The Sunday Diigo Links Post (weekly)
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Evolutionary Psychology (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
“Evolutionary psychology is one of many biologically informed approaches to the study of human behavior. Along with cognitive psychologists, evolutionary psychologists propose that much, if not all, of our behavior can be explained by appeal to internal psychological mechanisms. What distinguishes evolutionary psychologists from many cognitive psychologists is the proposal that the relevant internal mechanisms are adaptations—products of natural selection—that helped our ancestors get around the world, survive and reproduce. To understand the central claims of evolutionary psychology we require an understanding of some key concepts in evolutionary biology, cognitive psychology, philosophy of science and philosophy of mind. Philosophers are interested in evolutionary psychology for a number of reasons. For philosophers of science —mostly philosophers of biology—evolutionary psychology provides a critical target. There is a broad consensus among philosophers of science that evolutionary psychology is a deeply flawed enterprise. For philosophers of mind and cognitive science evolutionary psychology has been a source of empirical hypotheses about cognitive architecture and specific components of that architecture. Philosophers of mind are also critical of evolutionary psychology but their criticisms are not as all-encompassing as those presented by philosophers of biology. Evolutionary psychology is also invoked by philosophers interested in moral psychology both as a source of empirical hypotheses and as a critical target.”
Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.
(Image source: Suggestive Contour Gallery)
this reminds me of BBC ‘balance’. I never read anything more non-commital!
Comment by melanieb — July 5, 2010 #
Yeah, it’s pretty equivocal. I couldn’t figure out which part of the entry to highlight, so I just went with this introduction. I should go back into the entry and add QUOTE and UNQUOTE, just to make sure it’s clear that it’s a quote from their site, not my words! 😉 I’m interested in evolutionary psychology, particularly in terms of built form (what appeals, what repels, etc.) – but I guess it’s so contested that this introduction felt obliged to hedge all bets.
Comment by Yule — July 5, 2010 #