Courage is one of those virtues, societies idolize, poets extol in verses and authors lionize in epic stories. We see it as physical courage in soldiers, firefighters and police officers. We see it in parents protecting their children. We see it in anonymous people rescuing strangers. We also see it as moral courage in people who stand up for justice and human rights, theirs and those of others. We see it as professional courage in people who stand up for what is right in their work.
But where does courage come from? What makes doctors, nurses, emergency medical and hospital workers around the world get up each day and put themselves at risk in order to deliver life-saving services to the rest of us in this deadly pandemic? And most remarkably of all, what makes them excited and animated when they talk about their work? Certainly, it’s not because of the monetary rewards. Many of them earn below average salaries.
Our first inclination in answering these questions is to say that courage and selflessness are the outcomes of a very long process of inculcation from one generation to the next. Or that they come with the job. Or that courageous and helping people self-select to enter careers that require these traits. All that has a grain of truth. But let’s remember that there is no behavior that has no origin in our nature or, more plainly, in what nature has endowed us in order to survive very challenging and changing environments. Inculcation and upbringing matter. But they are not the whole story. How do we know this? Because the same courageous and selfless behavior is found in other species!
To ask “where does courage come from?” is not a superfluous question. Courage comes with risk. Risking one’s life, livelihood, or standing in the community are not exactly the types of behavior favored for survival, procreation and wellbeing. This is how Darwin himself described the dilemma of being courageous and selfless versus neither:
It is extremely doubtful whether the offspring of the more sympathetic and benevolent parents, or of those which were the most faithful to their comrades, would be reared in greater number than the children of selfish and treacherous parents of the same tribe.” On the contrary, the bravest, most self-sacrificial men “would on an average perish in larger number than other men.” A noble man “would often leave no offspring to inherit his noble nature.” *
The funny thing with nature, though, is that it achieves selfish results out of selfless behavior. Of course, the most basic example is that of a parent sacrificing him/herself for the child. Although the parent perishes his/her genes survive in the child. (That’s what Darwin meant in the last sentence above.) This gene inheritance instinct also works when one sacrifices for a relative. Choosing to risk and sacrifice can even extend beyond kin to members of one’s group (clan or tribe). It can also be justified by reciprocal altruism that increases the chances of survival for all. So, do nothing or take flight in the presence of danger, that is, the opposite of being courageous, is not the only behavior favored by our evolutionary path.
There is, however, another, even more heartwarming story, in the book of nature. This is the story of empathy and social bonding. We know that like us, other mammals like elephants and primates mourn the passing of members of their family. They, like us, are also attracted by the distress of others in their species. Even prairie moles and rats have been found to display signs of stress when other moles or rats are in distress. All that shows that we are endowed with empathy and have a social sense of wellbeing. As the primatologist Frans De Waal writes, our default mode is intensely social. Beyond the preservation of our genes, it is also our empathy for others and our instinctual need for social cooperation that drives us to behave selflessly and even courageously, and, by doing so, to gain a survival advantage as a species.
As important empathy and selflessness are for our physical survival so are they for our survival as a good society. It is selfless and courageous behavior that defines the moral standing of societies and, by extension, the preservation of human rights and liberties.
It is in periods of acute and nearly existential crises, like the current pandemic, our personal and collective courage is tested and matters. It is in such periods that mischievous and power-grabbing governments attempt to curtail civic liberties and political rights by exploiting public fear and misinformation. We see it these days in the attempts of strong men with authoritarian leanings to impose measures that go far beyond those responsible citizens are willing to surrender for the common good.
In good and trying times, courage matters the most for the preservation of liberal democracy. And to that end, it matters a lot to have leaders who promote courage and selflessness in the interest of political liberties and the wellbeing of society. That’s why it is sad to see that this administration is led by someone who seems so oblivious to the importance of cultivating courageous and selfless behavior. When the leader of a country declares “I don’t take responsibility at all” and instead brags about his ratings on Facebook, you know this person is leading without courage. And this is not all. With an unprecedented record of firings of government officials and public servants who do not toe his line, this President has shown that courage and selflessness are punishable qualities.
Too bad he is not versed in history. Had he been fortunate to partake of such knowledge, he would perhaps be aware of another leader who, twenty-five centuries ago, knew the significance of courage for the wellbeing of society. That leader was Pericles, who in his funeral oration for the fallen soldiers of Athens during the first year of the Peloponnesian War and in the midst of a plague spoke these words to his mourning people: “Happiness comes from Freedom, and Freedom comes from Courage.”
* From The Moral Animal, Robert Wright.
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