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I don't know that it's any worse off than anthropology, or any of the other social sciences. There is certainly the temptation to engage in the naturalistic fa

I don't know that it's any worse off than anthropology, or any of the other social sciences. There is certainly the temptation to engage in the naturalistic fallacy (i.e. "just because something is natural that it is therefore necessarily moral"). At the base of it, evo-psych rests on the premise that for a behavior to persist, it must have a purpose. Asking what that purpose is, without ascribing a value judgement, seems like a reasonable avenue of inquiry.

thaumasiotes 7y ago
> At the base of it, evo-psych rests on the premise that for a behavior to persist, it must have a purpose. Asking what that purpose is, without ascribing a value judgement, seems like a reasonable avenue of inquiry. This conflicts with the broader understanding of evolution in general, which treats "selection" (changes that have a purpose) and "genetic drift" (changes that have no purpose) separately.
- brazzy 7y ago
  "Purpose" is also the wrong word, isn't it? A more correct way would be the changes that improve the chances of survival and procreation, and changes that don't but persist because they at least don't decrease those chances.
brazzy 7y ago
> There is certainly the temptation to engage in the naturalistic fallacy (i.e. "just because something is natural that it is therefore necessarily moral"). My point was more that with evo psych, you can additionally declare almost any behaviour to be "natural" by coming up with some convoluted reasoning why it confers an evolutionary advantage.