The target article tells a natural history of our moral stance. Although philosophers have long been analyzing the conceptual peculiarities of our specifically moral engagements with each other, our reactive attitudes, second-person feelings, and the like, Tomasello's project aims at tracing their natural foundations. Building on decades of research in developmental and comparative psychology, Tomasello closely ties the phylogeny and ontogeny of the moral stance to more basic social-cognitive capacities – in particular the intentional stance, shared intentionality, and group thinking. This project certainly presents massive progress in naturalizing morality.
Here, I simply ask how, exactly, the moral stance relates to the intentional stance, to shared intentionality and to group thinking. Clearly, the four stances (intentional stance, shared intentionality, group stance, moral stance) are very closely related, and one of the main merits of the target article is to highlight this very nexus. At places, however, the target article reads as if the links were so close that the stances almost coincide: “This creates the most basic […] distinction […] between those of us who, by following and enforcing the practices and beliefs of our culture, are rational/moral beings, and those from alien groups (barbarians) who are not rational/moral beings at all” (sect. 2.2.1, para. 3). This passage thus sounds like there may really be only one unitary distinction in our social cognition: between rational agents (subject to the intentional stance) with whom one can enter into shared intentionality, that are members of one's tribe (group stance) here and subject to the moral stance; and the rest (“barbarians”) there, who are neither rational nor members of one's group, partners for shared intentionality nor morally relevant agents.
But the real relations between the four stances are probably much more complex: That some basic form of the intentional stance and shared intentionality can come apart is exemplified by the Machiavellian intelligence of nonhuman great apes (who, according to Tomasello, understand each other as rational agents in some basic sense without ever entering into shared intentionality) and (perhaps) human psychopaths. The relation between shared intentionality and the group stance is complicated by the fact that there is no such thing as the one and only way to categorize groups. Rather, social group concepts work in complex, criss-crossing, and partly hierarchical ways. In a soccer game, for example, “we” (the back four) play our part so that “we” (the 11 players of our team) succeed against “them,” but a different “we” (the 22 of us on the pitch) are playing this match according to conventional rules that yet another “we” (the community of football players) follow. Each of these hierarchically structured group categorizations go along with some forms of shared intentionality, but arguably very different ones ranging from very concrete and action-based to abstract and far-reaching in temporal and spatial scope. Tomasello's bi-partition into dyadic and group-based shared intentionality is an important step towards recognizing this plurality of shared intentionalities, but it may not be fine-grained enough.
This becomes even clearer when considering the relations between group thinking, shared intentionality, and the moral stance, or normative stances more generally. Some normative stances may be intimately linked, conceptually, ontogenetically and evolutionarily, with more or less small-scale, tribe-like group conceptions. This pertains, roughly speaking, to local, conventional customs that solve coordination problems. Such customs are arbitrary: they are such and so (driving on the right; putting the knife right of the plate), but could have been different (driving and knives left). Correspondingly, they are context-relative in a strong sense: Since they derive their existence from the shared intentional practices of the more or less small-scale group, they are valid only in the context of the group's activities; and if the group changes its intentions, agreements, or decisions, the conventions change.
The moral stance as we know it, in contrast, seems not to be contingent in the same ways on the concrete shared intentionality of local, small-scale group practices. If it depends on group categorizations and corresponding shared intentionality at all, these are located at much higher levels of abstractions, pertaining to the class of rational agents, potential interlocutors, or the like. The moral stances derive their status from our sharing a nature of rational, sentient beings rather than from sharing an intention to perform this or that concrete collective activity (Nagel Reference Nagel1970a).
Quite young children seem to be aware of this fundamental difference between rational and moral versus conventional normative stances to some degree: They understand that moral norms pertaining to human well-being and justice, for example, lack the relativity to local, group-based customs and shared intentionality typical of arbitrary conventions (Turiel Reference Turiel1983). And they enforce norms of rationality and moral norms vis-à-vis other agents irrespective of their group status, whereas they hold only in-group members responsible with respect to conventional norms (Schmidt et al. Reference Schmidt, Rakoczy and Tomasello2012).
In general, group categorization and the corresponding forms of shared intentionality range from the concrete, action-based, transient, and very local matters of, say, a pair of dancers to the maximally abstract category of rational sentient beings (which, depending on technology and ideology may include [some] animals and robots besides humans). The normative stances related to these different levels and layers of groups and shared intentionalities differ in fundamental ways. It will be crucial for future research to better understand how, exactly, group stances, the intentional stance, shared intentionality and the moral stance, relate to each other developmentally. This would be enlightening theoretically, but may also be important politically: In light of threats by new moral tribalisms around the globe, such a better understanding may help to secure moral enlightenment and progress with its ever-widening scope. As Sellars emphasized long ago:
To think of a featherless biped as a person is to construe its behaviour in terms of actual or potential membership in an embracing group each member of which thinks of itself as a member of the group. Let us call such a group a ‘community’. Once the primitive tribe, it is currently (almost) the ‘brotherhood’ of man, and is potentially the ‘republic’ of rational beings (cf. Kant's ‘Kingdom of Ends’).” (Sellars Reference Sellars and Colodny1962, p. 76f.)
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The target article tells a natural history of our moral stance. Although philosophers have long been analyzing the conceptual peculiarities of our specifically moral engagements with each other, our reactive attitudes, second-person feelings, and the like, Tomasello's project aims at tracing their natural foundations. Building on decades of research in developmental and comparative psychology, Tomasello closely ties the phylogeny and ontogeny of the moral stance to more basic social-cognitive capacities – in particular the intentional stance, shared intentionality, and group thinking. This project certainly presents massive progress in naturalizing morality.
Here, I simply ask how, exactly, the moral stance relates to the intentional stance, to shared intentionality and to group thinking. Clearly, the four stances (intentional stance, shared intentionality, group stance, moral stance) are very closely related, and one of the main merits of the target article is to highlight this very nexus. At places, however, the target article reads as if the links were so close that the stances almost coincide: “This creates the most basic […] distinction […] between those of us who, by following and enforcing the practices and beliefs of our culture, are rational/moral beings, and those from alien groups (barbarians) who are not rational/moral beings at all” (sect. 2.2.1, para. 3). This passage thus sounds like there may really be only one unitary distinction in our social cognition: between rational agents (subject to the intentional stance) with whom one can enter into shared intentionality, that are members of one's tribe (group stance) here and subject to the moral stance; and the rest (“barbarians”) there, who are neither rational nor members of one's group, partners for shared intentionality nor morally relevant agents.
But the real relations between the four stances are probably much more complex: That some basic form of the intentional stance and shared intentionality can come apart is exemplified by the Machiavellian intelligence of nonhuman great apes (who, according to Tomasello, understand each other as rational agents in some basic sense without ever entering into shared intentionality) and (perhaps) human psychopaths. The relation between shared intentionality and the group stance is complicated by the fact that there is no such thing as the one and only way to categorize groups. Rather, social group concepts work in complex, criss-crossing, and partly hierarchical ways. In a soccer game, for example, “we” (the back four) play our part so that “we” (the 11 players of our team) succeed against “them,” but a different “we” (the 22 of us on the pitch) are playing this match according to conventional rules that yet another “we” (the community of football players) follow. Each of these hierarchically structured group categorizations go along with some forms of shared intentionality, but arguably very different ones ranging from very concrete and action-based to abstract and far-reaching in temporal and spatial scope. Tomasello's bi-partition into dyadic and group-based shared intentionality is an important step towards recognizing this plurality of shared intentionalities, but it may not be fine-grained enough.
This becomes even clearer when considering the relations between group thinking, shared intentionality, and the moral stance, or normative stances more generally. Some normative stances may be intimately linked, conceptually, ontogenetically and evolutionarily, with more or less small-scale, tribe-like group conceptions. This pertains, roughly speaking, to local, conventional customs that solve coordination problems. Such customs are arbitrary: they are such and so (driving on the right; putting the knife right of the plate), but could have been different (driving and knives left). Correspondingly, they are context-relative in a strong sense: Since they derive their existence from the shared intentional practices of the more or less small-scale group, they are valid only in the context of the group's activities; and if the group changes its intentions, agreements, or decisions, the conventions change.
The moral stance as we know it, in contrast, seems not to be contingent in the same ways on the concrete shared intentionality of local, small-scale group practices. If it depends on group categorizations and corresponding shared intentionality at all, these are located at much higher levels of abstractions, pertaining to the class of rational agents, potential interlocutors, or the like. The moral stances derive their status from our sharing a nature of rational, sentient beings rather than from sharing an intention to perform this or that concrete collective activity (Nagel Reference Nagel1970a).
Quite young children seem to be aware of this fundamental difference between rational and moral versus conventional normative stances to some degree: They understand that moral norms pertaining to human well-being and justice, for example, lack the relativity to local, group-based customs and shared intentionality typical of arbitrary conventions (Turiel Reference Turiel1983). And they enforce norms of rationality and moral norms vis-à-vis other agents irrespective of their group status, whereas they hold only in-group members responsible with respect to conventional norms (Schmidt et al. Reference Schmidt, Rakoczy and Tomasello2012).
In general, group categorization and the corresponding forms of shared intentionality range from the concrete, action-based, transient, and very local matters of, say, a pair of dancers to the maximally abstract category of rational sentient beings (which, depending on technology and ideology may include [some] animals and robots besides humans). The normative stances related to these different levels and layers of groups and shared intentionalities differ in fundamental ways. It will be crucial for future research to better understand how, exactly, group stances, the intentional stance, shared intentionality and the moral stance, relate to each other developmentally. This would be enlightening theoretically, but may also be important politically: In light of threats by new moral tribalisms around the globe, such a better understanding may help to secure moral enlightenment and progress with its ever-widening scope. As Sellars emphasized long ago:
To think of a featherless biped as a person is to construe its behaviour in terms of actual or potential membership in an embracing group each member of which thinks of itself as a member of the group. Let us call such a group a ‘community’. Once the primitive tribe, it is currently (almost) the ‘brotherhood’ of man, and is potentially the ‘republic’ of rational beings (cf. Kant's ‘Kingdom of Ends’).” (Sellars Reference Sellars and Colodny1962, p. 76f.)