Abstract

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Brase (2003, Psychology Press) Opening paragraph:
An aspect of evolutionary psychology that seems to distress a number of people is the degree of modularization it implies. The concept of a multi-modular mind can be difficult to accept. To be more precise, many sensible people readily accept that evolutionary theory is relevant to the study of the mind, and even that the evolutionary process is an important consideration in understanding how the mind was designed, but balk at the implication – drawn by most pre-eminent theorists in evolutionary psychology – that the mind is therefore composed of a large number of relatively specialised cognitive adaptations, or modules (Buss, 1995, 1999; Pinker, 1997; Tooby & Cosmides, 1992). The reason for positing a large number of specialized mental abilities lies at the very foundations of evolutionary thinking. …