Ethical Life: Its Natural and Social Histories

by Webb Keane

The human propensity to take an ethical stance toward oneself and others is found in every known society, yet we also know that values taken for granted in one society can contradict those in another. Does ethical life arise from human nature itself? Is it a universal human trait? Or is it a product of one's cultural and historical context? Webb Keane offers a new approach to the empirical study of ethical life that reconciles these questions, showing how ethics arise at the intersection of human biology and social dynamics.Drawing on the latest findings in psychology, conversational interaction, ethnography, and history, Ethical Life takes readers from inner city America to Samoa and the Inuit Arctic to reveal how we are creatures of our biology as well as our history--and how our ethical lives are contingent on both. Keane looks at Melanesian theories of mind and the training of Buddhist monks, and discusses important social causes such as the British abolitionist movement and American feminism. He explores how styles of child rearing, notions of the person, and moral codes in different communities elaborate on certain basic human tendencies while suppressing or ignoring others.Certain to provoke debate, Ethical Life presents an entirely new way of thinking about ethics, morals, and the factors that shape them.

Genres: Anthropology, Nonfiction, Philosophy

304 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 6, 2015

Reviews

[versarbre · Rating 4 out of 5]

Especially in conversation with (analytic) philosophers, developmental psychologists and bringing anthropology to a discussion about humanity in the making in our time. Goodbye, the anthropology dominated by cultural relativism! We do need to re-think the shared foundations of humanity!

[Brendan Holly · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book provides a compelling account of ethics from multiple important and intersecting perspectives: developmental psychology, social interaction, and historical social movements. Keane argues that an important concept in ethics that runs throughout these spheres is affordances. Affordances are concepts, norms, or capacities that allow for an action to occur. Ethical affordances are thus concepts like sexism, norms like eye contact, or capacities like empathy that allow us to make ethical judgments. Through an understanding of Keanes ethical spheres and the affordances therein, Keane claims we can begin to understand the nature of human ethical life.