Evolucionist archaeologies and the horror of theoretical diversity

Abstract

We support that contradictions in debates and polemics between diverse theoretical positions make up the main factor in the development of science. Positions that share evolutionists’ ideas –reacting against the historical-cultural diffusionism–, like the neo-Darwinism and the historical materialism in some of their principal variations, and how they have been studied by anthropological and archaeological researches in Patagonia and Tierra de Fuego, are summarily covered as examples. We conclude encourage theoretical-methodological debates which help us to get over the predominant “paleo-scientist attitude, maintained by a primitive empiricist philosophy, which is the main cause of the backwardnessin in men’s science” (Bunge, 1969: 416), under basic conditions, like democratic practices and scientific ethical and professional integrity.