circle meeting will take place on Wednesday, Feb. 13,
from 12:00-2:00 pm, at Room 469, Science Center, 1 Oxford Street.</b>
<b>Please RSVP to
<a href="mailto:sang-hyun_kim@ksg.harvard.edu">
sang-hyun_kim@ksg.harvard.edu</a> by Feb. 10 (Sunday).</b> <br>
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<br>
</font><div align="center"><font size=4><b>STS Circle at Harvard:
February 13 (Wednesday), 2008<br>
</b></font><font size=2> <br>
<br>
</font><font size=5><b><i>Evolving a Moral Grammar: Domain-specificity,
<br>
Origins, Universality and Moral Organs<br>
</i></b></font><font size=2> <br>
<br>
</font><font size=4><b>Mark Hauser<br>
</b></font>(Department of Psychology, Harvard University)<br>
<font size=2> <br><br>
</font><font size=4><b>12:00-2:00 pm at Room 469, Science Center, 1
Oxford Street</b><br>
</font></div>
<font size=2> <br>
<br>
</font><b>Abstract:<br>
</b><font size=2>How do you decide what is morally right and wrong?
Historically, there have been two answers to this question. On the
one hand, we deliver moral judgments on the basis of a rational,
conscious, and deliberate process of accessing principles to justify our
actions. On the other hand, our judgments are the result of
intuitions mediated by emotions. Though these two processes
certainly play some role in our moral deliberations, each suffers from a
set of critical problems. I offer a solution: by appealing to an
analogy to language, I argue that humans are endowed with a universal
moral grammar that generates intuitive judgments of right and wrong based
on an inaccessible code of action. I present evidence from a large
scale study of the internet with over 200,000 subjects, together with
work on small scale societies, to justify a dissociation between
judgments and justifications, and to reveal a set of core principles that
appear immune to cultural influences, including religious
background. I also present results from studies of brain damaged
patients, neuroimaging, and brain stimulation to reveal the architecture
of our moral organ. <br>
<br>
</font><b>Biography:</b><font size=2> <br>
Marc Hauser is Professor of Psychology, Organismic and Evolutionary
Biology, and Biological Anthropology at Harvard University, where he is
director of the Cognitive Evolution Laboratory and co-director of the
Mind, Brain and Behavior Program. His research focuses on the
evolutionary and developmental foundations of the human mind, with the
specific goal of understanding which mental capacities are shared with
other nonhuman primates and which are uniquely human. Dr. Hauser's
previous books include <i>The Evolution of Communication</i> (MIT);
<i>Wild Minds: What Animals Really Think</i> (Henry Holt); and <i>The
Design of Animal Communication</i> (with Mark Konishi) (MIT). His
most recent book, <i>Moral Minds: How Nature Designed Our Universal Sense
of Right and Wrong</i>, is published by HarperCollins.<br>
<br>
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For more information about the Harvard STS circle, please visit our
website at:
<a href="http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/sts/events/weeklymeeting.htm">
http://www.ksg.harvard.edu/sts/events/weeklymeeting.htm</a> <br>
or e-mail to:
<a href="mailto:sang-hyun_kim@ksg.harvard.edu">
sang-hyun_kim@ksg.harvard.edu</a> or
<a href="mailto:jhurlbut@fas.harvard.edu">jhurlbut@fas.harvard.edu</a>
.</font></blockquote></body>
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