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A proper framing of "design" in terms of cultural evolution is primarily an academic question, but it also has political implications. https://twitter.com/adam_kranz/status/1271921000695898119
As @Evolving_Moloch summarizes in this article, conservativism has a reasonable claim to having discovered one of the core insights of cultural evolution centuries before it was confirmed by academia: tradition works, and we reject it at our peril. https://areomagazine.com/2018/07/16/cultural-evolution-and-conservative-thought/
I don't find that claim very convincing. It obviously doesn't describe modern "conservativism" at all, and it has some serious theoretical shortcomings. What does this rule of thumb suggest when traditions are mutually exclusive? What if context changes? etc.
The more interesting question is about Hayek's "conservativism" in particular. Hayek was maybe the biggest advocate of the concept of cultural evolution before its modern anthropological incarnation, and used the concept to argue against economic planning.
I've been reading through this great thread @123456789blaaa put together about the overlaps and tensions between the ideas of Hayek and James Scott, who also argued against the perils of planning. https://twitter.com/123456789blaaa/status/1255516072603770881
But whereas Scott believes markets count as "design"--wealthy elites using the state or monopoly power to impose standards, surveillance, and control and erase evolved communal solutions--Hayek counts markets as vehicles of cultural evolution.
The papers extend that debate over where that line should be drawn--some argue regulatory capture makes corporations extensions of the state and thus excludes evolved solutions, others argue that there's less "design" than we think even in megacorps and states
If design is treated as a product and vessel of cultural evolution, though, there is no line. The Hayek-Scott debate becomes an academic question for scholars to parse as they define design as an evolutionary phenomenon.
The debate on planning should be reinterpreted in light of this conclusion. The question is not whether design is "good or bad," but rather: what are the characteristics of situations where design is called for, and how do we make sure solutions are at least safer than inaction?
I know this sort of work is in fact being done in restoration ecology, conservation, and biocontrol now, and I'd guess it's a major thrust of economics and political science too. It's just more boring to talk about because it can't lead to a big victory for any ideology
