Sample Questions for the Final Exam Philosophy 2233, Fall 2007
I.
1.
Short Answer:
Outline the argument from our evolutionary continuity with living things that are not subject to
ethical evaluation to the claim that we cannot be subject to ethical evaluation either.
2. What is kin selection?
3. What is reciprocal altruism?
4. Distinguish between descriptive and evaluative language.
5. What is the is/ought gap?
6. What is an epigenetic trait?
7. What is social Darwinism?
8. What is a prisoners’ dilemma?
9. What is a “tit for tat” strategy?
10. What is “chicken”?
11. What is the “cooperative dividend”?
12. What is group selection? (Describe how it could lead a trait that is always selected against to
become more widespread in the overall population.)
13. How does kin selection allow natural selection to favour self-sacrifice?
14. What is a function?
15. Distinguish efficient causes from teleological causes.
16. How does reciprocal altruism allow natural selection to favour self-sacrifice?
17. Describe Ruse and Wilson’s “illusion” account of ethical beliefs.
18. Explain Gould’s distinction between biological determinism and his view of our biological
potential.
19. Why does Gould think sociality has evolved so regularly among the haplo-diploid insects?
20. Describe how Spencer might argue for the elimination of welfare benefits.
II. Essay Questions
1. What do you think evolution has to tell us about ethics? Are the two compatible, so that our
understanding of evolution merely helps us to explain how it is that we came to be ethical beings? Or is
there some incompatability between them? Consider some of the views and arguments in the readings, and
defend your answer.
2. Do you think we could come to some agreement on ethics with a species that is very different from us in
its mode of life/ social organization, etc.? Consider the example that Ruse and Wilson give (intelligent
termites), and any others you would like to raise. Justify your position!
3. If our ethical convictions are hardwired, as Ruse and Wilson claim, could they also be correct? (Note
that our senses are also the product of evolution.) Or must any such “programmed” ethics be a kind of
(collective) illusion, as they also claim? How strong is the case for hardwiring? Compare with Gould’s
alternative in “So Cleverly Kind...”.
III. Review Essay: Set Question.
Consider carefully the way in which the biologists and geologists we've been reading about have
tried to reason regarding the Earth's past. Describe some of the methods used, and consider how the
conclusions they reached compare to the sorts of skeptical possibilities philosophers sometimes worry
about. Is there any important difference between the sorts of hypotheses scientists have actually considered
and debated and the skeptical possibility, say, that the world was created, memories and all, only 5 minutes
ago? Can you say what the difference is, and if (and why) it makes a difference to whether or not we take a
hypothesis seriously? Can we use our account of the difference to justify ruling out (for example) young
earth creationism, or “intelligent design” theory as non-starters in the debate?
The point here is to return to the issue we began with, that is, how do we reach (and justify)
conclusions about the past from our present evidence, and consider it again with a richer background grasp
on how biology and geology has been done, and what sorts of hypotheses scientists have, and have not,
considered as candidates for acceptance.