Jay Hanson wrote: > Evolutionary psychology is quickly becoming the ONLY psychology.
Man, is that arrogant! Remember that 100 years ago or so, Freudianism quickly became the ONLY psychology. Then, behaviorism quickly became the ONLY psychology. Etc. Etc., inflicting punishment on us down to the third and fourth generation. Now, it's so-called "evolutionary psychology" that claims to becoming the ONLY psychology allowed (the only one that isn't infused with normative assumptions, develops "testable predictions," prevents dissenters from getting tenure, etc.) But can evolutionary psychology explain why Prozac and other SSRIs can help treat depression? why the French hate the English and vice-versa? can it explain why so many people seem to worship those with blonde hair and blue eyes? Can comparing people to worker bees, jays, and other instinct-driven beasts say much if anything about people, who have developed complicated cultures, languages, and technology? (Doesn't that seem to be a case of the fallacy of argument by analogy?) Or do we have to bring in some sort of independent role for culture and social institutions in determining human behavior? We see this kind of arrogance in economics with case of the Neoclassicals -- especially those of the Chicago school -- claiming that they had the ONLY economics.[*] Everything can be reduced to a nice simple explanation, with simple one-way lines of causation. Can this kind of narrow and reductionist thinking be explained by the ONLY psychology in town, i.e., evolutionary psychology? Further, am I to understand that these psychologists think they can explain EVERYTHING psychological by reference to the "altruism" of selfish genes? Pen-pals probably know the line: according to Dawkins: I'm just a survival machine for my genes, aiding their self-replication over time. Thus, I'm nice to my kid because he shares half of my genes, while I beat my wife because she doesn't share _any_ of my genes.[**] (BTW, she's already done the work of preserving my genes for posterity, so any reason for loving her has the bogus status of sunk costs. She's not contributing anything to help my genes at all these days. Thus, she's not worthy of any consideration anymore.) Is this "evolutionary psychology" theory ever done in comparison to alternative hypotheses? For example, in the book introduction (that's been posted to pen-l before, BTW), "stepparents were a major source of [child] abuse." Following the reductionist tradition, the ONLY explanation that evolutionary psychology seems to allow is that it's because stepparents don't share any of the kid's genes. Why can't it be that it's because the stepparents don't share any "memes" with the kids? that is, to use plainer English and clearer thinking, that the stepparent doesn't have as much experience living with the kid and thus doesn't communicate very well with the kid at the same time that the kid doesn't communicate with the stepparent? Or maybe _both_ genes and memes play a role? (After all, both supply and demand play a role in markets, don't they?) Has anyone worried about the scientific status of a perspective which, like astrology, has an explanation (likely only after the fact) of EVERYTHING? Is there any way to falsify this "evolutionary psychology"? or is it rather that "evolutionary psychology" only tries to answer questions that fit with its oversimplified theory, ignoring the harder questions? [*] Speaking of which, I had the unfortunate experience of reading a book that merged "evolutionary psychology" with Chicago-style economics (see Gandolfi, Gandolfi, and Barash, Economics as Evolutionary Science: From Utility to Fitness, 2002). I haven't seen such an unmitigated pile of nonsense in quite awhile. It's all about "testable predictions" that are never tested, claims to be value-free, etc., in the end presenting nothing but ideology. [**] This presumes that my selfish genes are the ONLY basis for my love of others. -- Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante. _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
