What are the best books on evolutionary psychology?
post by diegocaleiro · 2012-09-21T19:59:01.453Z · LW · GW · Legacy · 11 commentsI'd like to divide three classes of reasons to read a discipline:
1) You are curious and want to begin reading by something 100-500 pages. I'd go for Pinker's 1990's "How the mind works"
2) You want to screen the whole field, by reading something 500-1500 pages. I definitely recommend David Buss 2004 "The Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology" which defeats the usual SI recommendations on the field
3) You want to know the state of the art of the field, so you really need something that is very recent, say from the last 2 or 3 years at most. This is me. Please help me if you know what should I read. 300-1500 seems a good interval.
Just for a comparative, in Cognitive Neuroscience, 3 would be 2009 "MIT The Cognitive Neurosciences IV"
Post your opinions on what 1 2 and 3 should be for Evolutionary Psychology.
Oh, and if you like Evolutionary Cognitive Neuroscience (a field so new I don't know any of the 3) please post yours too...
11 comments
Comments sorted by top scores.
comment by lukeprog · 2012-09-22T14:25:46.886Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
Replies from: diegocaleiroI definitely recommend David Buss 2004 "The Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology" which defeats the usual SI recommendations on the field
↑ comment by diegocaleiro · 2012-09-23T22:54:42.335Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
Back in the day we had a big discussion, I voted for this book, I think Vassar was against it because no one else had read it. Great to see it there!
comment by Manfred · 2012-09-21T23:58:32.811Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
It would be nice if you added this to the thing we have that's like this.
Replies from: diegocaleiro↑ comment by diegocaleiro · 2012-09-23T22:55:56.717Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
I didn't because this does not go according to the rules, also I'm suggesting different reasons for reading the books than those stated there. But thanks :)
comment by bramflakes · 2012-09-22T11:40:33.509Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
Thanks for making this, I was vaguely disappointed that the "best textbooks on every subject" thread didn't have an evpsych section, and I didn't expect to get a response were I to ask for a recommendation there.
comment by hankx7787 · 2012-09-21T23:42:56.578Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
the usual SI recommendations on the field
What are these?
Replies from: Randaly, Manfred↑ comment by Randaly · 2012-09-22T09:02:53.073Z · LW(p) · GW(p)
See e.g. here, in particular:
Barrett, L. et al., eds. 2002. Human Evolutionary Psychology. Princeton University Press.
Buss, D. 2005. The Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology. Wiley.
There are also pages for Intro and Auxiliary reading; I've also heard an old one, Tooby and Cosmides' The Adapted Mind, recommended.
Replies from: hankx7787