Leda Cosmides was elected an Honorary Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2024.
[photo credit: Matt Perko]
She was cited by AAAS for “distinguished contributions to the field of evolutionary psychology and cognitive science, particularly using evolutionary theory to develop computational theories of adaptive information processing problems”
The UCSB Current has an article with more:
and here is the announcement for all 2024 fellows from the AAAS:
Don Symons (1942-2024), Professor Emeritus of Anthropology, University of California, Santa Barbara
Don Symons was a pioneer of evolutionary psychology in its earliest years. He was a fundamental thinker who nurtured scientists, young and old, who were interested in what he called “evolution-minded approaches” to human behavior. The Center for Evolutionary Psychology is at UCSB mostly because Don Symons made it so.
Steve Pinker wrote a moving piece about Don in Quillette, Sage of Sex and Psyche: Remembering Don Symons. He did a brilliant job encapsulating many insights that originated with Don, that are now taken for granted. Read it. Now. Especially if you were a child in the 1980s and 1990s, when Don was doing his most foundational work.
Don is best known for his pathbreaking–and still relevant–1979 book, The Evolution of Human Sexuality. But I would like to call your attention to his chapters and articles on the foundations of the field: about why Darwinian claims about behavior necessarily entail claims about psychological adaptations, why many of these adaptations will be specialized and domain-specific, the difference between studying adaptations and “adaptiveness”, and about how not to think about culture. Many of these are still required reading for graduate students taking general exams; links to some of them are below.
On the use and misuse of Darwinism in the study of human behavior. (Symons, 1992)
Adaptiveness and adaptation (Symons, 1990)
If we’re all Darwinians, what’s the fuss about? (Symons, 1987)
L-R: Don Symons, Leda Cosmides, and Paulina Ospina, Don’s wife. 2015
Don Symons, 1992, in his safari vest, as always.
Front: Cindy Reyfus, David Buss, Don Symons, Don Brown
Behind: Steve Pinker, Leda Cosmides, John Tooby
John Tooby (1952-2023) founded the Center for Evolutionary Psychology with Leda Cosmides in 1994, and served as its co-director for the rest of his life.
We wanted to share memories of John on this page. Steve Pinker wrote a moving tribute in Nautilus, Psychology Lost a Great Mind.
John’s memorial service was held on December 3, 2023 at the UCSB Faculty club–the link is to a zoom recording (the sound starts after ~2 minutes and 40 seconds).
Steve Pinker officiated, and many of John’s friends, colleagues, former students, and relatives shared their memories (links to those in prose), including Pascal Boyer, David Buss, Steve Gaulin, Mike Gurven, Dave Pietraszewski, Jordan Smoller, Larry Sugiyama and Michelle Scalise Sugiyama, Daniel Sznycer, Alvaro Fischer and Ximena Katz, Miguel Eckstein and Maria Acosta, Paul Tooby, Nike Tooby Cosmides, and Leda Cosmides.
John spoke too, in a sense: Steve Pinker shared emails from John (from 1990 on!), so we were able to enjoy his warmth and wit one more time.
A photo album of the memorial service is here (ppt slides)
Nike created a slideshow of John from childhood on, set to music he enjoyed.
Left: John with Nike, his daughter, in Juneau, Alaska, 2012
Thank you to Ryan Oprea, Debra Lieberman, Dylan Tweed, Steve Pinker, and Mike and Charlotte Gazzaniga for organizing this special event and making it possible.
A bench inscribed to John is in front of Davidson Library, on the main thoroughfare of the UCSB campus. Many thanks to Howard Waldow, Naomi Rustomjee, Jordan Smoller, and Steve Pinker for this.
We received touching letters, emails, and texts, some to John, others with memories of John. We will share some of them here, with the link on the writer’s name, as we get permission.
Jim Roney. Brad Duchaine. Michael Bang Petersen. Nicole Hess. Adam Cohen. Danielle Truxaw. Oliver Scott Curry. Nicolas Baumard @ EHBEA. Andy Delton.
A few moments with John follow.
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAA&S) was founded in 1780, during the American Revolution, by John Adams, John Hancock, and other U.S. Founding Fathers.
From the election letter: “The American Academy of Arts and Sciences honors excellence and convenes leaders from every field of human endeavor to examine new ideas, address issues of importance to the nation and the world, and work together, as expressed in our charter, “to cultivate every art and science which may tend to advance the interest, honor, dignity, and happiness of a free, independent, and virtuous people.” Our work has helped set the direction of research and analysis in science and technology policy, global security and international affairs, social policy, education, the humanities, and the arts.”
“With your election, you join the company of notable members – from our earliest members John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Alexander Hamilton, and George Washington to Ralph Waldo Emerson, Maria Mitchell, and Alexander Graham Bell. Other distinguished members have included Margaret Mead, Jonas Salk, Barbara McClintock, John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr., Aaron Copland, Martha Graham, John Hope Franklin, Georgia O’Keeffe, E. O. Wilson, Madeleine Albright, and Colin Powell. International Honorary Members have included Charles Darwin, Albert Einstein, Winston Churchill, Wislawa Szymborska, Laurence Olivier, Mary Leakey, Gabriel Garcia Márquez, Akira Kurosawa, and Nelson Mandela. Our current members represent today’s innovative thinkers in every field and profession, including more than two hundred and fifty Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winners.”
Michelle Scalise Sugiyama (University of Oregon) is a CEP alum who earned her doctorate in literature. Recently she has created Talking Stories: An Encyclopedia of Traditional Ecological Knowledge, and made it available to all who are interested in evolutionary psychology and the arts.
HBES gave its inaugural Don Symons Adaptationism Award at the 2023 Palm Springs conference. The award is bestowed for the best paper exemplifying the adaptationist program written or published in the last three years.
Although many excellent papers were nominated, three were so outstanding that the judges could not rank them. Two are CEP faculty—Jim Roney and Annie Wertz—and Larry Sugiyama (CEP alum ’96!), is senior author on the third.
Jim Roney won the award for his lead chapter on “Hormones and Human Mating” in the 2023 Handbook of Human Mating,
Annie Wertz won for her paper in Trends in Cognitive Sciences, How Plants Shape the Mind.
Larry Sugiyama won for his paper, Lassitude: The emotion of being sick, by Schrock, Snodgrass, & Sugiyama in Evolution and Human Behavior.
Human Behavior and Evolution Society
Dan Conroy-Beam was honored with one the first ever Rising Star Awards at the 2023 meeting of the Human Behavior and Evolution Society in Palm Springs, California.
The HBES Rising Star Award is presented to outstanding HBES members in the earliest stages of their research careers post-PhD. This designation recognizes researchers whose innovative work has already advanced the field and signals great potential for their continued contributions.
The Don Symons Adaptationism Award was created by the Human Behavior and Evolution Society in honor of UCSB Professor Emeritus, Don Symons. Professor Symons was a founder of the field of evolutionary psychology, starting with his breakout book in 1979, The Evolution of Human Sexuality. He was widely known for his careful use of adapationist thinking, especially when evaluating alternative hypotheses about the adaptive function of a mechanism.
The Don Symons Adaptationism Award is bestowed for the best paper exemplifying the adaptationist program written or published in the last three years. The inaugural award was announced at the 2023 Human Behavior and Evolution Society meeting in Palm Springs, California.
The Human Behavior & Evolution Society will be meeting in Palm Springs, California from May 31 to June 3, 2023.
During this unique event that took place on May 8th at CEP (Centro de Estudios Públicos de Chile), attendees had the opportunity to witness an engaging dialogue between Isabel Behncke and Leda Cosmides. While some participants enjoyed the experience in person, those unable to attend physically could still join the conversation through the live stream on Emol TV. The event focused on the topic of Political Tribes (Evolution and Society), with both experts sharing their knowledge, perspectives, and insights.
The conversation can be seen in Youtube.
