How to Lose an Argument

Megan McArdle has a longish post up on the Paterno affair in which, as usual, she insists that it's complicated and besides Nazis. One obvious response is if I did what Joe Pa and co did then I would be a moral failure. A second response is that when anybody argues something along the lines of

We are evolved to live in small groups, with very deep loyalty to the other members.

They lose the argument. Why? Because just so stories about evo psych that support your position are the Freidman cab drivers of ignorance. Fear of men with sticks is a much better explanation of failure to act as we know is right; love of men with carrots works as well. Relying on the hand waving of pseudo-science is a sign of intellectual dishonesty.