The Seven Sins of Evolutionary Psychology - Konrad Lorenz Institute

Jaak Panksepp and Jules B. Pankseppand other external practices) exhibited a high environmentalloading. The two forms of religiousnesswere inversely correlated—probably not surprisingfor many evolutionists who understand the utility ofdeception and the probable importance of corticalprocesses in generating such tendencies. Also, intrinsicreligiosity was positively related to authoritarianism(BOUCHARD et al. 1999). A liberal collegeeducation had a small effect on dampening that oldtime prophet instinct (i.e., a temporary nurture effect),but at eight years past those liberating collegedays, the old ways were—hang on Evolutionary Psychologyfans—coming back with a vengeance, especiallyif you had lots of kids (personal communicationwith J.P.). Once again kids force us back to ourgenetic roots. Clearly, practically any human or animaltrait can be amplified or diminished genetically.However, in the past we rarely knew what was reallyselected, but the new molecular biology will soonchange that.Politics and TribalismAn enormous amount of ink and mental energy waswasted during the sociobiology wars because of thepolitical inclinations of certain participants (SEGER-STRÅLE 2000). We cannot easily escape our politicalbiases, but intellectual and social disasters can easilybe made if we do not own up to our ‘mere beliefs’.For this reason, we especially appreciate SEGER-STRÅLE’s participation in these discussions. Forinstance, the harsh treatment of the role of genes inour destinies at the hands of politically motivatedMARXISTS is a story that presently has only been halftold (hopefully, some forthcoming memoirs will setthe records straighter). We are the kind of speciesthat can perform intellectual, emotional and bodilymonstrosities in behalf of what we deeply believe(PETERSON 1999). All too easily, we develop tribalaffiliations which color all our subsequent beliefsand arguments. None of us are immune to suchissues, but they are often very apparent when wecome to issues as contentious as sociobiology andEvolutionary Psychology (LEWONTIN 1993).Probably most who read journals such as this arewell sensitized (or habituated) to those aspects ofthe human spirit, but the present debate has certainlynot been absent of those features. Let us be sobold as to highlight a striking instance that we couldnot avoid noticing. Our harshest critic in these discussions,PITCHFORD, asserts that “Neuroevolutionarypsychobiology’s reassignment of the tabula rasato the neocortex revivifies CARTESIAN dualism andrepresents a desperate strategy likely to be extremelydeleterious to scientific investigation. Evolutionarypsychology should reject this approach…”To some extent, this assertion is notsimply a cold-headed response to the strengths andweaknesses of existing data and arguments, but alsoan indication of tribal affiliation, since he is a ‘listmaster’ for the extended evolutionary psychologycommunity. In personal communications, PITCH-FORD was kind enough to say, upon first reading ourarticle, that “although I disagree with a few of thedetails I do agree with broad thrust of the piece. Inmy view EP has made a number of fundamentalerrors: (1) by adopting the method of reverse engineeringin place of a consideration of phylogeny (2)by adopting functionalism, or the study of substrateneutral processes, in preference to the study of neurobehaviouraland neuropsychological homologies,(3) by adopting a commitment to the notionof the monomorphic mind, thereby excluding aconsideration of both polyphenism and adaptivegenetic variation as studied by game theorists, and(4) by adopting genic selectionism in preference todevelopmental systems theory. I think the issue ofdomain-specific versus domain-general mechanismsis of less importance than these four mainissues, as the brain surely contains both, and theirrelative contributions to our cognitive–emotionalcapacities is an empirical matter” (personal communicationwith J.P., 1/3/01).Then, four months later, after one of us (J.P.) hadshared some surprise about the throttling he hadprovided, PITCHFORD wrote back that “In my viewyour perspective embraces almost every issue of importance.The commentary does concentrate on areasof disagreement, but had the word limit allowedI would have had much more to say about affectiveneuroscience as the essential foundation for evolutionarypsychology. The emphasis on functionalismthat evolutionary psychology has adopted from cognitivescience can result in a neglect of cross-speciescomparisons, and in a reluctance to embrace importantbranches of evolutionary biology such as ecologyand game theory. This can make it seem abiologicalat times, but I see this as an unwelcome tendencyrather than a defining trait. However, most of thefaults you identify in ‘seven sins’ can be found in thework of evolutionary psychologists” (personal communicationwith J.P., 4/23/01). We do not share suchpersonal communications with any desire to embarrass(indeed we agree completely with the gist ofthose arguments), but they do highlight that in ourhuman (male?) eagerness to put forward strongEvolution and Cognition ❘ 76 ❘ 2001, Vol. 7, No. 1