The New Atheists are big fans of reason. Sam Harris' Project Reason, Victor Stenger's "The New Atheism: Taking a Stand for Science and Reason", Richard Dawkins' Foundation for Reason and Science, etc.

Sounds admirable, doesn't it? Who isn't in favor of reason? After all, reason is what makes us, well… reasonable, right? Reason is what separates us from the lower animals. Reason is how we make right choices. Reason guides us to the truth, right?

Not so fast. Professors Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber want to show you the darker side of reason.

Why Do We Rape, Kill and Sleep Around? The fault, dear Darwin, lies not in our ancestors, but in ourselves, a Newsweek article by Sharon Begley, shows us what happens when evolutionary psychology clashes with powerful social values. The former comes out the worse for it.

I only just found out that Jerry Fodor recently debated Philip Kitcher on the merits of Darwinism, specifically the value of natural selection in an explanatory capacity. While Fodor is an avowed atheist and metaphysical naturalist, he nevertheless takes a very dim view of Darwinism (though not evolution or common descent), and I tend to find his views interesting for one reason only: His ability to really, really irritate a diverse array of people.

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Status, sex prime for aggression is a Minnesota Daily article which uses evolution to explain, not just human behavior, but more specific events which illustrate the behavior. It starts out:

Several months ago, what police believe began as an altercation at a nightclub led an individual to shoot a Jacksonville Jaguar offensive lineman 14 times, leaving him paralyzed.

It’s hard to deny the senselessness of such violence, but recent University of Minnesota research indicates that such behavior could indeed make evolutionary sense.

University assistant marketing professor Vladas Griskevicius described results of a study to be published in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology that found when men have status and sex on their minds, they’re more likely to respond aggressively — with face-to-face confrontation — to a trivial slight.

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John Tierney contemplates New Year's resolutions with a new research review from psychologists at the University of Miami spanning 8 decades in his New York Times article today,

For Good Self-Control, Try Getting Religious About It

Some choice excerpts:

His [Michael McCullough's] professional interest arose from a desire to understand why religion evolved and why it seems to help to many people. Researchers around the world have repeatedly found that devoutly religious people tend to do better in school, live longer, have more satisfying marriages and be generally happier.

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The Books section of the weekend New York Times offers this article:
Dumb and Dumber: Are Americans Hostile to Knowledge?

It begins…

A popular video on YouTube shows Kellie Pickler, the adorable platinum blonde from "American Idol," appearing on the Fox game show "Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader?" during celebrity week. Selected from a third-grade geography curriculum, the $25,000 question asked: "Budapest is the capital of what European country?"

Ms. Pickler threw up both hands and looked at the large blackboard perplexed. "I thought Europe was a country," she said. Playing it safe, she chose to copy the answer offered by one of the genuine fifth graders: Hungary. "Hungry?" she said, eyes widening in disbelief. "That's a country? I've heard of Turkey. But Hungry? I've never heard of it."

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From here:

I've been searching for a relationship for some time but I don't meet many men whom I find good-looking – and looks are important to me. I see many more attractive women than men. Do men have more choice when it comes to good-looking partners?

Y'gotta see Dr Luisa Dillner's answer:

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From here:

A study in Current Biology reports some of the first conclusive evidence in support of the long-held notion that men and women differ when it comes to their favorite colors. Indeed, the researchers found that women really do prefer pink–or at least a redder shade of blue–than men do.

So how is this explained?

The explanation might go back to humans' hunter-gatherer days, when women–the primary gatherers–would have benefited from an ability to key in on ripe, red fruits.

"Evolution may have driven females to prefer reddish colors–reddish fruits, healthy, reddish faces," Hurlbert said. "Culture may exploit and compound this natural female preference."

C'mon, this is just a classic example of a "just-so" story. The only thing the researchers actually measured is the biological difference between male and females. And that's where the science ended. There is nothing in the study that indicates "evolution may have driven females to prefer reddish colors–reddish fruits, healthy, reddish faces." Don't believe me? Just watch the imagination go wild some more:

About the universal preference for blue, "I can only speculate," said Hurlbert. "I would favor evolutionary arguments again here. Going back to our 'savannah' days, we would have a natural preference for a clear blue sky, because it signaled good weather. Clear blue also signals a good water source."

Why in the world does there have to be an adaptive explanation that supposedly accounts for such color preferences?

It's been four months since I posted an entry on Dawkins, so I decided that I better not disappoint any longer. Today, I bring you a truly thought-provoking review of Dawkins' book from biologist David Sloan Wilson. Sloan begins his lengthy review with:

When Dawkins' The God Delusion was published I naturally assumed that he was basing his critique of religion on the scientific study of religion from an evolutionary perspective. I regret to report otherwise. He has not done any original work on the subject and he has not fairly represented the work of his colleagues.

and ends it with:

Time will tell where Dawkins sits on the bell curve of open-mindedness concerning group selection in general and religion in particular. At the moment, he is just another angry atheist, trading on his reputation as an evolutionist and spokesperson for science to vent his personal opinions about religion.

For those of us interested in evolution and religion, I highly recommend the review to you (it provides balance to the religion-as-accident "theory" I discussed before). I will probably offer some brief comments, but wait until tomorrow so you can read the review without the filter of my words.

Cornell lecturer in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology Allen MacNeill has announced another summer course, this one entitled Evolution and Religion: Is Religion Adaptive? It looks to be fairly interesting, and of course has PZ all atither. Because the idea has been explored a little bit here in the thread Hard-Wired for God: Take 2, let me list below the 6 requirements for qualification as an evolutionary adaptation that MacNeill offers:

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From here:

HOLLYWOOD'S most beautiful couple, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, are in the grip of evolutionary forces that made it almost inevitable that their child would be a girl.

Researchers rated their beauty according to height, weight and apparent age, all factors that can be used to judge basic attraction levels without subjective viewpoints.

Yes, but did they factor in hunger?

Effectively, the new theory–"selective investment theory"–presents a striking alternative to traditional self-interest theories of close relationships that tend to emphasize what individuals get from others, not what they give.

"Viewed through the lens of selective investment theory," Stephanie Brown said, "the fabric of close relationships appears different. Sacrifice becomes a characteristic feature of healthy, enduring relationships rather than aberrant, inexplicable, or diagnostic of pathology".

What makes selective investment theory distinctive is not only its focus on high-cost altruism, but also its premise that "selfish genes" are ultimately responsible for selfless, other-directed behavior. -Here

If you say ID theory, that's evidence that you don't understand what theory is and thus you don't understand science. If you say selective investment theory, that's a new theory in science. That new, fruitful field of evo-psych keeps coming up with new theories.

Men who have skipped lunch find larger women more attractive than their slimmer counterparts, new research has revealed.

A team of psychologists established that men who are hungry are attracted to plumper women, but the researchers found that, once they had eaten, men's taste in women reverted to those with slimmer figures.

The academics suggest the phenomenon arises from primeval associations between larger body sizes and health and survival. -Here

Why be so PC about this? This is powerful evo-psych evidence that selection shaped us to be cannibals.

In response to my list of 5 signs you might be an intelligent design critic, Mark Nutter has put together a 45-item long You may be an intelligent design supporter if"¦ list. Item 29 goes:

You blame the theory of evolution for war, rape, the Holocaust, bestiality, racism, the high cost of gasoline, and the fact that you never seem to notice that the toilet paper roll is empty until after it's too late.

While it's clear that the theory of evolution cannot be blamed for any of those things, there might be reasons for blaming evolution itself for them. Take the fact that you never seem to notice that the toilet paper roll is empty until after it's too late. If this is a trait in humans, then evolution must have created it, right? This insight prompted me to provide an explanation for the evolution of this trait, which I'll present below, freshly pulled out of my… no, let's not go there.

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Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection has been a little too fruitful lately. A couple years back, Randy Thornhill and Craig Palmer argued that rape is an adaptation. When evolutionary biologist Jerry Coyne criticized their thesis, Thornhill labeled him as an "anti-evolution critic."

Well, there is a new discovery on the block. This time, evolutionary psychologist David Buss, from the University of Texas, argues that murder is also an adaptation.

Murder could be traced back to the "ruthless evolutionary drive to reproduce", he said.

Thousands of years ago killing an enemy would boost a man's social status and improve his chances of attracting a mate, the book argued.

Murderers' genes won the evolutionary battle over those of their victims and the instinct to kill now lies dormant in all of us, Prof Buss argued.

I don't want to comment on Buss's argument as I have not read the book. Nevertheless, since it is so easy to create a new field of scientific exploration about human behavior using Darwin's theory, I am inspired to try my hand at it.

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