A Constructive Critical Assessment of Feminist Evolutionary Psychology

Abstract

In this dissertation, I develop an approach to philosophical critique of morally relevant science and apply this approach to a new branch of evolutionary psychology called “feminist evolutionary psychology.” Morally relevant science is science that produces knowledge that has the potential to risk harm to humans, non-humans, or the environment. For example, a science that produces claims about women that reinforce prejudicial beliefs about women is a morally relevant science. The approach I develop, what I call the “social-dimensional approach,” is designed to assess a science’s epistemic and ethical dimensions which makes it ideal for the assessment of morally relevant science. My development of the social-dimensional approach is informed by an analysis of the philosophy of biology literature on the criticism of evolutionary psychology (EP), the study of the evolution of human psychology and behaviour. I apply the social-dimensional approach to feminist evolutionary psychology and show that this new science has serious epistemic and ethical flaws. I address the implications of these flaws and offer recommendations for how feminist evolutionary psychologists can amend them. I argue the social-dimensional approach has use beyond evolutionary psychology and can be used for the assessment of morally relevant science more broadly.