John Mikhail: Georgetown Law

Scientists from various disciplines have begun to focus renewed attention on the psychology and biology of human morality. One research program that has recently gained attention is universal moral grammar (UMG). UMG seeks to describe the nature and origin of moral knowledge by using concepts and models similar to those used in Chomsky’s program in linguistics. This approach is thought to provide a fruitful perspective from which to investigate moral competence from computational, ontogenetic, behavioral, physiological, and phylogenetic perspectives. In my talk, I first outline a framework for UMG and describe some of the evidence supporting it. I then discuss some initial findings of a related study in comparative law that seeks to determine how certain norms, such as the prohibition of homicide, are codified and interpreted in several hundred jurisdictions around the world. The study’s main finding, the apparent universality or near-universality of specific justifications and excuses, lends further support to UMG. It also raises novel questions for cognitive science, broadly construed, including neuroethics, behavioral economics, evolutionary psychology, and legal anthropology.
http://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=1163422