Document Type
Article
Publication Date
Spring 2001
Keywords
Evolutionary psychology, Sociobiology, Evolutionary analysis of law
Disciplines
Cognitive Psychology | Law and Society | Legal Theory
Abstract
In recent years, some legal scholars have argued that legal scholarship could benefit from a greater reliance on theories of human behavior that arise from biological evolution. These scholars contend that reliance on biological evolution would successfully combine the rigor of economics with the scientific aspects of psychology. Complex legal systems, however, are uniquely human. Law has always been the product of cognitive processes that are unique to humans and that developed as a response to an environment that no longer exists. Consequently, the evolutionary development of the cognitive mechanisms upon which law depends cannot be rigorously modeled or studied empirically.
Recommended Citation
Rachlinski, Jeffrey J., "Is Evolutionary Analysis of Law Science or Storytelling?" (2001). Cornell Law Faculty Publications. 843.
https://scholarship.law.cornell.edu/facpub/843
Publication Citation
Published in: Jurimetrics, vol. 41, no. 3 (Spring 2001).