Value and moral values

 

A policy is a coordinated pattern of behaviour.  

A value is either: 1) a utilitarian good; 2) a policy for achieving a goal G.  

A moral value is a policy for achieving a moral goal: i.e., a joint goal G.  

A moral value is the same thing as a moral principle.  

If a moral value is a policy for achieving G, jointly, then a moral principle is a method, within a moral domain defined by an overall method, of achieving some overall G jointly.  

So, if cooperation is an overall description of ways to achieve win-win mutualism (mutual fitness – thriving, surviving, and cooperative breeding), then specifically cooperative moral principles (e.g., altruism, fairness, reciprocity, the Golden Rule) are also methods or policies for achieving win-win mutualism in everyday situations.  

The goal of patriarchy is ultimately reproduction at men's convenience, and proximately, mate acquisition and retention by men using the control and suppression of women.  Patriarchy is constructed collectively, on a society-wide scale, through social norms: ways to be cooperative (to achieve win-win mutualism) in otherwise competitive situations (e.g., competition between males to control and dominate females).  Patriarchal values or moral principles include acknowledgement of the "superiority" and dominance of men; obedience in women; sexual exclusivity in women but not necessarily in men; men providing resources for women; and men physically protecting women from other marauding men.  All of these are ways to achieve the goal of reproduction on men's terms.  

 

Right and wrong

In what sense does evolutionary ethics say that things are right and wrong?  

Interpersonal behaviour can be right or wrong according to this or that moral principle – whether helping in response to need; the Golden Rule; obedience in women; faithfulness to a pair-bonded sexual partner; etc.  Hence, it can be right in ways A, B, and C; but wrong in ways D, E and F.  Behaviour is rarely 100% one or the other: ethical or immoral.