ONE of the most influential works in the field of economics is Milton Friedman’s 1953 essay, The Methodology of Positive Economics, in which he argues that people behave as if the assumptions of neoclassical economic theory are correct, even when they are not. One of the most influential works in the field of evolutionary biology is Stephen Jay Gould and Richard Lewontin’s 1979 paper “The Spandrels of San Marcos and the Panglossian Paradigm”, which argues against excessive reliance on the concept of adaptation.
A tale of two classics
Other Publications
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Rethinking the theoretical foundation of economics I: The multilevel paradigm
Feb 23, 2023
This article offers a new paradigm for economics: the “multilevel paradigm,” which applies the Darwinian theory of evolution to the analysis of economic processes. “Darwinian” refers to all variation/selection/replication processes,… -
Reintroducing Pierre Teilhard de Chardin to modern evolutionary science
Feb 23, 2023
Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955) developed an evolutionary worldview that was both spiritual and consistent with the scientific knowledge of his day. He has been largely forgotten by modern evolutionary… -
Groups as Organisms: Implications for Therapy and Training
Aug 26, 2021
Abstract: The intellectual tradition of individualism treats the individual person as the fundamental unit of analysis and reduces all things social to the motives and actions of individuals. Most methods…