Why be good?

[Angrboda]

Most but not all? In the course of evolution, we have evolved with very specific physical features such as two arms, two legs, five senses, and we walk upright, etc. Now, there are some people who are born without all of these things, but the overwhelming majority are. However, I'm not so sure that the number of people born with the same sense of selflessness matches the percentage of those born with our highly evolved physical traits, are you? In fact, don't parents have to spend an awful lot of time TEACHING their otherwise tyrannical toddlers to share their toys and not throw food on the floor when they are mad, etc? And if morality is learned, then is it merely a societal convention rather than a product of evolution (as has been claimed by NUMEROUS respondents in this thread)?

It's not exclusively one or the other. It is a product of both nature and nurture. Does a baby not smile when her mother smiles. Cry until she is fed. The social impulses are already there, waiting to be shaped by a close bond with another.