<p>This is a pretty popular research topic!
One good place to start might be with the work of Spelke, she's all over this.
Try this: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNq_a_wgdgQ" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNq_a_wgdgQ</a></p>

<p>If you prefer written words, this paper is a nice broad overview, although note the 2007 publishing date, there's been a fair bit of work since then.
Spelke, Elizabeth S., and Katherine D. Kinzler. "Core knowledge." Developmental science 10.1 (2007): 89-96.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-06-25T22:03:35.003Z
Thanks for the references. I'm particularly interested in a priori normative judgements related mainly to morality. Do you know about any references showing evidences or supporting non existence of such kind of a priori knowledge?
user40276
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-06-26T13:49:23.917Z
Well, towards the end of that talk Spelke discusses 'social stuff' which I think is as close as you'll get from an empirical-developmental view. She argues for a distinction between separate core knowledge domains for 'agency' and 'social behavior' that later merge. I think it's reasonable to read that as two tools in an innate toolkit from which morality is constructed. But the empirical results are still coming in, and the big philosophical debate is really over how to organize them: is the agent/social clustering useful, & how do these components relate to the broader concept of morality?
steveLangsford
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-06-26T19:42:14.720Z
Yes. I've read the paper that you mentioned, but it doesn't seem to address exactly my question in the comment. My question was whether morality itself might be a priori and not whether it emerges by means of other a priori systems through experience. I understand that it's probably something too difficult to test, though. Here I mean morality in its wider sense (as what you should do and shouldn't do), but the ones related to the social such as altruism would be more interesting.
user40276
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-06-26T19:42:22.530Z
Also I've heard (by a psychologist) that infants in early age are not able to distinguish themselves from the rest of the world in space, so it's a little doubtful that they can identify their own race visually. But maybe it happens through other senses or by visual resemblance to their parents.
user40276
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-06-27T15:18:08.663Z
Well, a 'whether' question could be answered 'yes' or 'no'! Here the answer depends how you define morality. If your definition is broad, the answer is "definitely no". If your definition is narrow, it's either "innate endowment makes this development close to inevitable" or "this is itself an atomic innate endowment" These more interesting narrow versions compel you to match the language you're using to the empirical results, and to be open to changing your terminology somewhat as those results improve.
steveLangsford
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-07-02T23:43:38.480Z
Sorry, I was unable to grasp your last comment. If the narrow definition is contained in the broad one, then, if the narrow one occurs a priori, the broad one will also occur a priori. Let's stick to the broad one, namely, morality as any normative judgement about physical objects (be it about agents or inanimate objects).
user40276
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-07-03T17:42:33.140Z
By 'a broad definition of morality' I mean the whole process of deciding one course of action or state of the world is better than another. A 'narrow' definition of morality would be some specific component of that, like 'be pro-social', or even narrower 'recognize that other people are sentient beings'. I think 'choosing a good course of action' probably requires 'be pro-social', but 'be pro-social' is definitely not enough, for example cults can be both pro-social and nasty. 'be pro-social' might be innate, 'choose the social norm' is definitely learned (since the norms must be learned).
steveLangsford
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-07-03T21:35:56.677Z
Well. I'm considering a moral judgement any normative judgement. So any knowledge about one of these judgements would be a moral assertion in my definition. I guess that no experiment can be performed without infringing some ethical boundaries or being invasive (like testing the responses of a fetus). In any case, I still have a tiny hope that someone might have already found an ingenious way of circumventing these problems.
user40276
CC BY-SA 4.0
2018-06-25T21:08:33.730Z
2018-06-25T21:08:33.730Z
steveLangsford
<p><strong>1) Is there any set of rules that human beings or, more generally, other sentient living beings know a priori before any learning process?
In other words, do sentient living beings always were born knowing some causal relations about the world?</strong></p>
<p>For instance, a newborn baby may not know that walking from a high place in direction of an edge may result on him falling due to gravity. Maybe he doesn't even know that he can move its arms and he only learns that after performing fortuitously an impulse that generates such action. Maybe he doesn't even know that he must breath in order to survive and he only learns that after feeling the discomfort and pain caused by the lack of oxygen.</p>
<p>As a disclaimer, I'm excluding here tautological logical syllogisms such as the principle of non contradiction and other axioms of logic. I'm also excluding here any synthetic a priori knowledge that can be derived from these (if you believe in synthetic a priori).</p>
<p><strong>2) In the positive case, how complex can these causal relations be (maybe a measure or an undeniably remarkable complex a priori knowledge)?</strong></p>
<p>I'm particularly interested in a priori knowledge about normative judgements mainly related to social mores.</p>

<cognitive-psychology><neuroscience><learning><behavior>
Do we know a priori any rules about the world?
user40276
# Do we know a priori any rules about the world?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2018-06-24)

**1) Is there any set of rules that human beings or, more generally, other sentient living beings know a priori before any learning process?
In other words, do sentient living beings always were born knowing some causal relations about the world?**

For instance, a newborn baby may not know that walking from a high place in direction of an edge may result on him falling due to gravity. Maybe he doesn't even know that he can move its arms and he only learns that after performing fortuitously an impulse that generates such action. Maybe he doesn't even know that he must breath in order to survive and he only learns that after feeling the discomfort and pain caused by the lack of oxygen.

As a disclaimer, I'm excluding here tautological logical syllogisms such as the principle of non contradiction and other axioms of logic. I'm also excluding here any synthetic a priori knowledge that can be derived from these (if you believe in synthetic a priori).

**2) In the positive case, how complex can these causal relations be (maybe a measure or an undeniably remarkable complex a priori knowledge)?**

I'm particularly interested in a priori knowledge about normative judgements mainly related to social mores.

**Tags:** cognitive-psychology, neuroscience, learning, behavior


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2018-06-25. Score: 4

This is a pretty popular research topic!
One good place to start might be with the work of Spelke, she's all over this.
Try this: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNq_a_wgdgQ>

If you prefer written words, this paper is a nice broad overview, although note the 2007 publishing date, there's been a fair bit of work since then.
Spelke, Elizabeth S., and Katherine D. Kinzler. "Core knowledge." Developmental science 10.1 (2007): 89-96.

> **Comments:**
> **username_0**: Thanks for the references. I'm particularly interested in a priori normative judgements related mainly to morality. Do you know about any references showing evidences or supporting non existence of such kind of a priori knowledge?  
> **username_1**: Well, towards the end of that talk Spelke discusses 'social stuff' which I think is as close as you'll get from an empirical-developmental view. She argues for a distinction between separate core knowledge domains for 'agency' and 'social behavior' that later merge. I think it's reasonable to read that as two tools in an innate toolkit from which morality is constructed. But the empirical results are still coming in, and the big philosophical debate is really over how to organize them: is the agent/social clustering useful, & how do these components relate to the broader concept of morality?  
> **username_0**: Yes. I've read the paper that you mentioned, but it doesn't seem to address exactly my question in the comment. My question was whether morality itself might be a priori and not whether it emerges by means of other a priori systems through experience. I understand that it's probably something too difficult to test, though. Here I mean morality in its wider sense (as what you should do and shouldn't do), but the ones related to the social such as altruism would be more interesting.  
> **username_0**: Also I've heard (by a psychologist) that infants in early age are not able to distinguish themselves from the rest of the world in space, so it's a little doubtful that they can identify their own race visually. But maybe it happens through other senses or by visual resemblance to their parents.  
> **username_1**: Well, a 'whether' question could be answered 'yes' or 'no'! Here the answer depends how you define morality. If your definition is broad, the answer is "definitely no". If your definition is narrow, it's either "innate endowment makes this development close to inevitable" or "this is itself an atomic innate endowment" These more interesting narrow versions compel you to match the language you're using to the empirical results, and to be open to changing your terminology somewhat as those results improve.  
> **username_0**: Sorry, I was unable to grasp your last comment. If the narrow definition is contained in the broad one, then, if the narrow one occurs a priori, the broad one will also occur a priori. Let's stick to the broad one, namely, morality as any normative judgement about physical objects (be it about agents or inanimate objects).  
> **username_1**: By 'a broad definition of morality' I mean the whole process of deciding one course of action or state of the world is better than another. A 'narrow' definition of morality would be some specific component of that, like 'be pro-social', or even narrower 'recognize that other people are sentient beings'. I think 'choosing a good course of action' probably requires 'be pro-social', but 'be pro-social' is definitely not enough, for example cults can be both pro-social and nasty. 'be pro-social' might be innate, 'choose the social norm' is definitely learned (since the norms must be learned).  
> **username_0**: Well. I'm considering a moral judgement any normative judgement. So any knowledge about one of these judgements would be a moral assertion in my definition. I guess that no experiment can be performed without infringing some ethical boundaries or being invasive (like testing the responses of a fetus). In any case, I still have a tiny hope that someone might have already found an ingenious way of circumventing these problems.  

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