I’m saying that there are strong reasons to distrust current evo-psych results. One of those reasons is that evo-psych, as used in popular culture, provides justification for writing essays like the one you and I both think was a bad idea.
I think there are reasons to distrust a lot of evolutionary psychology results, and I think Luke’s breakup letter was just as bad an idea as he’s presented it as, but I don’t think the latter provides much evidence for the former. The rules of social interaction are only tangentially related to empirical reality, and even severe violations of social etiquette don’t establish empirical falsehood. In fact, it’s generally considered polite to deemphasize a number of empirical truths which our culture considers awkward, such as differences in skill.
As to invoking evopsych to dodge responsibility for your sexual preferences, it seems to me that that’s only dishonest if the results it invokes are untrue in the first place. It’s impolite regardless, though; our culture smiles on only a fairly narrow set of mechanistic excuses for behavior, and that’s not one of them.
I think there are reasons to distrust a lot of evolutionary psychology results, and I think Luke’s breakup letter was just as bad an idea as he’s presented it as, but I don’t think the latter provides much evidence for the former. The rules of social interaction are only tangentially related to empirical reality, and even severe violations of social etiquette don’t establish empirical falsehood. In fact, it’s generally considered polite to deemphasize a number of empirical truths which our culture considers awkward, such as differences in skill.
As to invoking evopsych to dodge responsibility for your sexual preferences, it seems to me that that’s only dishonest if the results it invokes are untrue in the first place. It’s impolite regardless, though; our culture smiles on only a fairly narrow set of mechanistic excuses for behavior, and that’s not one of them.