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Adam Smith on Instincts, Affection, and Informal Learning: Proximate Mechanisms in Multilevel Selection

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  • Jonathan Wight

Abstract

Why do people give away knowledge in tutoring other people's children or when mentoring junior employees? Neoclassical economists explain informal learning as rational behavior that arises out of enlightened self-interest. They can also justify it as acts that satisfy the agent's preferences for the utility of others. By contrast, this paper shows that Smith's moral sentiments model anticipates a biological approach that explains additional and deeper motives for such exchanges. Instincts and emotions serve consequentialist ends because the ultimate causes of behavior are grounded in adaptations useful for survival and procreation. But man is largely innocent of this knowledge. The proximate causes of behavior—that is, the adaptive mechanisms actually at work in human society—are psychologically obscure—not left to the conscious mind. Social and moral capital develop through instincts and affection, and mentoring and collaboration are examples of social exchanges that arise from them.

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  • Jonathan Wight, 2009. "Adam Smith on Instincts, Affection, and Informal Learning: Proximate Mechanisms in Multilevel Selection," Review of Social Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 67(1), pages 95-113.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:rsocec:v:67:y:2009:i:1:p:95-113
    DOI: 10.1080/00346760802483679
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    1. McCloskey, Deirdre Nansen, 2006. "The Bourgeois Virtues," University of Chicago Press Economics Books, University of Chicago Press, number 9780226556635, December.
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    Cited by:

    1. Wilfred Dolfsma & Deborah Figart & Robert McMaster & Martha Starr, 2012. "Promoting Research on Intersections of Economics, Ethics, and Social Values: Editorial," Review of Social Economy, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 70(2), pages 155-163, June.
    2. Schliesser, Eric, 2011. "Reading Adam Smith after Darwin: On the evolution of propensities, institutions, and sentiments," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 77(1), pages 14-22, January.
    3. Brosnan, Sarah F., 2011. "An evolutionary perspective on morality," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 77(1), pages 23-30, January.
    4. Daphne W. Yiu & William P. Wan & Kelly Xing Chen & Xiaocong Tian, 2022. "Public sentiment is everything: Host-country public sentiment toward home country and acquisition ownership during institutional transition," Journal of International Business Studies, Palgrave Macmillan;Academy of International Business, vol. 53(6), pages 1202-1227, August.
    5. Jonathan B. Wight, 2011. "Ethics and Critical Thinking," Chapters, in: Gail M. Hoyt & KimMarie McGoldrick (ed.), International Handbook on Teaching and Learning Economics, chapter 18, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    6. Eric Schliesser, 2010. "Reading Adam Smith after Darwin: On the Evolution of Propensities, Institutions, and Sentiments," Post-Print hal-00921187, HAL.

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