Wilson & Sober's discussion of group selection is marred by the absence of plausible examples of human group-level behavioral adaptation. The trait of authoritarianism is one possible example of such an adaptation. It reduces within-group variance in reproductive success, manifests itself more strongly in response to group-level threat, and is found in a variety of cultures.

Historians of science and religion usually trace the origins of the “conflict thesis,” the notion that science and religion have been in perennial “conflict” or “warfare,” to the late nineteenth century, particularly to the narratives of New York chemist John William Draper and historian Andrew Dickson White. In this essay, I argue against that convention. Their narratives should not be read as stories to debunk, but rather as primary sources reflecting themes and changes in religious thought during the late nineteenth (...) century. I contend that Draper and White were part of a long liberal Protestant heritage that emphasized history, reason, and religious emancipation against ecclesiastical authority. As an alternative source of origins, however, I suggest that the real “conflict thesis” is to be found in the fledgling discipline of the history of science as it emerged during the late nineteenth and first half of the twentieth century. The real origin of the “conflict thesis” is found in the very discipline that now seeks to condemn it. (shrink)

What is the relation of the biological to the social sciences? Fierce battles are being currently fought over this question and much hangs on the answer. If society (or culture) is taken as an irreducible category which can only be understood in its own terms, the social sciences can feel safe from the sinister designs of other disciplines. Yet it is a commonplace that cultures vary, and we humans are prone to look at the differences rather than the similarities between (...) them. The result can be a thoroughgoing relativism. If culture cannot be understood by means of any non-cultural categories, cultural differences themselves can be accepted as the ultimate truth about man. When everything is cultural, even the notion of a non-cultural category can seem to be a ludicrous contradiction in terms. The categories with which we think are the product of our culture, or so we are told. Instead of our being able to understand culture in terms of anything beyond itself, our understanding appears totally moulded by the society to which we belong. Any theory can thus be seen as merely the expression of the beliefs of a particular society. (shrink)

When stripped to the bare bone, there are only 11 foundational paradigms in social sciences. These foundational paradigms are like flashlights that can be utilized to shed light on different aspects of human society, but each of them can only shed light on a limited area of human society. Different schools in social science result from different but often incomplete combinations of these foundational paradigms. To adequately understand human society and its history, we need to deploy all 11 foundational paradigms, (...) although more limited combinations of them may be adequate for understanding more specific social facts. (shrink)

Jonathan Haidt’s _Moral Foundation Theory _has been criticized on many fronts, mainly on account of its lack of evidence concerning the genetic and neurological bases of the evolved moral intuitions that the theory posits. Despite the fact that Haidt’s theory is probably the most promising framework from which to integrate the different lines of interdisciplinary research that deal with the evolutionary foundations of moral psychology, _i) _it also shows a critical underspecification concerning the precise mental processes that instantiate the triggering (...) of our evolved moral intuitions, and that _ii) _that underspecification coexists with and overspecification of the structure of human nature when it comes to exploring alternatives to capitalist societies. (shrink)

This chapter examines the influence of the empirical sciences (e.g., physics, biology, psychology) in contemporary analytic philosophy, with focus on philosophical theories that are guided by findings from the empirical sciences. Scientific approaches to philosophy follow a tradition of philosophical naturalism associated with Quine, which strives to ally philosophical methods and theories more closely with the empirical sciences and away from a priori theorizing and conceptual analysis.

In The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature , Steven Pinker maintains that at present there are three competing views of human nature—a Christian theory, a "blank slate" theory (what I call a social constructivist theory), and a Darwinian theory—and that the last of these will triumph in the end. I argue that neither the outcome of such competition nor the particular content of these theories is as clear as Pinker believes. In this essay I take a critical (...) as well as a constructive look at the challenge presented by a Darwinian theory of human nature—a challenge to the social sciences and the humanities and also to theology and more specifically to a Christian understanding of human nature. (shrink)

The most public-facing forms of contemporary Darwinism happily promote its worldview ambitions. Popular works, by the likes of Richard Dawkins, deflect associations with eugenics and social Darwinism, but also extend the reach of Darwinism beyond biology into social policy, politics, and ethics. Critics of the enterprise fall into two categories. Advocates of Intelligent Design and secular philosophers (like Mary Midgley and Thomas Nagel) recognise it as a worldview and argue against its implications. Scholars in the rhetoric of science or science (...) communication, however, typically take the view that Darwinism isn't a worldview, but a scientific theory, which has been improperly embellished by some; they uphold the distinction between is and ought and argue that science is restricted to the former. This prompts an is–ought problem on another level. I catalogue the ways in which Darwinism plainly is a worldview and why commentators' beliefs that it ought not to be distorts their analysis. Hence, it is their own worldview that precludes them from accepting Darwinism's worldview implications. (shrink)

Against the common historiographic narratives of evolutionary biology, the first decades of the 20th century were theoretically far richer than usually assumed. This especially refers to the hitherto neglected role that early theoretical biologists played in introducing visionary research perspectives and concepts before the institutionalization of the Modern Synthesis. Here, we present one of these scholars, the German theoretical biologist and ecomorphologist Hans Böker, by reviewing his 1935 paper “Artumwandlung durch Umkonstruktion, Umkonstruktion durch aktives Reagieren der Organismen”, published in the (...) inaugural volume of the journal Acta Biotheoretica. While largely forgotten today, this work represents a melting pot of ideas that adumbrate some of today’s most lively debated empirical and conceptual topics in evolutionary biology: the active role of organisms as actors of their own evolution, environmental induction and phenotypic plasticity, genetic assimilation, as well as developmental bias. We discuss Böker’s views on how species change through "Umkonstruktion," and how such reconstruction is exerted through active reactions of organisms to environmental perturbations. In addition, we outline the aims and wider context of his "biological comparative anatomy," including Boker’s reprehensible political affiliation with the Nazi Party. Finally, we highlight some of the historical reasons for why Böker’s views did not have a larger impact in evolutionary biology, but we also recount some of the direct and indirect legacies of his approach in research areas such as ecomorphology and EvoDevo. Böker’s paper is available as supplementary material in the online version of this article, as part of the journal's "Classics in Biological Theory" collection; the first translation of the paper into English, by Alexander Böhm and Jan Baedke, is also being published in this volume. (shrink)

The reception so far of Kitcher's Vaulting Ambition reminds me of the old saw about the difference between an optimist and a pessimist. Looking at the same glass of water, the former sees it as half full while the latter sees it as half empty. Some have seen Kitcher's book as a vindication of the possibility of an evolutionary science of human behavior; others have seen it as a devastating critique of the most influential efforts to date to construct such (...) a science. As in the joke about the water glass, both assessments have their point. Sociobiology is a research program, not a unified theory. What one can do is test particular hypotheses within this program and see whether they live up to reasonable standards of rigor and evidence. This is what Kitcher does, with great energy and care. (shrink)

Nietzsche was a philosopher, not a biologist, Nevertheless his philosophical thought was deeply influenced by ideas emerging from the evolutionary biology of the nineteenth century. His relationship to the Darwinism of his time is difficult to disentangle. It is argued that he was in a sense an unwitting Darwinist. It follows that his philosophical thought is of considerable interest to those concerned to develop an evolutionary biology of mankind. His approach can be likened to that of an extraterrestrial sociobiologist studying (...) clever beasts... in some out of the way corner of the universe ... It is shown how be uses this viewpoint to account for the origin of the central psychobiology of humankind: for dualistic philosophies, such as that of Descartes (which Ryle famously called the official doctrine), for human notions of truth and falsehood, being and becoming, and for other fundamental concepts of Western philosophy and science. All these, he argues, are no more and no less than the necessary adaptations of a zoological species, Homo sapiens, in its struggle for life in a Darwinian world. It is concluded that Nietzsche was the first philosopher to accept and use in their full depth the philosophical implications of nineteeth-century evolutionism, implications which are still resisted to this day. It is also argued that this interpretation of Nietzsche's aphoristic writings provides them with an organic consistency. (shrink)

A few years ago I gave a paper on the aesthetics of ‘noise,’ that is, on the ways in which non-musical sounds can be given aesthetic shape and structure, and thereby form the basis of significant aesthetic experience. Along the way I made reference to Arnold Schoenberg's musical theory, in particular his notion of Klangfarbenmelodie, literally ‘sound colour melody,’ or musical form based on timbre or tonal colour rather than on melody, harmony or rhythm. Schoenberg articulated his ideas about Klangfarbenmelodie (...) in the final section of his Harmonielehre. ‘Pitch is nothing else but tone colour measured in one direction,’ wrote Schoenberg. ‘Now, if it is possible to create patterns out of tone colours that are differentiated according to pitch, patterns we call ‘melodies’…then it must also be possible to make such progressions out of the tone colours of the other dimension, out of that which we simply call “tone colour.”’ In other words, traditional melodies work by abstracting and structuring the dominant pitch characterizing a musical sound, while ‘sound colour melodies’ work, Schoenberg argues, by structuring the combined set of pitches contained in a given musical sound. Schoenberg is emphatic that, although a neglected and underdeveloped possibility within Western classical music, ‘sound colour melody’ is a perfectly legitimate and viable form of musical expression; indeed for Schoenberg it is a musical form with enormous potential. (shrink)

My dissertation brings into conversation two thinkers who are seldom considered together and highlights previously unnoticed similarities in their critical responses to scientism, which was just as prevalent in the late nineteenth century as it is today. I analyze this attitude as consisting of two linked propositions. The first, which Nietzsche calls “the unconditional will to truth,” is that the aims of science, discovering truth and avoiding error, are the most important human aims; and the second is that no practice (...) other than science can achieve them. Both Nietzsche and James criticize the unconditional will to truth for privileging a transcendent ideal over the demands of human life. This unconditional will regards truth as valuable in itself and demands that we pursue it under all circumstances—even if that demand comes into conflict with other values. I lay out the ways in which Nietzsche and James view the value of truth and the imperative to pursue it as conditional on its promotion of human flourishing. In response to the second proposition of scientism, both philosophers argue that science can neither tell us what we should value, nor fully account for the value we in fact find in certain objects, activities, and experiences. And crucially, science cannot tell us whether or why its own goal of attaining truth is valuable. Nietzsche and James reach different conclusions about what is ultimately valuable, and whether traditional religious belief is defensible in light of the discoveries of science. Nonetheless, the hitherto unappreciated similarities I have uncovered in their arguments show that principled opposition to scientism need not be associated with any particular moral or religious viewpoint. This analysis is not only of historical interest: those who consider scientism to be ill-founded and intellectually confining can take some cues from our nineteenth-century predecessors’ strategies for combating it. (shrink)

This article discusses recent naturalistic theories of religion from the viewpoint of how the deal with the issue of the origins of religion. It will be argued that the theories can be divided according to if they view religion as being an adaptation or not, on the other hand, and if they consider it to be mostly natural or cultural on the other. On the basis of this discussion, it is suggested that a cognitive mechanism referred to here as the (...) narrative drive seem to have a fundamental role to play in the formation of religious beliefs and, thus, in the origins of religion. (shrink)

O conceito freudiano de "impulso", ou "instinto" (Trieb), é reconhecidamente um dos conceitos mais fundamentais da psicanálise. No entanto, seu sentido ainda é objeto de controvérsia. Originalmente definido por Freud em um sentido biológico ou quase biológico, sua recepção em muitas das diversas tradições pós-freudianas tendeu, frequentemente, a recusar essa filiação epistemológica inicial. Um dos sinais dessa reorientação doutrinária é a recusa da tradução de "Trieb" por "instinto" e a preferência pelo neologismo "pulsão", de origem francesa e comum na literatura (...) psicanalítica escrita em várias das línguas neolatinas, inclusive em português. O objetivo deste artigo é criticar essa tendência. Para tanto, são examinados os principais argumentos normalmente apresentados contra uma visão biológica do Trieb freudiano, a saber, 1) a alternativa terminológica entre os termos alemães "Trieb" e "Instinkt" e o modo como estes são utilizados por Freud; 2) a crítica freudiana de uma redução da sexualidade humana à função reprodutiva; 3) o conceito de "Todestrieb" ("instinto de morte" ou "pulsão de morte") formulado por Freud por volta de 1920 e central na etapa final de seu pensamento. Procura-se argumentar que essas formulações não impedem uma interpretação biológica do conceito de "Trieb". Essa interpretação, por sua vez, abre uma via de diálogo entre a psicanálise e a biologia, a qual é também enfática e explicitamente defendida por Freud. Esta primeira parte do trabalho introduz a questão e também aborda o problema da relação entre sexualidade e reprodução na psicanálise e na biologia. Uma segunda parte, a ser publicada em uma próxima edição de Scientiae Studia, será dedicada ao problema da agressividade e da autodestrutividade nessas duas áreas do conhecimento. Freud's concept of "drive" or "instinct" ("Trieb") has been widely acknowledged as one of the most fundamental concepts of psychoanalysis. However, its meaning is still a matter of controversy. It was originally defined by Freud in a biological or quasi-biological sense, but its reception in many different post-Freudian traditions has often tended to reject this early epistemological affiliation. One sign of this theoretical reorientation has been to refuse the translation of "Trieb" as "instinct" and to favor instead the neologism "pulsion" ("drive"), which has French origins and became common in the psychoanalytic literature written in many neo-Latin languages, including Portuguese. The objective of this paper is to criticize this trend. For that, the main arguments usually presented against a biological view of Freud's "Trieb" are discussed, namely: (1) the terminological alternative between the German words "Trieb" and "Instinkt" and how these terms are employed by Freud; (2) Freud's critique of the reduction of human sexuality to the reproductive function; (3) the concept of "Todestrieb" ("death instinct" or "death drive"), formulated by Freud around 1920 and central in the last stage of his thought. It is argued that these formulations do not preclude a biological interpretation of the concept of "Trieb". Such interpretation, in turn, opens the way for dialogue between psychoanalysis and biology, a dialogue which was also emphatically and explicitly supported by Freud. This first part of the paper is an introduction to this issue, and approaches the problem of the relationship between sexuality and reproduction in psychoanalysis and biology. A second part will be published in a forthcoming issue of Scientiae Studia; it will be dedicated to the problem of aggression and self-destructiveness in these two fields of knowledge. (shrink)

Kinship was one of the key areas of research interest among anthropologists in the nineteenth century, one of the most hotly debated areas of theory in the early and mid-twentieth century, and yet an area of waning interest by the end of the twentieth century. Since then, the study of kinship has experienced a revitalization, with concomitant disputes over how best to proceed. This special issue brings together recent studies of kinship by scientific anthropologists employing evolutionary theory and quantitative methods. (...) We argue that the melding of the evolutionary theoretical perspective with quantitative and ethnographic methodologies has strengthened and reinvigorated the study of kinship by synthesizing and extending existing research via rigorous analyses of evidence. (shrink)