From Graham Perkins, De Montfort University
While it is clear that a lot of evolutionary psychology needs debunking, I
thought it rather shameful that the Roses resorted to attacking neo-Darwinism in
general and Richard Dawkins in particular.
Dawkins’s work shows no evidence that he supports the wholesale use of
Pleistocene “just so” stories to account for modern social behaviour. Precisely
the opposite. He points out that our genes have created intelligence and
surrendered their sovereignty to it, unlike the spiders, bee orchids, and fig
wasps.
Accusing Dawkins of invoking free will as a “sky-hook” to rescue evolutionary
psychology is pure invention. Asserting that “Darwin knew better” and denied
free will for humans is equally false, and were it true would completely
undermine the Roses’ own case.
Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire
