As a historical fact, did people actually burn witches because they were copying someone else’s behavior, or because they had some verbal theory for why that is the right thing to do?
These two possibilities are not mutually exclusive; talking is a thing that people do. The correct answer is that it’s the latter case (verbal theory) as an instance of the former category of cases (cases where people copy the behavior of others, such as fashions of thinking and talking).
I’m also not very sure that removing the ability to negotiate theories of objectivity or fairness, which are naturally controversial subjects, would make people more peaceful on average given it as a limiting condition on the deveopment of culture starting with the first appearance of any human communication; I expect it would make world histories more violent on average to remove such an ability.
As a historical fact, did people actually burn witches because they were copying someone else’s behavior, or because they had some verbal theory for why that is the right thing to do?
These two possibilities are not mutually exclusive; talking is a thing that people do. The correct answer is that it’s the latter case (verbal theory) as an instance of the former category of cases (cases where people copy the behavior of others, such as fashions of thinking and talking).
I’m also not very sure that removing the ability to negotiate theories of objectivity or fairness, which are naturally controversial subjects, would make people more peaceful on average given it as a limiting condition on the deveopment of culture starting with the first appearance of any human communication; I expect it would make world histories more violent on average to remove such an ability.