Re: Little Dutch Boy

From: Keith Henson (hkhenson@rogers.com)
Date: Thu 02 Feb 2006 - 19:44:51 GMT

  • Next message: Keith Henson: "Re: Wham, bam, epigram"

    At 07:16 AM 2/2/2006 -0500, Scott Chase wrote:
    >>From: Chris Taylor <chris.taylor@ebi.ac.uk>

    snip

    (Keith)

    >>>Incidentally, Robert Wright, author of _Moral Animal_, an early popular
    >>>book on EP, says that popular authors have a better gut feel for EP than
    >>>any psychologist prior to the mid 1990s. That's because they are
    >>>turning on deep seated EP rooted emotions. Consider The Fellowship of
    >>>the Ring as an example.
    >>
    >>Lol. Is this not just something of an indictment of a century of
    >>psychology/psychiatry..?
    >_Fellowship of the Ring_ was an attempt at a modern mythology, using older
    >themes. If Keith wants to offer the generation of mythic themes as an
    >example of implicit EP,

    It is not the generation of mythic themes, but the *fact* that such stories real or myth become widespread and persist a long time in human culture. This shows such stories have an effect on human brains that gets them passed along selectively.

    >he might consider that Jung was pondering the implications of an evolved
    >mind for the human propensity to shared mythic themes across cultures LONG
    >before Tooby and Cosmides saved the day. He might want to give Anthony
    >Stevens (a fellow EP enthiasiast and bona fide Jungian) a read.

    I think the affinity of human brains to such stories is activating psychological mechanisms shaped by inclusive fitness where your genes were more likely to live on if you made the ultimate and personally irrational sacrifice. If Anthony Stevens has come to a similar explanation, I would really appreciate a pointer to his work.

    >Ernst Haeckel talks of a "phylogenetic psychology" in his _The Riddle of
    >the Universe_ published at the turn of last century.
    >
    >Why is it that EP'ers feel the need to portray EP as salvation for
    >psychology? After a while this repetitive hyperbole starts sounding like
    >the health food/vitamin propaganda against the pharmaceutical companies.

    "My contention, simply put, is that the evolutionary approach is the only approach in the social and behavioural sciences that deals with why, in an ultimate sense, people behave as they do. As such, it often unmasks the universal hypocrisies of our species, peering behind self-serving notions about our moral and social values to reveal the darker side of human nature." (Silverman 2003)

    Keith Henson

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