Heya. Yes, I’m submitting questions forty minutes before the start of class. So sue me.

Here’s what I’d really like to discuss.

How useful is it to take evolutionary biology and apply some of its principles to other fields? I know we /can/ (as our project and invited speakers have shown), but does it help us understand the fields better? We’ve seen how people study language and folklore and some of it seems very similar to the study of evolution, and I’m wondering how new these ways of thinking are, and whether they’ve consciously borrowed from biology or not (and vice versa, as I seem to recall someone talking about biology taking tree building tactics from linguistics). Also, I know many people don’t like the idea of using evolution to study non-bio fields, and I’d like to discuss whether these arguments have merit or not.

Mostly, it feels like to some degree that we have been learning about several disconnected topics, and I would just like to (attempt to!) tie them neatly together.