Altruism & Altruistic Love: Science, Philosophy & Religion in Dialogue

510 Pages·2002·2.01 MB·English

by  Stephen Garrard Post

Altruism & Altruistic
Love:
Science, Philosophy, &
Religion in Dialogue
STEPHEN G. POST, et al.,
Editors
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
Altruism & Altruistic Love
Altruism & Altruistic Love
Science, Philosophy, & Religion
in Dialogue
Edited by
stephen g. post
lynn g. underwood
jeffrey p. schloss
william b. hurlbut
1

2002
3

Oxford New York
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Copyright © 2002 by Oxford University Press
Published by Oxford University Press, Inc.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Altruism and altruistic love : science, philosophy, and religion in dialogue /
edited by Stephen G. Post ...[et al.].
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 0-19-514358-2
1. Altruism.
I. Post, Stephen Garrard, 1951–.
BJ1474 .A472 2001
171'.8—dc21 00-068140
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Printed in the United States of America
on acid-free paper
preface
Robert Frost once wrote, “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall.” We would
like to thank the John Templeton Foundation for the courage and vision to engage
such a wide group of scholars from various disciplines on the topics of altruism,
love, empathy, and compassion in a dialogue that overcomes walls of division. Its
financial support made possible an initial conference, titled “Empathy, Altruism
and Agape: Perspectives on Love in Science and Religion,” in October 1999. The
task of chapter preparation and editing took place over the course of the following
year, involving further efforts at integration of the sciences and humanities. This
further evolution was also made possible with support from the foundation.
Abundant gratitude goes to Sir John Templeton for his belief that love and altru-
ism are at the core of “ultimate reality” and human nature and for his willingness
to commit funds to allow the scholarly community to explore the scientific, psy-
chological, and theological dimensions of love. His enthusiasm encouraged Dr.
John M. Templeton Jr. and Charles L. Harper Jr. to build on this core belief by pro-
posing the project that gave rise to this book. Judith Marchand, Allyson McHugh,
and the entire foundation staff are also commended for facilitating the work so
positively. The challenge presented by the John Templeton Foundation has planted
the seeds for subsequent research and scholarship at this union of disciplines.
We thank the Fetzer Institute for its support and commitment to this project
and to the fields of study touched by this book and the late John Fetzer for his will-
ingness to initiate a nonprofit foundation that has the bold intention to be based
on unconditional love. Fetzer’s public financial commitment to pursue this area of
study provides an opportunity to bridge various perspectives and to build a deeper
preface
vi
understanding of these complex topics with research that can be effectively trans-
lated into action.
Thanks also to Greg Fricchione, Lawrence Sullivan, and David G. Myers and
again to Charles L. Harper Jr. for joining our extended planning committee as it
sought to identify scholars who could best contribute to the project. We are also
deeply appreciative of those practitioners of altruism and altruistic love who con-
tributed to the initial conference, thereby providing scholars with a sense of lived
altruism. These practioners include Dame Cicely Saunders, originator of the mod-
ern hospice movement; Reverend Eugene Rivers of Ella J. Baker House in Boston;
and Joan Eads, zone coordinator of L’Arche USA.
This project was supported, in part, by grants to Jeffrey Schloss from West-
mont College and the Discovery Institute that allowed him to devote his energy
and talents to it.
Finally, thanks to the Center for Biomedical Ethics of the School of Medicine
at Case Western Reserve University for providing necessary materials and allowing
time for the overall facilitation of the editorial endeavor by Stephen G. Post, and to
the Institute for Research on Unlimited Love, of which Post is president.
Cleveland S. G. P.
Kalamazoo L. G. U.
Santa Barbara J. P. S.
Palo Alto W. B. H.
November 2001
contents
Contributors, xi
General Introduction, 3
Stephen G. Post, Lynn G. Underwood, Jeffrey P. Schloss,
and William B. Hurlbut
part i: definitions
Introduction to Part I, 15
Stephen G. Post
1. The ABCs of Altruism, 17
Elliott Sober
2. Pythagorean Bodies and the Body of Altruism, 29
Edith Wyschogrod
3. Morality, Altruism, and Love, 40
Jerome Kagan
4. The Tradition of Agape, 51
Stephen G. Post
Conclusion to Part I, 65
Stephen G. Post
part ii: human motivation and action
Introduction to Part II
Lynn G. Underwood,69
5. The Human Experience of Compassionate Love: Conceptual Mapping
and Data from Selected Studies, 72
Lynn G. Underwood
6. Addressing the Altruism Question Experimentally, 89
C. Daniel Batson
7. Explicating Altruism, 106
Kristen Renwick Monroe
8. Extraordinary Acts of Ordinary People: Faces of Heroism
and Altruism, 123
Samuel P. Oliner
Conclusion to Part II, 140
Lynn G. Underwood
contents
viii
part iii. evolutionary biology
Introduction to Part III, 145
Jeffrey P. Schloss
19. A Darwinian Naturalist’s Perspective on Altruism, 151
Michael Ruse
10. Relating Self, Others, and Sacrifice in the Ordering of Love, 168
Stephen J. Pope
11. The Fall and Rise and Fall and Rise and Fall and Rise of Altruism in
Evolutionary Biology, 182
David Sloan Wilson and Elliott Sober
12. Some Obstacles to Altruism, 192
Melvin Konner
13. Emerging Accounts of Altruism: “Love Creation’s Final Law”?, 212
Jeffrey P. Schloss
Conclusion to Part III, 243
Jeffrey P. Schloss
part iv: the science of altruism
Introduction to Part IV, 249
William B. Hurlbut
14. Implications for the Neurobiology of Love, 254
Thomas R. Insel
15. A Note on the Neurobiology of Emotions, 264
Antonio R. Damasio
16. Impairment of Interpersonal Social Behavior Caused by
Acquired Brain Damage, 272
Hanna Damasio
17. The Communication of Emotions and the Possibility of
Empathy in Animals, 284
Stephanie D. Preston and Frans B. M. de Waal
18. Empathy, Evolution, and Altruism, 309
William B. Hurlbut
Conclusion to Part IV, 328
William B. Hurlbut
part v: religion
Introduction to Part V, 333
Stephen G. Post
19. Science and Religion on the Nature of Love, 335
Don S. Browning
20. Separation, Attachment, and Altruistic Love: The Evolutionary
Basis for Medical Caring, 346
Gregory L. Fricchione
contents
ix
21. Compassion out of Wisdom: Buddhist Perspectives from the Past
toward the Human Future, 362
Ruben L. F. Habito
Conclusion to Part V, 376
Stephen G. Post
Concluding Summary: Future Research Needs on Altruism and
Altruistic Love, 379
Stephen G. Post and Lynn G. Underwood
Annotated Bibliography: Research on Personality and Individual
Differences in Altruism, 387
Shelley Dean Kilpatrick and Michael E. McCullough
References, 475
List of Articles by Subject, 485
Index, 491
contributors
c. daniel batson is a social psychologist and professor of psychology at the Uni-
versity of Kansas. He has conducted a number of experiments on empathy and
altruism (some funded by the National Science Foundation), is the author of The
Altruism Question: Toward a Social-Psychological Answer (1991), and is coauthor
(with Patricia Schoenrade and Larry Ventis) of Religion and the Individual: A
Social-Psychological Perspective (Oxford University Press, 1993).
don s. browning is Alexander Campbell Professor of Religious Ethics and the
Social Sciences at the University of Chicago Divinity School. He is the principal
investigator of the Religion, Culture, and Family Project, financed by a grant from
the Lilly Endowment, that resulted in the publication of an 11-book series on var-
ious topics pertaining to the contemporary debate on the family. His writings on
psychology, Christianity, and images of human fulfillment span four decades.
antonio r. damasio is Van Allen Distinguished Professor and head of the De-
partment of Neurology at the University of Iowa and adjunct professor at the Salk
Institute in La Jolla, California.
Damasio’s work has focused on elucidating critical problems in the funda-
mental neuroscience of mind and behavior at the level of large-scale systems in
humans, although his investigations have also encompassed Parkinsonism and
Alzheimer’s disease. His contributions have had a major influence on our under-
standing of the neural basis of decision making, emotion, language, and memory.
xi