Araştırma Makalesi

Revisiting Evolutionary Naturalism: Challenging Misconceptions and Embracing Interactionism

Sayı: 21 3 Haziran 2024
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Revisiting Evolutionary Naturalism: Challenging Misconceptions and Embracing Interactionism

Abstract

The study aims to illuminate the fallacious misconceptions regarding evolutionary naturalism, which often reduce it to strict fatalist naturalism, while also defending an interactionist perspective between nature and nurture in explaining social and individual traits. To achieve this goal, the study is divided into two sections. The first section offers a brief overview of evolutionary naturalism and nurturism, illustrating their biased interpretations as well as the erroneous philosophical, ethical, and political implications they allegedly entail. By clarifying the fundamental tenets of evolutionary naturalism and distinguishing it from sociobiology, the second section argues that evolutionary naturalism, as an interactionist approach, offers incomplete yet superior explanations for highly complex traits such as cultural, legislative, and ethical ones. To support this argument, the second section exposes several fallacies and misconceptions surrounding evolutionary naturalism, which often lead to overlooking its interactionist dimension. These fallacies include the fallacy of genetic causation, the fallacy of genetic sufficiency, and the fallacy of genetic necessity. It is concluded that, rather than adhering to creationist naturalism, sociobiology, strict naturalism, or nurturism, embracing evolutionary and interactionist naturalism provides better insights into investigating the origins of such complex traits.

Keywords

Kaynakça

  1. Buss, David M. Evolutionary Psychology: The New Science of The Mind (3rd ed.). Boston and New York: Pearson, 2008.
  2. Darwin, Charles. The Origin of Species. London: William Collins, 2011.
  3. Davis, Bernard D. “Social Determinism and Behavioral Genetics,” Science 189, no. 4208 (1975): 1049-1049.
  4. De Waal, Frans. Good Natured: The Origins of Right and Wrong in Humans and Other Animals (7th printing). Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2003.
  5. Dennett, Daniel C. From Bacteria to Bach and Back: The Evolution of Mind. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2017.
  6. Driscoll, Marsha., Elizabeth E. Dunn, Dann Siems and B. Kamran Swanson. Charles Darwin, the Copley Medal, and the Rise of Naturalism, 1861-1864. United States: University of North Carolina Press, 2022.
  7. Locke, J. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1947.
  8. Pinker, Steven. The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature. New York: Penguin Books, 2003.

Ayrıntılar

Birincil Dil

İngilizce

Konular

Bilim Felsefesi

Bölüm

Araştırma Makalesi

Yayımlanma Tarihi

3 Haziran 2024

Gönderilme Tarihi

19 Nisan 2024

Kabul Tarihi

21 Mayıs 2024

Yayımlandığı Sayı

Yıl 2024 Sayı: 21

Kaynak Göster

Chicago
Birgül, Osman Gazi. 2024. “Revisiting Evolutionary Naturalism: Challenging Misconceptions and Embracing Interactionism”. Temaşa Erciyes Üniversitesi Felsefe Bölümü Dergisi, sy 21: 218-28. https://doi.org/10.55256/temasa.1470742.

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