[extropy-chat] Calling all EvoPsych Jedi...

[Robin Hanson]

At 09:10 PM 5/6/2005, Keith Henson wrote:
>>>I predict that EP and related evolutionary understandings will displace 
>>>virtually all of social science, kind of like plate tectonics displaced 
>>>theories in geology.
>>>But it will take the present generation of social "science" professors 
>>>dying off to do it.
>>
>>I don't plan on dying off anytime soon, and as economics is a social 
>>science, I must be one of these professors you are talking about.  ...  I 
>>see little chance of EP displacing economics, nor should it.
>
>Sorry, I didn't state that clearly.
>
>"I predict that EP and related evolutionary understandings will displace 
>[the underpinnings of] virtually all of social science, kind of like plate 
>tectonics displaced [foundation] theories in geology."  It is not like 
>sediment geology was dumped, but what drove places to sink and accumulate 
>sediment is now understood in terms of plate tectonics.

If EP takes over psychology, then it will displace other psychology 
foundations of economics.  But economics has many other foundations besides 
psychology.

>... They also work very hard for status, one classic example is judges who 
>give up large amounts of income for the higher status of a judge.  Why is 
>this?  The answers are obvious if not downright trivial given EP.

What exactly status is and what people use to infer it and produce it 
remain big open questions, and have been for a long time, long before EP 
was popular.  They remain so even within EP.  These questions are far from 
trivial.



Robin Hanson  rhanson at gmu.edu  http://hanson.gmu.edu
Assistant Professor of Economics, George Mason University
MSN 1D3, Carow Hall, Fairfax VA 22030-4444
703-993-2326  FAX: 703-993-2323