Re: New Gould Collection Coming Out

On Mon, 29 May 2006 15:09:19 +1200, "observa" <observa_spamsux@xxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

[...]

Now you've gone and done it and attracted Larry.

Before I head for cover . . .

I won't pretend to know enough to really judge it. Pinker's book was a
strange "defense" of it, however. You didn't have to take sides in the
controversy to see that Pinker's claims of having no political motives
rang
hollow. One doesn't spend most of the first third of the book settling
old
scores out of disinterested science. This fits with Ullica Segerstrale's
history of the debate, _Defenders of the Truth_ and her opinion that both
sides had motives not to resolve their differences, which weren't nearly
as
great as the parties made out. That desire to maximize differences with
the "received view" is a common tactic in scientific disputes as David
Hull
has shown. That's why I take Pinker's claims about his opponent's
positions with a healthy grain of salt. (And the kind of "blank slate"
that
might show up in school curricula doesn't necessarily have anything to do
with front line science.)

The blank slate stuff and the curricula were not related. The blank slate
stuff was about how to successfully teach kids and how they learn.

I just put it badly.

None of
it was based on good research. If you looked at the research structures you
found such things as the time of day, weather, number of kids in room, age
and experience of teacher simply left out. The research was garbage.

Gould made similar complaints about experiments/observations in
sociobiology and evolutionary psychology in his article "Biological
Potentiality vs. Biological Determinism" in _Ever Since Darwin_.

But
you weren't allowed to question it. To do so earned you failing grades.

That wasn't Lewontin or Gould saying that to you, I assume.


I'll not argue with you about Pinker's approach to the opposition. I was
rather annoyed during the first 1/4 of the book. But, having read stuff by
Rose and Lewontin, as well as by Wilson, I'm inclined to think that R and L
are guilty of more mud throwing - or at least putting broken glass in the
mud. Wilson's book ( have you read it?)

The 25th anniversary edition is in my "to read" pile but I wanted to finish
Segerstrale's book first for context and then got sidetracked on that . . .

only deals with sociobiology in the
last (2nd last?) chapter. I do think he got a bit carried away. But his
political background was not that of a rightwing crazy. Which is what R and
L painted him as.

Well, the thing that was most complained of by Wilson's supporters was the
infamous letter in the New York Review of Books:

<http://www.nybooks.com/articles/9017>

and, while I would have preferred if they left out the business about
sterilization laws and the like, the objections (right or wrong) were based
on science and logic rather than politics. Gould, in his individual
articles, such as "Biological Potentiality vs. Biological Determinism"
makes it clear it is the biology he primarily objects to. Maybe if we
could read his mind Gould's politics may color his biology, but his case
against Wilson is still biological.


The problem with R, L and Gould (and I've read them all) is that they
automatically paint anyone who sounds even slightly like they support
evolutionary/cognitive studies as if they are Nazis.

There was a sharp exchange between Gould and Pinker (over Gould's
complaints about Dennett) where Gould was hardly holding anything back. If
there is any such political attack, I'm missing it:

<http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1151>
<http://www.nybooks.com/articles/1070>

Forgetting, of course,
that the greatest blankslaters of all (the communists) were guilty of the
worst behaviour. It's as if they have no appreciation of history - just
their own positions.

<Cough> Are you blaming Lewontin, Rose or Gould for the deprecations of
Communist governments? For that matter, do you really blame *science* for
anything that totalitarians do?


The evidence Pinker produced in the first sections of the book was
extremely weak to this layperson's eyes but then, in the last third, he
did
a much better job. But some of the things he claimed were the result of
evolution seemed to me to require the kind of hyper-evolution that was one
of the acknowledged problems with Wilson's early work. Still, there seems
to be considerable value in at least looking to evolutionary accounts for
social interactions, though there is more than a hint of "just-so" about
them.

But don't forget, Pinker admits to that.

I don't. Though Pinker, while paying lip service to the non-strawman
version of his opponents views, keep insisting that they don't *really*
mean it.

He accepts that evolutionary
psychology has a long way to go. But that is, IMO, a plus. It has
potential for fruitful research.

You'll see in the Gould / Pinker exchange I gave the links to above that
Gould agrees. He just thinks they have to stop relying on just-so stories
and deal with non-adaptionist forces at work.

The blank slate assumption simply results
in study after study that establish nothing than to say "well, people are
people - fancy that". The blank slaters have been at it for over a hundred
years and have resulted in some of the silliest ideas out - Freud, Jung,
Skinner as examples. Oh, and currently "recovered memory". Sheesh.

Whoa! You decry even the idea that evolutionary psychologists should be
compared with genetic determinists like the Nazis but you (they?) feel free
to do the same with linking Lewontin, Rose and Gould with totalitarians and
"recovered memory" pseudoscientists? I take it this is a oneway street,
then.


While I'm sure there are extremists in the e/p camp I think their research
is more readily assessed for validity and I think it'll have more relevance
to understanding who we are and why we operate the way we do.

Then maybe they should get on with it rather than spendiong time, as Pinker
does, with fighting old battles.


As to the allegations of "dirty pool", I sincerely doubt that either side
was inhabited only with angels in that regard.

See above.

--
---------------
J. Pieret
---------------

One of the strengths of science is that it
does not require that scientists be unbiased,
only that different scientists have different biases.

- David L. Hull -

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: New Gould Collection Coming Out
    ... The blank slate stuff and the curricula were not related. ... That wasn't Lewontin or Gould saying that to you, ... makes it clear it is the biology he primarily objects to. ... There was a sharp exchange between Gould and Pinker (over Gould's ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: New Gould Collection Coming Out - whoopsie
    ... Potentiality vs. Biological Determinism" in _Ever Since Darwin_. ... That wasn't Lewontin or Gould saying that to you, ... makes it clear it is the biology he primarily objects to. ... There was a sharp exchange between Gould and Pinker (over Gould's ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Darwins false dichotomy fallacy.
    ... What is the formally established Theory of Evolution ... not in its first stated form by Darwin in the 19th century. ... and again with molecular biology). ... Gould 2002 and a vast majority of mainstream scholars say you are ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: No distinction between artificial and natural selection - John
    ... Gould may have been an arrogant bastard, ... cultural evolution is evolution by definition. ... There are too many major differences between culture and ... biology for the analogies to be useful:'' ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: A hearing or a reading
    ... Here are some of the questions Dennett could have asked but didn't. ... Can evolution really be reduced to an algorithm or is there a great deal ... > your biology nothing more than glorified plumbing. ... Gould has ever said. ...
    (sci.bio.evolution)