Comments on: Which Ideas Are Ready To Go To Florida? http://popsych.org/which-ideas-are-ready-to-go-to-florida/ The Internet's Best Evolutionary Psycholo-guy Wed, 03 Jan 2018 01:05:13 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.4.2 By: Why Parents Affects Children Less Than Many People Assume | Pop Psychology http://popsych.org/which-ideas-are-ready-to-go-to-florida/#comment-943 Why Parents Affects Children Less Than Many People Assume | Pop Psychology Mon, 27 Jan 2014 04:50:25 +0000 http://popsych.org/?p=2894#comment-943 [...] what a small handful of detractors have had to say, inclusive fitness theory has proved to be one of most valuable ideas we have for understanding [...] [...] what a small handful of detractors have had to say, inclusive fitness theory has proved to be one of most valuable ideas we have for understanding [...]

]]> By: Pellegri http://popsych.org/which-ideas-are-ready-to-go-to-florida/#comment-942 Pellegri Thu, 16 Jan 2014 01:08:01 +0000 http://popsych.org/?p=2894#comment-942 Without having read Matt Ridley's response, I can probably give you some insight on why he'd want to retire Malthus' ideas without any reference to their truth value: They're generally believed, by a large set of people, to have caused a great deal of human suffering through the mechanism of eugenics. Once you accept that human population must be checked or a world-ending catastrophe will absolutely result, it becomes easier to justify getting rid of one's <i>human</i> competitors on the grounds they bring less value to the species. The destructive behavior we've heretofore turned on the environment and other competing species isn't done away with, it's just reversed onto other humans. Of course "easier to justify" doesn't mean "inevitable" and the fact that knowledge can be used for bad ends doesn't justify getting rid of it, but it does explain why some people are hostile to Malthus per se. If Malthus' ideas about population limits had not been invoked, tacitly or explicitly, by eugenicists, "Malthusian" wouldn't be a dirty word in many circles the way it is now. Without having read Matt Ridley’s response, I can probably give you some insight on why he’d want to retire Malthus’ ideas without any reference to their truth value: They’re generally believed, by a large set of people, to have caused a great deal of human suffering through the mechanism of eugenics. Once you accept that human population must be checked or a world-ending catastrophe will absolutely result, it becomes easier to justify getting rid of one’s human competitors on the grounds they bring less value to the species. The destructive behavior we’ve heretofore turned on the environment and other competing species isn’t done away with, it’s just reversed onto other humans.

Of course “easier to justify” doesn’t mean “inevitable” and the fact that knowledge can be used for bad ends doesn’t justify getting rid of it, but it does explain why some people are hostile to Malthus per se. If Malthus’ ideas about population limits had not been invoked, tacitly or explicitly, by eugenicists, “Malthusian” wouldn’t be a dirty word in many circles the way it is now.

]]>