61: “You cannot go wrong with compassion” – Frans de Waal – Animal Morality – Sentientist Conversations

We discuss the biggest questions: "what's real?", "who matters?" and "how to make a better world?" with scientists, celebrities, activists, writers and philosophers. The Sentientism worldview is "evidence, reason and compassion for all sentient beings." It's a simple, yet radical, philosophy that's grounded in reality (naturalistic epistemology) and has compassion for all sentient beings (mostly human and non-human animals). Naturalism & sentiocentrism combined.

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Frans (fransdewaal.com) is a primatologist & ethologist. He is Professor of Primate Behavior at Emory University, director of the Living Links Center at Emory & the author of many books including “Chimpanzee Politics”, “Our Inner Ape” & “The Bonobo & the Atheist”. He has featured in TV/radio productions & TED talks viewed by tens of millions of people. His research centers on primate social behavior, including conflict resolution, cooperation, inequity aversion, & food-sharing. He is a member of the United States National Academy of Sciences & the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts & Sciences.

In Sentientist Conversations we talk about the two most important questions: “what’s real?” & “what matters?”

Sentientism is “evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings.” The video of our conversation is here on YouTube.

We discuss:

0:00 Welcome

1:19 Frans’ Intro – Understanding animals

– Ethology, primates, animal behaviour, intelligence & morality

– Breaking out of behaviourism. “We have so much evidence for animal intelligence… these taboos are being broken”

– The ripple effect. Finding remarkable capabilities in primates, then in many other species

4:05 What’s Real? From Catholic to apathist

– Growing up Catholic & dropping religion at 17

– “My parents were very unhappy but I was part of a generation where everyone was doing that”

– Apathism… “I don’t particularly care if god exists”

– “In Catholicism & every religion there’s a lot of hypocrisy… people who talk one way & act another”

– Child abuse scandals & cover-ups

– “Jesus was an inspiring figure… whether he’s a real historical figure or not”

– Half of people in the Netherlands call themselves atheists & we see that coming to the USA

8:48 What Matters Morally?

– Religious & evolutionary & intuition as drivers of morality

– Religions can provide narratives to support your moral intuitions (e.g. the good samaritan)

– “You cannot go wrong with compassion, morally”

– Studying empathy in non-human animals

– You can’t build a moral system without empathy

– Reasoning & logic, without compassion, can lead to awful harm

– “Empathy & compassion are not human inventions”

– Very young human children & dogs both show compassion to a crying person (Carolyn Zahn-Waxler)

– We find compassion in many non-human animals & that is the basis for human morality too

– The ability to detect sentience in others & to feel affected by it. Roots in maternal care (hence empathy more developed in females)? Oxytocin

– “If you have a co-operative animal society you need to worry about your fellows”

… And much more… full show notes at sentientism.info

Sentientism is “Evidence, reason & compassion for all sentient beings.” More at sentientism.info. Join our “I’m a Sentientist” wall using this simple form.

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Thanks @cgbessellieu for the post-production.