Evolutionizing the Cognitive Sciences: A Reply to Shapiro and Epstein

We have argued that the social sciences—anthropology, economics, soci- ology—will be revolutionized when their practitioners realize that theories about the evolved architecture of the human mind play a necessary and central role in any causal account of human affairs (Tooby and Cosmides, 1989, 1992; Cosmides and Tooby, 1994a). We have further argued that cogni- tive scientists will make far more rapid progress in mapping this evolved architecture if they begin to seriously incorporate knowledge from evol- utionary biology and its related disciplines—behavioural ecology, paleoanthropology, hunter-gatherer studies, and primatology—into their repertoire of theoretical tools, and use theories of adaptive function to guide their empirical investigations (Cosmides and Tooby, 1987, 1989, 1992, 1994b; Tooby and Cosmides, 1992). Shapiro and Epstein (S&E) have responded to our arguments with a series of mild criticisms and modest endorsements. Here, briefly put, are S&E's main points: