Hayek's The Sensory Order contains a physicalistic identity theory of the mind. Popper criticized it, saying that it could not explain the higher functions of language. Hayek took up that challenge in a manuscript but failed to refute Popper's arguments. Drawing upon the same manuscript, Hayek developed a theory of behavioural rules and cultural evolution. Despite his criticism of the theory of mind on which this evolutionary theory was based, Popper adopted Hayek's idea of group selection. He transformed it into a theory of the selective power of ecological niches. This became a central element of Popper's theory of evolution. The chapter traces the influence Popper and Hayek had on each other in the fields of the philosophy of mind and evolutionary theory. This is documented, inter alia, by their correspondence. Popper's theory of evolution, which is based on his dualistic theory of mind, is presented in its various stages of development The chapter concludes with a possible application of that evolutionary theory, some thoughts about David Hume as the source of the differences between Popper and Hayek, and on the possible impact Popper's criticism had on Hayek's role in artificial intelligence.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Bartley, III, William Warren, 1976. Critical Study. The Philosophy of Karl Popper. Part I: Biology & Evolutionary Epistemology. Philosophia, 6(3–4): 463–494.
Bartley, III, William Warren. 1978. Critical Study. The Philosophy of Karl Popper. Part II. Consciousness and Physics. Quantum Mechanics, Probability, Indeterminism, The Body—Mind Problem. Philosophia, 7(3–4): 675–716.
Birner, Jack. 1999. Making Markets. In Economic Organisation and Economic Knowledge: Essays in Honour of Brian Loasby, eds. Sheila C. Dow and Peter E. Earl, pp. 36–56. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.
Birner, Jack. 2001. The Mind—Body Problem and Social Evolution. Unpublished paper, presented at the workshop on The Nature and Evolution of Institutions, Max Planck Institute of Economics, Jena, January.
Birner, Jack. 2004. F.A. Hayek's The Sensory Order. An Evolutionary Perspective. Unpublished paper.
Caldwell, Bruce. 2006. Popper and Hayek: Who Influenced Whom? In Karl Popper. A Centenary Assessment, eds. Ian Jarvie, Karl Milford, and David Miller, Vol. I, pp. 111–124. Aldershot: Ashgate.
Campbell, Donald. 1974. “Downward Causation” in Hierarchically Organized Biological Systems. In Studies in the Philosophy of Biology, eds. Francis Ayala and Theodore Dobzhansky, pp. 179–186. London: Macmillan.
Gould, Stephen Jay. 2002. The Structure of Evolutionary Theory. Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
Hacohen, Malachi Haim. 2000. Karl Popper — The Formative Years, 1902–1945. Politics and Philosophy in Interwar Vienna. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hayek, Friedrich August. 1920. Beiträge zur Theorie der Entwicklung des Bewusstseins. Hayek Archives, Hoover Institution on War, Revolution and Peace, Box 92/1.
Hayek, Friedrich August. 1937. Economics and Knowledge. In Individualism and Economic Order, ed. Friedrich August Hayek, pp. 33–56. London: Routledge (1949). Hayek, Friedrich August. 1945. Individualism: True and False. In Individualism and Economic Order, ed. Friedrich August Hayek, pp. 1–32. London: Routledge (1949).
Hayek, Friedrich August. 1952. The Sensory Order. An Inquiry into the Foundations of Theoretical Psychology. Chicago University Press.
Hayek, Friedrich August. 1963. Rules, Perception and Intelligibility. In Studies in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, ed. Friedrich August Hayek, pp. 43–65. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press (1967).
Hayek, Friedrich August. 1963a, The Legal and Political Philosophy of David Hume. In Studies in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, ed. Friedrich August Hayek, pp. 106–121. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press (1967).
Hayek, Friedrich August. 1967. Notes on the Evolution of Systems of Rules of Conduct. In Studies in Philosophy, Politics and Economics, ed. Friedrich August Hayek, pp. 66–81. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press (1967).
Hayek, Friedrich August. 1979. Law, Legislation and Liberty. In The Political Order of a Free People, Vol. III. London: Routledge ' Kegan Paul.
Hayek, Friedrich August. 1982. The Sensory Order After 25 Years. In Cognition and the Symbolic Process, eds. Walter Weimer and David Palermo, Vol. 2, pp. 287–293. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.
Hayek, Friedrich August. 1988. The Fatal Conceit. The Errors of Socialism. London: Routledge.
Hebb, Donald. 1949. The Organization of Behavior. New York: Wiley.
Hertel, Rainer. 1997. Was kann die Evolutionsbiologie zur Diskussion der Ethik beitra-gen? In Anthropologie und Ethik. Biologische, sozialwissenschaftliche und philosophische Überlegungen, Hrsg. Jean-Pierre Wils, pp. 148–175. Marburg: Francke Verlag.
Milford, Karl. 1994. In Pursuit of Rationality. A Note on Hayek's The Counter-Revolution of Science. In Hayek, Co-ordination and Evolution, eds. Jack Birner and Rudy van Zijp, pp. 323–340. London: Routledge.
Popper, Karl Raimund. 1953. Language and the Body—Mind Problem. In Conjectures and Refutations. The Growth of Scientific Knowledge, ed. Karl Raimund Popper, pp. 293–298. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul (1963).
Popper, Karl Raimund. 1957. The Poverty of Historicism. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Popper, Karl Raimund. 1961. Evolution and the Tree of Knowledge. In Objective Knowledge. An Evolutionary Approach, ed. Karl Raimund Popper, pp. 256–284. Oxford: Clarendon (1972).
Popper, Karl Raimund. 1965. Of Clouds and Clocks. An Approach to the Problem of Rationality and the Freedom of Man. In Objective Knowledge. An Evolutionary Approach, ed. Karl Raimund Popper, pp. 206–255. Oxford: Clarendon (1972).
Popper, Karl Raimund. 1967. Epistemology Without a Knowing Subject. In Objective Knowledge. An Evolutionary Approach, ed. Karl Raimund Popper, pp. 106–152. Oxford: Clarendon (1972).
Popper, Karl Raimund. 1972. Two Faces of Common Sense. In Objective Knowledge. An Evolutionary Approach, ed. Karl Raimund Popper, pp. 32–105. Oxford: Clarendon (1972).
Popper, Karl Raimund. 1977. Natural Selection and the Emergence of Mind. First Darwin Lecture, Darwin College, Cambridge. In Evolutionary Epistemology, Rationality, and the Sociology of Knowledge, eds. Gerhard Radnitzky and William Warren Bartley, III, pp. 139–156. Lasalle, IL: Open Court (1987).
Popper, Karl Raimund and Eccles, John Carew. 1977. The Self and Its Brain, Berlin: Springer International.
Popper, Karl Raimund. 1994. Knowledge and the Body—Mind Problem. In Defence of Interactionism, ed. Michael Notturno. London: Routledge.
Watkins, John. 1995. Popper and Darwinism. In Karl Popper: Philosophy and Problems, ed. Anthony O'Hear, pp. 191–206. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2009 Springer Science + Business Media B.V.
About this paper
Cite this paper
Birner, J. (2009). From Group Selection to Ecological Niches. In: Parusniková, Z., Cohen, R.S. (eds) Rethinking Popper. Boston Studies in The Philosophy of Science, vol 272. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9338-8_15
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-9338-8_15
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-1-4020-9337-1
Online ISBN: 978-1-4020-9338-8
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawPhilosophy and Religion (R0)