The third rampage of evolutionism: evolutionary pscyhology

Well, evo-psych has a lot of problems, primarily because some of its proponents make outrageous claims for what it can do. However, as an approach to psychology where some of the ideas and concepts of evolutionary theory can be applied to the study of psychology, it's not an inherently bad method. It's a way of trying to answer questions about behavior: How does behavior develop or change over time? What are the environmental determinants of behavior and how does the environment test behavior (thinking of a particular behavior pattern as analogous to a phenotypical trait — how does that specific trait/suite effect an organism’s or population’s survival?)? How is a particular behavior transmitted (inherited or passed laterally) through time — and how do environmental factors change the behavior over time? What are the physiological bases for a given behavior (i.e., what combination of internal and external stimuli cause a particular behavior)? What elements within an organism or its environment elicit a particular behavioral pattern? Etc.It's not some new kind of social darwinism as Syamasu keeps babbling about. Don't fall into the same trap he continually leaps headlong into. Contrary to popular belief, not everything on the planet concerning humans has a political dimension. Sometimes sience is just science. Evo-psych may or may not be a valid science, but it has nothing to do with New Age pseudo-mysticism or 19th Century racism.

And sometimes, as evidenced by the article you quoted, it's just plain silly. Making enemy troops too horny to fight has got to rank right up there on the silliness scale.

Damn, you mean the evo-psych folks have the same Ultimate Goal as the Vast Worldwide Evilutionist Conspiracy? I thought only biologists from around the world were dedicated to performing hundreds of person-years of research and writing thousands of papers for the sole purpose of convincing US high school students that there is no god. It's a surprise that the psychologists and anthropolgists are in on it, too. Good luck with Syamasu.

Which, of course, anyone who actually read the book - or the follow-on "The Extended Phenotype" (which is a much better book, IMO) - agrees is NOT what Dawkins is saying. The unfounded opinions of those who have NOT read the book are irrelevant and immaterial. As I'm sure you're discovering...

Heh. Many of us never respond to Syamasu anymore. You will NEVER get a straight answer nor any closure from a discussion with him. People like Dan and Mammuthus only do it out of some perverse sense of humor.