Something radically new is in the air: new ways of understanding physical systems, new ways of thinking about thinking that call into question many of our basic assumptions. A realistic biology of the mind, advances in evolutionary biology, physics, information technology, genetics, neurobiology, psychology, engineering, the chemistry of materials: all are questions of critical importance with respect to what it means to be human. For the first time, we have the tools and the will to undertake the scientific study of human nature.

This began in the early seventies, when, as a graduate student at Harvard, evolutionary biologist Robert Trivers wrote five papers that set forth an agenda for a new field: the scientific study of human nature. In the past thirty-five years this work has spawned thousands of scientific experiments, new and important evidence, and exciting new ideas about who and what we are presented in books by scientists such as Richard Dawkins, Daniel C. Dennett, Steven Pinker, and Edward O. Wilson among many others.

In 1975, Wilson, a colleague of Trivers at Harvard, predicted that ethics would someday be taken out of the hands of philosophers and incorporated into the "new synthesis" of evolutionary and biological thinking. He was right.

Scientists engaged in the scientific study of human nature are gaining sway over the scientists and others in disciplines that rely on studying social actions and human cultures independent from their biological foundation.

No where is this more apparent than in the field of moral psychology. Using babies, psychopaths, chimpanzees, fMRI scanners, web surveys, agent-based modeling, and ultimatum games, moral psychology has become a major convergence zone for research in the behavioral sciences.

So what do we have to say? Are we moving toward consensus on some points? What are the most pressing questions for the next five years? And what do we have to offer a world in which so many global and national crises are caused or exacerbated by moral failures and moral conflicts? It seems like everyone is studying morality these days, reaching findings that complement each other more often than they clash.

Culture is humankind’s biological strategy, according to Roy F. Baumeister, and so human nature was shaped by an evolutionary process that selected in favor of traits conducive to this new, advanced kind of social life (culture). To him, therefore, studies of brain processes will augment rather than replace other approaches to studying human behavior, and he fears that the widespread neglect of the interpersonal dimension will compromise our understanding of human nature. Morality is ultimately a system of rules that enables groups of people to live together in reasonable harmony. Among other things, culture seeks to replace aggression with morals and laws as the primary means to solve the conflicts that inevitably arise in social life. Baumeister’s work has explored such morally relevant topics as evil, self-control, choice, and free will. [More]

According to Yale psychologist Paul Bloom, humans are born with a hard-wired morality. A deep sense of good and evil is bred in the bone. His research shows that babies and toddlers can judge the goodness and badness of others' actions; they want to reward the good and punish the bad; they act to help those in distress; they feel guilt, shame, pride, and righteous anger. [More]

Harvard cognitive neuroscientist and philosopher Joshua D. Greene sees our biggest social problems — war, terrorism, the destruction of the environment, etc. — arising from our unwitting tendency to apply paleolithic moral thinking (also known as "common sense") to the complex problems of modern life. Our brains trick us into thinking that we have Moral Truth on our side when in fact we don't, and blind us to important truths that our brains were not designed to appreciate. [More]

University of Virginia psychologist Jonathan Haidt's research indicates that morality is a social construction which has evolved out of raw materials provided by five (or more) innate "psychological" foundations: Harm, Fairness, Ingroup, Authority, and Purity. Highly educated liberals generally rely upon and endorse only the first two foundations, whereas people who are more conservative, more religious, or of lower social class usually rely upon and endorse all five foundations. [More]

The failure of science to address questions of meaning, morality, and values, notes neuroscientist Sam Harris, has become the primary justification for religious faith. In doubting our ability to address questions of meaning and morality through rational argument and scientific inquiry, we offer a mandate to religious dogmatism, superstition, and sectarian conflict. The greater the doubt, the greater the impetus to nurture divisive delusions. [More]

A lot of Yale experimental philosopher Joshua Knobe's recent research has been concerned with the impact of people's moral judgments on their intuitions about questions that might initially appear to be entirely independent of morality (questions about intention, causation, etc.). It has often been suggested that people's basic approach to thinking about such questions is best understood as being something like a scientific theory. He has offered a somewhat different view, according to which people's ordinary way of understanding the world is actually infused through and through with moral considerations. He is arguably most widely known for what has come to be called "the Knobe effect" or the "Side-Effect Effect." [More]

NYU psychologist Elizabeth Phelps investigates the brain activity underlying memory and emotion. Much of Phelps' research has focused on the phenomenon of "learned fear," a tendency of animals to fear situations associated with frightening events. Her primary focus has been to understand how human learning and memory are changed by emotion and to investigate the neural systems mediating their interactions. A recent study published in Nature by Phelps and her colleagues, shows how fearful memories can be wiped out for at least a year using a drug-free technique that exploits the way that human brains store and recall memories. [More]

Disgust has been keeping Cornell psychologist David Pizarro particularly busy, as it has been implicated by many as an emotion that plays a large role in many moral judgments. His lab results have shown that an increased tendency to experience disgust (as measured using the Disgust Sensitivity Scale, developed by Jon Haidt and colleagues), is related to political orientation. [More]

[EDITOR'S NOTE: Marc Hauser, one of the nine participants at the conference, has withdrawn his contribution.]

Each of the above participants led a 45-minute session on Day One that consisted of a 25-minute talk. Day Two consisted of two 90-minute open discussions on "The Science of Morality", intended as a starting point to begin work on a consensus document on the state of moral psychology to be published on Edge in the near future.

Among the members of the press in attendance were: Sharon Begley, Newsweek, Drake Bennett, Ideas, Boston Globe, David Brooks, OpEd Columnist, New York Times, Daniel Engber, Slate, Amanda Gefter, Opinion Editor, New Scientist, Jordan Mejias, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, Gary Stix, Scientific American, Pamela Weintraub, Discover Magazine.

HOWARD GARDNER
Psychologist, Harvard University; Author, Changing Minds

Enlightenment ideas were the product of white male Christians living in the 18th century. They form the basis of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other Western-inflected documents. But in our global world, Confucian societies and Islamic societies have their own guidelines about progress, individuality, democratic processes, human obligations. In numbers they represent more of humanity and are likely to become even more numerous in this century. What do the human sciences have to contribute to an understanding of these 'multiple voices' ? Can they combined harmoniously or are there unbridgeable gaps?

GEOFFREY MILLER
Evolutionary Psychologist, University of New Mexico; Author, Spent: Sex, Evolution, and Consumer Behavior

1) Many people become vegans, protect animal rights, and care about the long-term future of the environment. It seems hard to explain these 'green virtues' in terms of the usual evolutionary-psychology selection pressures: reciprocity, kin selection, group selection -- so how can we explain their popularity (or unpopularity?)

2) What are the main sex differences in human morality, and why?

3) What role did costly signaling play in the evolution of human morality (i.e. 'showing off' certain moral virtues' to attract mates, friends, or allies, or to intimidate rival individuals or competing groups)?

4) Given the utility of 'adaptive self-deception' in human evolution -- one part of the mind not knowing what adaptive strategies another part is pursuing -- what could it mean to have the moral virtue of 'integrity' for an evolved being?

5) Why do all 'mental illnesses' (depression, mania, schizophrenia, borderline, psychopathy, narcissism, mental retardation, etc.) reduce altruism, compassion, and loving-kindness? Is this partly why they are recognized as mental illnesses?

BRIAN ENO
Artist; Composer; Recording Producer: U2, Cold Play, Talking Heads, Paul Simon; Recording Artist

Is morality a human invention - a way of trying to stabilise human societies and make them coherent - or is there evidence of a more fundamental sense of morality in creatures other than humans?

Another way of asking this question is: are there moral concepts that are not specifically human?

Yet another way of asking this is: are moral concepts specifically the province of human brains? And, if they are, is there any basis for suggesting that there are any 'absolute' moral precepts?

Or: do any other creatures exhibit signs of 'honour' or 'shame'?

JAMES FOWLER
Political Scientist, University of California, San Diego; Coauthor, Connected

Given recent evidence about the power of social networks, what is our personal responsibility to our friends' friends?

REBECCA MACKINNON
Blogger & Cofounder, Global Voices Online; Former CNN journalist and head of CNN bureaus in Beijing & Tokyo; Visiting Fellow, Princeton University's Center for Information Technology Policy

Does the human race require a major moral evolution in order to survive? Isn't part of the problem that our intelligence has vastly out-evolved our morality, which is still stuck back in the paleolithic age? Is there anything we can do? Or is this the tragic flaw that dooms us? Might technology help to facilitate or speed up our moral evolution, as some say technology is already doing for human intelligence? We have artificial intelligence and augmented reality. What about artificial or augmented morality?

JARON LANIER
Musician, Computer Scientist; Pioneer of Virtural Reality; Author, You Are Not A Gadget: A Manifesto

A crucial topic is how group interactions change moral perception. To what degree are there clan-oriented processes inherent in the human brain? In particular, how can well-informed software designs for network-mediated social experience play a role in changing behavior and values? Is there anything specific that can be done to reduce mob-like phenomena, as is spawned in online forums like 4chan's /b/, without resorting to degrees of imposed control? This is where a science of moral psychology could inform engineering.

EVA WISTEN
Journalist; Author, Single in Manhattan

What's would be a good definition - a few examples - of common moral sense? How does an averagely moral human think and behave (it's easy to paint a picture of the actions of an immoral person...) Now, how can this be expanded?

Could an understanding/acceptance of the idea that we are all having unconscious instincts for what's right and wrong replace the idea of religion as necessary for moral behavior?

What tends to be the hierarchy of "blinders" - the arguments we, consciously or unconsciously, use to relabel exploitative acts as good? (I did it for God, I did it for the German People, I did it for Jodie Foster...) What evolutionary purpose have they filled?

BRIAN KNUTSON
Psychologist & Neuroscientist, Stanford

What is the difference between morality and emotion? How can scientists distinguish between the two (or should they)? Why has Western culture been so historically reluctant to recognize emotion as a major influence on moral judgments?

ANDRIAN KREYE
Feuilleton Editor, Sueddutsche Zeitung

Is there a fine line or a wide gap between morality and ideology?

ANONYMOUS

1. Some of the new literature on moral psychology feels like traditional discussions of ethics with a few numbers attached from surveys; almost like old ideas in a new can. As an outsider I'd be curious to know what's really new here. Specifically, if William James were resurrected what might be the new findings we could explain to him that would astound him or fundamentally change his way of thinking?

2. Is there a reason to believe there is such a thing as moral psychology that transcends upbringing and culture? Are we really studying a fundamental feature of the mind or simply the outcome of a social process?

ALISON GOPNIK
Psychologist, UC, Berkeley; Author, The Philosophical Baby

Many people have proposed an evolutionary psychology/ nativist view of moral capacities. But surely one of the most dramatic and obvious features of our moral capacities is their capacity for change and even radical transformation with new experiences. At the same time this transformation isn't just random but seems to have a progressive quality. Its analogous to science which presents similar challenges to a nativist view. And even young children are empirically, capable of this kind of change in both domains. How do we get to new and better conceptions of the world, cognitive or moral, if the nativists are right?

ROBERT TRIVERS
Evolutionary Biologist, Rutgers University; Coauthor, Genes In Conflict: The Biology of Selfish Genetic Elements

Shame.

What is it? When does it occur? What function does it serve? How is it related, if at all, to guilt? Is it related to "morality" and if so how?

Key point, John, is that shame is a complex mixture of self and other: Tiger Woods SHAMES his wife in public — he may likewise be ashamed.

If i fuck a goat i may feel ashamed if someone saw it, but absent harm to the goat, not clear how i should respond if i alone witness it.