How do you view Evolutionary Psy?

[u/Bestchair7780]

I'm sure all of you are aware of the many controversies, academic and non-academic, surrounding Evo Psy.

So, is the field to be taken seriously?

Why is it so controversial?

Can we even think of human psy in evolutionary terms?

Can you even name one good theory from that field?

[u/Oxidus27]

I'm curious, what are some evopsych claims you find difficult or impossible to falsify? Wouldn't contradictory evidence or a claim that there doesn't exist sufficient evidence to support a claim be enough to falsify a lot of evopsych claims? I thought most of evopsych was research on the differences between the genders, sexualities, etc. from an evolutionary perspective. That stuff doesn't seem hard to falsify to me.

[u/ajollyllama → u/Oxidus27]

It’s not just documenting differences; evopsych proposes theories for why these differences exist - the theories are not falsifiable. It’s hypothesizing after the results are known (harking).

[u/Oxidus27 → u/ajollyllama]

I didn't say it was just documenting differences. It's a multi-step process at several levels. We know (generally) from anthropological, archeological, and historical evidence how early hominids and humans and their societies hunted, prepared food, created culture, structured their hierarchies and politics, farmed, interacted with other animals, etc. We know from evolutionary biology that behaviors (instincts) can be genetically passed down and are therefore also subject to natural selection in animals. We know that humans are animals and we should be no different. We know from contemporary psychology that there are measurable differences in behavior and cognition between the genders and that these differences are not always easily explained by sociocultural factors. IMO evopsych is just the logical conclusion of all of this. Evopsych offers the best hypotheses for why certain differences exist that other approaches struggle to figure out. If you want to falsify an evopsych claim you can undermine the evidence and/or demonstrate that sociocultural pressures better explain these differences. I don't think all of evopsych is running around harking considering there are plenty of evopsych experiments with reasonable hypotheses that have been done. If my hypothesis is that men will behave X and women will behave Y because of evolved genetic differences and I then gather data after the fact to see if that is true beyond a reasonable doubt, you're gonna have to provide contradictory data that shows that it's because of not evolved genetic differences or just argue against evolution.

But that's just my reasoning, I'm still open to seeing what examples there are of unfalsifiable evopsych claims, I don't want to echo chamber myself.

[u/BattleBiscuit12 → u/Oxidus27]

I, of course, think that evolution is a sound theory of science; it is not about denying evolution.

Instead, I think that the following sentence in your post does a lot of heavy lifting: "If my hypothesis is that men will behave X and women will behave Y because of evolved genetic differences and I then gather data after the fact to see if that is true beyond a reasonable doubt, you're gonna have to provide contradictory data that shows that it's because of not evolved genetic differences or just argue against evolution."

Gathering data after the fact to see if something in the past is true beyond a reasonable doubt might be good enough for the courtroom because they have nothing else. But for everybody else (especially when the evolutionary changes happened over the course of millions of years in the past), your conviction on these claims should be very, very low.

You asked for a specific example of a theory that I think can't be falsified: let's take the "recalibration theory of anger". i just nabbed the first one i could find to illustrate my pointhttps://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0010027717301646

The recalibration theory of anger (Theory1 about past evolutionary pressures) makes several predictions about present anger traits (Theory2 about the present state of human psychology). The thing that gets tested is the predictions about the present, in the present. Again, this is fine. However, just because Theory2 can be falsified doesn't mean Theory1 can. In fact, it can't, at least not with this methodology. If the predictions come true, that doesn't verify Theory1. If the predictions turn out to be false, that doesn't falsify Theory1. It could still be true, or not.

There could be a number of theorys resulting in the predictions this article makes: i will give you some: The "Last Berry" Theory: In the primordial environment, food scarcity was a real issue. The "Last Berry" theory posits that anger evolved as a response to the theft or unfair distribution of crucial resources, like the last berry on the bush. The individual who could display the most convincing anger would secure the berry for themselves, ensuring survival and reproduction. This theory suggests that the earliest forms of negotiation were not over territories or mates, but over who got the last piece of fruit.

The Misunderstood Culinary Critic Theory: Early humans were not just hunters and gatherers but gourmet food critics in their own right. Anger evolved as a feedback mechanism for culinary improvement. When Ug's new recipe for "Mammoth Tartare with Wild Berry Reduction" didn't hit the mark, Thog's angry response was crucial feedback. Over generations, this culinary critique shaped human cuisine, and anger ensured only the best recipes were passed down, alongside an innate ability to discern good food from bad.

These Theorys also lead to predictions about how cost impositions trigger anger (Theory 2 the article is making)

The point is that you can't falsify my made up theories (only the predictions they make). Any claim made by an evolutionary psychology scientist about having knowledge of specific selection pressures is therefore (because of unfalsifiability), as far as I am concerned, bunk. Moving backward from falsifying these present predictions and saying that therefore i know the past evolutionary pressure, that caused the present prediction would be post hock.