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"Universities are turning our youths into Marxists!" (hexbear.net)

submitted 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) by Dirt_Owl@hexbear.net to c/chapotraphouse@hexbear.net

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Meanwhile my ecology professor is literally teaching that survival of the fittest is about genetic superiority and that evolution is about working towards that 'goal'. This is incorrect and bad science that is rooted in right-wing ideology that was disproven decades ago.

This is not what survival of the fittest means by the way. There is no such thing as a genetically superior being, as 'fitness' is totally subjective, as well as dependent on your environment. A lifeform that reproduces well in the ocean will still die if you put in the vacuum of space, no matter how 'fit' it was for ocean life. Not to mention the idea that nature has some sort of conscious goal is anthropomorthising a concept and again, bad science.

I really want to do something about this, but I feel like complaining will get me failed or known as a shit stirrer.

I fucking hate capitalist education.

On the plus side, our next lecture is on mutualism

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[-] Belly_Beanis@hexbear.net 10 points 2 months ago

AFAIK evolutionary psychology has been completely taken over by "race realists," instead of trying to understand how mental illness evolved in humans or what mental illness looks like in other species.

[-] Poogona@hexbear.net 1 points 2 months ago

See I remember being interested in the stuff from a much more indistinct lens, stuff like our instinctive fear and disgust towards certain stimuli (seeing a snake in the grass, trypophobia, why certain bugs freak people out more than others) but most of the people I met who were into evopsych just wanted to study IQ, I assume because it would let them categorize people into tiers of worth. I hated it both because it was a hiding spot for racism and because it was ruining what could be a pretty interesting field looking at mankind's part in the evolutionary narrative of mammals.

[-] Belly_Beanis@hexbear.net 2 points 2 months ago

It would be really helpful too to know how things evolved so we could treat certain conditions (like with wisdom teeth or the appendix). But yeah. It feels like it's turned into Phrenology: 2020 edition. I think a lot of schools have dropped courses for it as a result and psychiatrists are avoiding it altogether.