Though I am interested in evolutionary psychology and i think it has a lot to teach us about our behaviors, I really enjoyed this critique in Newsweek that particularly deals with the evolutionary psychology of rape.
To sum up the critique, evolutionary psychology takes a behavior that exists today, like rape, and says "This behavior must have survived because it was necessary for survival at one time." While that has truth to it, what the article points out is the social flexibility of the human mind, and that while some behaviors emerge for survival, they can then be weeded away if they become detrimental to survival. The article goes into why this is the case for rape, and gives one pause for why some make the case for the existence of other terrible human behaviors.
No comments:
Post a Comment