In an essay published a couple of weeks ago in The Chronicle Review, Michael Ruse warned about the collateral damage from the Marc Hauser scandal. It’s not just those associated with Hauser whose reputations may be tarnished, he said, but all other researchers in the field. “No one,” he wrote, “will be following the Hauser story with the unabashed glee of the critics of modern evolutionary theory.”
Here comes the glee. The blog Uncommon Descent (slogan: “Serving the Intelligent Design Community”) delivers the following verdict: “Not wanting to dance on anyone’s grave, I must nonetheless say that I think the evolutionary biologists had this one coming.”
To say that Hauser’s misconduct (he’s admitted to “mistakes,” by the way) casts doubt on evolutionary psychology is a huge stretch; we’re talking about a single researcher here, albeit a prominent one. But to extend the condemnation to evolutionary biology as a whole? Come on.
The Christian commentator Chuck Colson also took aim at Hauser in a column published yesterday. “While Hauser’s misconduct should surprise us,” Colson writes, “his inability to find evidence supporting his belief that altruism and morality have an evolutionary basis should not.”
For one thing, Hauser isn’t the only one studying morality and evolution. But more importantly the evidence that’s been presented against Hauser so far has little to do with his work on morality: There’s no allegation that his 2006 book Moral Minds is in any way undermined by the problems in his laboratory. That book was knocked by some for making grandiose generalizations when it first came out, but its conclusions don’t appear to be connected to the public allegations against Hauser.
The full results of Harvard’s investigation remain under wraps. That makes it is easy for people like Colson to say that all of Hauser’s work is invalid–and that therefore all evolutionary psychology is bunk, along with evolutionary biology and science in general. Doesn’t make it true, but it definitely makes it easy.
9 Responses to Using the Hauser Scandal
11182967 - September 9, 2010 at 4:28 pm
But remember–Chuck Colson is an authority on professional misconduct.
suburbprof - September 9, 2010 at 4:38 pm
Colson’s manipulation of religion (“I’m born again, so you can’t hold my past against me any more”) should make him suspect by any plausible litmus test of legitimacy. To be criticized by him amounts to something of an accomplishment. It would be more alarming if he endorsed a view, as that would immediately suggest it had no basis in reason, fact, or science.
cwinton - September 9, 2010 at 5:53 pm
Considering Colson’s past history of scurrilous and criminal behavior, who by his own reckoning appears to have evolved into a moral authority, perhaps he should consider himself to be proof positive of an evolutionary basis for morality.
stannadel - September 10, 2010 at 8:25 am
I expect the yahoos to confuse “evolutionary psychology” with evolution, but I am surprised to see the CHE allowing a writer to elide the difference as well. Biological evolution is a scientific given, while much, most or all of “evolutionary psychology” consists of dubious science and just so stories–and has often been used to promote racist ideas, when not actually produced by racists.
tombartlett - September 10, 2010 at 10:38 am
@stannadel I didn’t elide the difference; I pointed it out. Or were you referring to Michael Ruse? I don’t think he elided the difference either. What are you talking about?
_perplexed_ - September 10, 2010 at 2:02 pm
stannadel is, apparently, a tabula rasa yahoo.
marvchron - September 13, 2010 at 12:25 am
Comments 1, 2 & 3 are nothing but ad hominem attacks on Charles Colson. His past criminal acts were appropriately punished. But the change in his life, the time span of that change and the thing to which he has devoted himself, prison ministries, clearly indicates a person who has eschewed his past criminal behavior in favor of positive contributions to society.
ccchron - September 24, 2010 at 6:30 pm
#7 marvchron: OK, but your post is nothing but an ad hominen defense of Colson. What does his repentance have to do with whether he’s qualified to comment on developments in evolutionary biology?
ccchron - September 24, 2010 at 6:48 pm
sorry for the typo: ad hominem