I would also like to challenge what appears to be an implication that evolution leads to all moral beliefs being “geared towards survival” as in “believing having many kids is obligatory.”, or a lack of belief in transitivity, etc. In the OP, that is said to be a consequence of anti-realism, but it seems to be written as a consequence of evolution by the mechanisms studied by science—i.e., not including a guiding will, or force, or creator, etc.
That is not what evolution would lead to. For example, consider monkeys or apes, say capuchins. They have species-wide rules (and some that are common to other species too, but that aside), and a motivation for punishing rule-breakers (I’d say morality, but let’s leave that aside). But they do not have a rule ‘have many monkey kids’. Sure, they do not know the connection between sex and reproduction, so it would be hard to enforce. But capuchins do not have a rule ‘have a lot of sex’, either. No, what was conducive to reproductive success was to punish those who behave in certain manners. And of course, it was not conducive to punish monkeys who did not have a lot of sex. And then, feelings of avoidance of rule-breaking—like guilt—were also conducive to reproductive success. And so on. The point is that rules do not need to involve a direct connection to reproductive success.
As for belief in transitivity, or things like that, that is a belief that requires theoretical thinking about morality. What evolution gave us is morality on the one hand, and the ability for high-order thinking on the other hand. Applying the latter to the former we can get beliefs not connected to reproductive success, at least not in any obvious manner.
I would also like to challenge what appears to be an implication that evolution leads to all moral beliefs being “geared towards survival” as in “believing having many kids is obligatory.”, or a lack of belief in transitivity, etc. In the OP, that is said to be a consequence of anti-realism, but it seems to be written as a consequence of evolution by the mechanisms studied by science—i.e., not including a guiding will, or force, or creator, etc.
That is not what evolution would lead to. For example, consider monkeys or apes, say capuchins. They have species-wide rules (and some that are common to other species too, but that aside), and a motivation for punishing rule-breakers (I’d say morality, but let’s leave that aside). But they do not have a rule ‘have many monkey kids’. Sure, they do not know the connection between sex and reproduction, so it would be hard to enforce. But capuchins do not have a rule ‘have a lot of sex’, either. No, what was conducive to reproductive success was to punish those who behave in certain manners. And of course, it was not conducive to punish monkeys who did not have a lot of sex. And then, feelings of avoidance of rule-breaking—like guilt—were also conducive to reproductive success. And so on.
The point is that rules do not need to involve a direct connection to reproductive success.
As for belief in transitivity, or things like that, that is a belief that requires theoretical thinking about morality. What evolution gave us is morality on the one hand, and the ability for high-order thinking on the other hand. Applying the latter to the former we can get beliefs not connected to reproductive success, at least not in any obvious manner.