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A Critical Discussion of a Recent Evolutionary–Cognitive Approach to “Folk-Economic Beliefs”

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ORIGINAL ARTICLE Evolution, Mind and Behaviour 17(2019)1, pp. 29–47 DOI: 10.1556/2050.2019.00011 Sense or non-sense? A critical discussion of a recent evolutionary–cognitive approach to “folk-economic beliefs” THEISS BENDIXEN* Department of the Study of Religion, Aarhus University, Denmark (Received: 17 Jul 2019; accepted: 13 Nov 2019) Laypeople hold beliefs about economics and policy issues—so-called folk-economic beliefs (FEBs)—that are often wrong or misleading according to professional economists. Here, I critically discuss a recent evolutionary–cogni- tive approach to understanding folk-economic beliefs. According to this approach (Boyer & Petersen 2018a), some economic beliefs are more prevalent than others, because such beliefs (i.e., folk-economic beliefs) resonate with evolved features of the human mind. I refer to this as the “FEB hypothesis”. A central challenge to the FEB hy- pothesis, with its heavy reliance on universal cognitive features, is to explain individual and cultural differences in economic beliefs and behavior. This challenge is the starting point for the discussion. Overall, the conclusion of this paper is that the FEB hypothesis relies on unnecessarily strong and controversial theoretical assumptions (e.g., “massive modularity” and the “Environment of Evolutionary Adaptedness”), and that it overlooks important find- ings from adjacent fields, but that the FEB hypothesis, following some modifications inspired by Dual Inheritance Theory, can be integrated with robust findings from the rest of the evolutionary, cognitive, and anthropological sciences, as well as standard political psychology. Based on this discussion, the paper ends with brief reflections on how to correct inaccurate folk-economic beliefs. Keywords: folk-economic beliefs, evolutionary psychology, cultural attraction theory, dual inheritance theory INTRODUCTION societies, do not think like economists (Kirby, Cornish, & Smith 2008, pp. 147–166). It is, for instance, a familiar finding that people are overinfluenced by consideration of Folk-economic beliefs sunk costs (Magalhães & White 2016) or fail to consider opportunity costs (Hazlitt 2010) in evaluating possible In many walks of life, laypeople hold widely different courses of action.” (p. 3) opinions, views, and beliefs compared to professionals or In this paper, I will critically discuss a recent evolution- experts. There are arguably few areas where this discrep- ary–cognitive approach to understanding so-called folk- ancy between laypeople and professionals matters more economic beliefs—a domain of beliefs about economics than in the political economic sphere (Caplan 2006, 2007). and policy issues that are held by laypeople but often Beliefs and opinions of laypeople determine the outcome deemed wrong or misleading by professional economists. of elections and thus the future direction and organization According to this approach (Boyer & Petersen 2018a), of democratic nations (Flynn, Nyhan, & Reifler 2017). It is some beliefs are more prevalent than others, because such thus in everybody's interest that laypeople hold beliefs that beliefs (i.e., folk-economic beliefs) resonate with evolved are generally compatible with the best knowledge of eco- features of the human mind. In the following, for the sake nomic and political experts. However, this is far from al- of brevity, I will refer to this approach as the “FEB hy- ways the case. As Leiser and Shemesh (2018) wrote: pothesis”, where FEB stands for folk-economic belief (see “Non-economists’ thinking has a short range and a nar- Boyer & Petersen 2018a). row scope. It focuses on direct links, and typically ignores In Part 1, I will introduce, in more detail, the concept indirect links, feedback loops, and aggregate effects. Peo- of folk-economic beliefs and identify the theoretical ple without specialized training do not countenance com- frameworks and assumptions from which the FEB hypoth- plex causal networks. [...] The result is that the public is esis is derived. I will also introduce a competing (although largely unaware of emergent processes [...].” (p. 122–123) not entirely incompatible) evolutionary framework – Dual Boyer and Petersen (2018a) provided a few additional examples: “It is a matter of common knowledge that most people, including the educated public in modern democratic * Author for correspondence. [email protected] This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium for non-com- mercial purposes, provided the original author and source are credited, a link to the CC License is provided, and changes - if any - are indicated. First published online: 17 January 2020 © 2019 The Author(s) Unauthenticated | Downloaded 09/26/21 09:45 PM UTC Folk-Economic Beliefs: A Critical Discussion Inheritance Theory – that will function as a counter- zero-sum (e.g., when 2 nations engage in trade, the export- perspective on the origin and spread of folk-economic be- ing country “win” and the importing country “loses”), liefs in Part 2. immigrants “steal” jobs (e.g., immigrants compete with In Part 2, I will critically evaluate and discuss the theo- native citizens for work), immigrants abuse the welfare retical foundations of the FEB hypothesis. The discussion system (e.g., immigrants are “lazy” and scrounge on hard- will take its outset from the challenge of explaining varia- earned tax money), and the profit motive is detrimental to tion in economic beliefs and behavior across cultures and general welfare (e.g., private companies only care about individuals. profit and are therefore uncaring and amoral) (for more Overall, the conclusion of this paper is that the FEB examples, see Boyer & Petersen 2018a,p.3–4, Rubin hypothesis relies on unnecessarily strong and controversial 2003, 2018, and Figure 1 below). theoretical assumptions (e.g., “massive modularity” and Although the specific folk-economic beliefs highlighted the “Environment of Evolutionary Adaptedness”), and that by the authors are all contrary to the views of mainstream it overlooks important findings from adjacent fields, but economic and political science, the authors emphasize that that the FEB hypothesis, following some modifications in- this is not in itself a criteria for labeling a belief “folk-eco- spired by Dual Inheritance Theory, can be integrated with nomic”. Instead, a belief is a folk-economic belief if it is robust findings from the rest of the evolutionary, cogni- common enough to be of political relevance—regardless tive, and anthropological sciences, as well as standard po- of its truth value (Boyer & Petersen 2018b). litical psychology. Lastly, I will sketch out what these insights mean for how to counter misleading and poten- tially damaging folk-economic beliefs in practice. Con- The “FEB hypothesis” and its “strong” assumptions cludingly, I will briefly reflect on the originality of this paper and will summarize. According to Boyer and Petersen (2018a, 2018b) and to However, before embarking on the main parts, the im- what I will hereafter call the “FEB hypothesis”, folk-eco- portance of this project is outlined. nomic beliefs are the products not of pure ignorance but of intuitions generated by domain-specific cognitive infer- ence systems, or so-called cognitive modules (Frankenhuis Importance of the project & Ploeger 2007; in this paper and following the literature, As alluded to at the outset of the introduction, understand- I will alternate between these two synonymous labels. ing why people believe and behave as they do in modern Sometimes, for the sake of brevity, derived abbreviations political and economic situations is vital for democratic will also be used, such as cognitive mechanisms or infer- nations. The long-term success of democracies hinges on ence systems or, plainly, modules). voters being sufficiently politically literate. By understand- Supposedly, these domain-specific cognitive inference ing how humans process and act upon pieces of political systems are evolved through natural selection, are each and economic information, societies can put in place inter- “designed to solve one kind of exchange problem recurrent ventions to counter and inoculate against misleading and in our ancestral environment” (Boyer & Petersen 2018a,p. potentially damaging folk-economic beliefs. 6), and are therefore universal in the human species. Since In addition, from a basic science perspective, spurring no domain-general cognitive mechanism could seemingly on the growth of a rigorous evolutionary–cognitive re- handle the plethora of diverse adaptive challenges faced by search program on the origin and spread of folk-economic our ancestors—from choosing a fertile mate over detecting beliefs is crucial, as it represents a promising arena for cheaters to avoiding toxins in foods—the brain must, so testing theories about the cultural evolution of ideas and the argument goes, necessarily function as a collection of behaviors in a societally important domain. This paper is a many domain-specific, or highly specialized, modules modest attempt at demonstrating the promise and potential (Cosmides 1989). Figure 1 illustrates the processes of such a program. whereby explicit folk-economic beliefs arise from intui- tions generated by domain-specific inference systems. The FEB hypothesis thus rests on 2 strong assumptions: “ 1) human cognition is, at
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