Re: the pseudoscience of evolutionary psychology?

Posted by Pieter Steenekamp on
URL: http://friam.383.s1.nabble.com/the-pseudoscience-of-evolutionary-psychology-tp7591207p7591224.html

IMO it's going to be difficult to debunk evolutionary psychology.  It is a valid part of the medley of components of psychology and sociology. But is it the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth? No, certainly not. There is much more to human behavior than evolutionary psychology. 

What's coming out from the #MeToo movement is just horrible. Sure, it may be consistent with evolutionary psychology, but we as humans should not accept it and root out the abhorrent behavior of some of the male of the species. And our society has been protecting the perpetrators and thank god that's changing. 

But don't throw out the baby with the bathwater. Give credit to evolutionary psychology as part of the effort to understand human behavior. 

On 15 February 2018 at 22:08, uǝlƃ ☣ <[hidden email]> wrote:

But your point *did* come through.  Peterson's (and many people's) conception of the "alpha male" (or "alpha female" for Frank), has become second nature.  It's everywhere in our culture.  And it is ripe for a debunking that is complete enough to GRIP the populace.  Dave's debunking is right, I think.  The Adam Ruins Everything video is good, but too fluffy.

Since Peterson depends on (some bastardization of) evol. psych., then it would be healthy to have an evol. psych. debunking.  *That's* what I'm actually looking for.  Perhaps your "Oh no" paper contains that debunking.  I'll look.


On 02/15/2018 11:58 AM, Nick Thompson wrote:
> I apologize for the length of MY DESCENT and for the poor quality of the Xerox.  It doesn't surprise me that the main point didn't come through.   I think Evolutionary Psychology does provide testable hypotheses, but I also think testability is not /sufficient /to make a hypothesis heuristic.  The hypothesis also has to be interesting.  To be interesting, a hypothesis has to challenge some way of thinking that has become second nature, and good EP thought sometimes produces such surprising challenges.  Such interesting challenges do not arise from studies designed to bolster social stereotypes with biological bafflegab.  Here is another paper <https://www.researchgate.net/publication/247372033_Oh_no_Not_social_Darwinism_again> much shorter (only 600 wds)  and better Xeroxed, which exemplifies my contempt for this latter sort of evolutionary psychology.

--
☣ uǝlƃ

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