Re: Jerry Fodor on Evolutionary Psychology

The Other wrote:
> "Michael Zeleny" <larvatus@xxxxxxxxx> writes:

>> A recent iteration of Jerry Fodor's critique of evolutionary psychology
>> is published online at the TLS website. The key objection remains: "You
>> just can't merge an Adaptationist account of evolution with the kind of
>> psychology that says that we act out of our beliefs and desires; not,
>> anyhow, in the way that EP proposes to do." Self-deception, anyone?
>>
>> http://tls.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,25344-1886558,00.html

> For some reason, Fodor has trouble getting past the terminology that
> some feature or other was "designed" by natural selection for
> such-and-such a purpose, or that an organism/gene "wants" to maximize
> its reproductive success. This philosopher is way more
> philosophically muddled than all the supposedly naïve scientists. If
> you don't believe me, see for yourself:
>
> Daniel C. Dennett suggests that, if Jones's behaviour is an
> adaptation, then it's (not Jones but) "Mother Nature" who is
> concerned about his contribution to the gene pool. But you might
> as well blame the Easter Bunny. There isn't any Mother Nature;
> and if unattached motives can't explain behaviour, neither can the
> concerns of fictitious persons. Richard Dawkins suggests that, if
> Jones's behaviour is an adaptation, then it must be (not Jones
> but) Jones's "selfish genes" that wish to maximize reproductive
> success.
>
> . . .
>
> But none of that will do. Familiar example: it's a beneficial
> effect of my having a nose that it helps to support my glasses
> (thereby contributing, indirectly, to such reproductive successes
> as I've managed to scrape together). But nobody, the Easter Bunny
> included, designed my nose. A fortiori, my nose wasn't "designed
> to" support my glasses. Of course it wasn't. In fact, it goes
> the other way around: my glasses were designed to be supported by
> my nose. There's no mystery about that; my glasses literally and
> unmysteriously had a designer; and that the glasses he designed
> should be supported by noses like mine was, literally and
> unmysteriously, part of what he had in mind when he designed them.
>
> Notice, in particular, that our glasses are designed to be
> supported by our noses whether or not our noses actually succeed
> in supporting them. It belongs to the logic of designs, goals,
> motives and the like, that you can't infer the effects intended
> from the effects produced. This is a stumbling block for EP, as
> we'll see in a moment.
>
> I mean, come on, that reads like a parody of philosophizing. The
> review never rises above that level, and shame on the TLS for even
> printing it. The "criticism" itself is typical of some of the popular
> reactions to sociobiology in the 1970s. I'm sure Fodor's criticism
> hits some of the easiest EP targets, but...big deal.

How would you know a parody of philosophizing from the real thing? "Se
moquer de la philosophie, c'est vraiment philosopher." Sociobiology is
no longer taken seriously even by its erstwhile acolytes, mainly owing
to philosophical critique by Philip Kitcher. Its latest offshoot looks
poised to suffer the same downfall. Throughout his article, Fodor makes
a point about attributing agency, which you have failed to recognize,
let alone answer. Your authorities are left with obscurantist babble
about ethnic self-deception, unsupported by any capacity to account for
the parties responsible for deceiving or being deceived.

> Philosophers don't have a very good track record reviewing EP books.
> Simon whats-his-name reviewed Pinker's _The Blank Slate_ for the New
> Republic, and while he made a few good points, he also just plain
> mis-read what Pinker had clearly written. (An acquaintance of mine
> with no knowledge in the field read Pinker's book and understood it
> with no trouble.) I'm sure these guys are good philosophers in their
> own fields, but when they venture out into topics like this, they're
> kooks.
>
> There was one brief remark that was interesting. Fodor mentioned in
> passing that the book under review argues convincingly that the
> "cheater detection module" is just an experimental artifact. I wish
> Fodor had said more about that. I'm not especially interested in EP,
> and for all I know maybe it's totally baseless -- got that? -- but I
> did once skim an article about the cheater detection thing. That's
> Tooby's and Cosmides' prime example that they're doing good science:
> predicting and discovering new phenomena, making and testing
> falsifiable predictions, testing against alternate explanations
> (including, importantly, non-adaptionist explanations), etc.
>
> By the way, if your post was supposed to be relevant to MacDonald,
> remember that while Kevin MacDonald calls himself an evolutionary
> psychologist, John Tooby has decreed to the contrary, that MacDonald
> is not an Evolutionary Psychologist®. Tooby is correct in that
> MacDonald does not subscribe to the EP Articles of Faith as defined by
> Tooby & Cosmides. And as I think you yourself finally came to
> understand, natural selection (or "adaptionism") is mostly irrelevant
> to MacDonald's evolutionary explanation of Jewish group strategy.

There is no explanation in positing interests without accountability.
Yiddishkeit is an adjective, not a proper name of a subject of agency
and experience.

Michael Zeleny@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://larvatus.livejournal.com/

.

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