This is Bioethics Bites with me David Edmonds and me Nigel Warburton.

Bioethics Bites is made an association with Oxford's Urohero Center for Practical Ethics and made possible by a grant from the Welcome Trust.

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Or to iTunes You. What can science tell us about morality? Many philosophers would say nothing at all. Facts don't

imply values, they say. You need further argument to move from facts about us and about the world

to conclusions about what we ought to do. For example, most humans are altruistic. They genuinely

care about the well-being of friends and family and to a lesser extent even of strangers

They'll give money to charity to help people they've never even met

Suppose science gives us a compelling scientific explanation for why we're altruistic.

Does that tell us whether we should be altruistic?

Professor Pat Churchland is a well-known neuroscientist based at the University of San Diego who works at the

intersection of neuroscience and philosophy. Pat Churchland, welcome to

Bioethics Bites. Thanks so much Nigel. It's a pleasure to be here.

The topic we're going to focus on is what neuroscience can tell us about morality.

I wonder if we could just begin by sketching your view of the neural basis of morality. It's a bit of a story.

There was a major shift in brain organization and structure as mammals evolved.

And there were a number of changes that were really important in the

mammalian brain and one of which was that it was organized to see to the care and the nurture of offspring. In the case of reptiles or

frogs or snakes for example, basically what happens is that the female lays the

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