EP Weaknesses

Five Big EP Weaknesses + Three Others

1) Instruction by environment is achieved by selection over generations. This view misses the important effects that organisms have in stabilizing environments or in changing them to suit the organism. Externalism is perhaps aggravated by a human bias that blames outside events, especially the actions of men. (This may be an adaptation itself!)

2) Universal human nature: in every culture or in every individual? Alliances compensate for individual variations. An economics principle revolves around specialization: make what is cheap easy for you and swap it for what is expensive and difficult to make. Differences between individuals and groups, of whatever origin, drive trade and increased cooperation (Wright, 2000).

3) Tennyson referred to nature red in tooth and claw. Certainly, "if it bleeds, it leads" still is true but manufactures an artificial problem in regard to altruism and kindness. There is less TandC in stable organizations (constructions) of niches and occupants: there is more when an invader arrives.

4) Characteristics that appear maladaptive should be extinct by now. Schizophrenia and ADHD are with us and elicit speculations about their adaptive value. Options: "things break" or "viruses" or "selective pressure has been abated by human alliances." We (and other creatures) help our clumsy.

5) Greatest interest in sex and aggression; often ignores territory as a variable.

(6) Reproduction an important aspect of fitness BUT couples in advanced cultures do not have enough children to replace themselves. Fitness may be less about reproduction and more about acquiring territories. Both scarcity and full but comfortable niches are associated with people's having fewer offspring. Women, given financial options, avoid having children.

7) Cultural studies have a genetic confound. e.g., Yanomami and Chagnon vs.. Mead/Freeman and Samoa. (Lots of self selection!)

8) Ignores foundations from physics, chemistry, and genetics. Female/male psychological differences, for example, explore a wider phase transition between rules and initiative, inhibition and impulse, order and chaos, searches and action. Married couples and stockbrokers copy the functions of a dendrite.

Notes & Refs:

Wright, R. (2000) NonZero: The Logic of Human Destiny. NY: Pantheon
Hrdy, S. (1999) Mother Nature: A History of Mothers, Infants, and Natural Selection. NY: Pantheon Press. Magnificent chronicle of how mothers match children to resources, whether natural or social and contrive ways to get the kids that they want.

Copyright James Brody, 2002, all rights reserved

Replies:

This is a common misconception, by Alex, 03/19/04

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