Thursday, August 30, 2007
Pleistocene Brains
We hear it often in our field that modern humans have Pleistocene brains, brains suitably adapted to life in the savannas of Africa where our ancestors lived for thousands of years. It was this period of stability that solidified our Pleistocene mind and all those fun modules. But is there any real evidence for this supposed Pleistocene mind/brain? I mean, any biological evidence other than just-so stories constructed based on clinical experiments with modern humans. I really would appreciate a point in the right direction. It seems patently false that we have Pleistocene brains, and also to fly in the face of evolutionary theory, which indicates our biology is constantly adapting.
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Girls prefer pink? evolutionary or cultural causes
Lately a story stemming from an article in Current Biology has been circulating. This study allegedly demonstrates 1) that women prefer pink and 2) that there is an evolutionary explanation about this. Does that make you suspicous? Well it should.
This blog eloquently dissects it and seriously questions both conclusions. It is a good example of the abuse of evolutionary psychology and shows how easy it is to supply an evolutionary story to any experimental result. On closer scrutiny the experimental results do not support the evolutionary theory. Oh, and by the way the experimental results are, as shown in the blog, entirely explicable as having a cultural cause.
Instead of a study in evolutionary psychology it is a good study of a cultural effect in color preference.
This blog eloquently dissects it and seriously questions both conclusions. It is a good example of the abuse of evolutionary psychology and shows how easy it is to supply an evolutionary story to any experimental result. On closer scrutiny the experimental results do not support the evolutionary theory. Oh, and by the way the experimental results are, as shown in the blog, entirely explicable as having a cultural cause.
Instead of a study in evolutionary psychology it is a good study of a cultural effect in color preference.
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