Do our brains allow us to act ethically?

Source: "Morality Studies" by PAUL BLOOM, The New York Times Sunday Book Review, February 3, 2008. This is a review of Experiments in Ethics, by Kwame Anthony Appiah.

The review focuses on Appiah's discussion of modern brain and psychological research which indicates how heavily influenced our behavior is by the specifics of the situation in which it occurs. This can be at quite a trivial level, such as whether we see someone needing help with a package while we are smelling fresh bread; it can be at a more profound level, such as whether we are in combat or in peaceful surroundings. On the basis of findings from research on the modification of choices by circumstances, the value of educational efforts to build character is challenged.

Clearly, there is a need for philosophers to study ethics, to shed light on the nature of ethical conduct. We can not simply decide that anything that anyone wants to do is OK. There are better and worse choices, and the better choice obviously need not always be the one that it most intuitive, or that is chosen.

I would suggest that an important educational objective would be to help people understand how external stimuli may affect their decision processes, so that they can resist the impulse to act wrongly. Character is not doing the right think when it is easy, but rather doing the right thing when it is hard. The person of good character should be one who has thought in advance about the right things to do in different circumstances, and perseveres in choosing the right action even in circumstances that would lead others to wrongful behavior.

As I posted the other day, I seems to me that there is also a need for the philosophy of ethics to be informed by an understanding of the neurology and psychology, as well as the sociology of actual choices. Genocide happens when the psychology of the situation created within their society leads them to decide to kill "the other". A philosophy that does not understand such pressures seems to me to be a poor thing.