On Modeling Cognition and Culture: Why cultural evolution does not require replication of representations
TL;DR: Three formal models are used to show that very low fidelity replication of representations at the individual level does not preclude accurate replication at the population level, and therefore, accurate individual-level replication is not necessary for either cultural inertia or cumulative cultural adaptation.
Abstract: Formal models of cultural evolution analyze how cognitive processes combine with social interaction to generate the distributions and dynamics of 'representations.' Recently, cognitive anthropologists have criticized such models. They make three points: mental representations are non-discrete, cultural transmission is highly inaccurate, and mental representations are not replicated, but rather are 'reconstructed' through an inferential process that is strongly affected by cognitive 'attractors.' They argue that it follows from these three claims that: 1) models that assume replication or replicators are inappropriate, 2) selective cultural learning cannot account for stable traditions, and 3) selective cultural learning cannot generate cumulative adaptation. Here we use three formal models to show that even if the premises of this critique are correct, the deductions that have been drawn from them are false. In the first model, we assume continuously varying representations under the influence of weak selective transmission and strong attractors. We show that if the attractors are sufficiently strong relative to selective forces, the continuous representation model reduces to the standard discrete-trait replicator model, and the weak selective component determines the final equilibrium of the system. In the second model, we assume inaccurate replication and discrete traits. We show that very low fidelity replication of representations at the individual level does not preclude accurate replication at the population level, and therefore, accurate individual-level replication of representations is not necessary for either cultural inertia or cumulative cultural adaptation. In the third model, we derive plausible conditions for cumulative adaptive evolution, assuming continuous cultural representations, incomplete transmission and substantial inferential transformations.
Citations
More filters
TL;DR: It is explained how, in contrast to non-cultural species, the details of the authors' evolved cultural learning capacities create the conditions for the cultural evolution of prosociality, and how natural selection is likely to favor prosocial genes that would not be expected in a purely genetic approach.
Abstract: In constructing improved models of human behavior, both experimental and behavioral economists have increasingly turned to evolutionary theory for insights into human psychology and preferences. Unfortunately, the existing genetic evolutionary approaches can explain neither the degree of prosociality (altruism and altruistic punishment) observed in humans, nor the patterns of variation in these behaviors across different behavioral domains and social groups. Ongoing misunderstandings about why certain models work, what they predict, and what the place is of “group selection” in evolutionary theory have hampered the use of insights from biology and anthropology. This paper clarifies some of these issues and proposes an approach to the evolution of prosociality rooted in the interaction between cultural and genetic transmission. I explain how, in contrast to non-cultural species, the details of our evolved cultural learning capacities (e.g., imitative abilities) create the conditions for the cultural evolution of prosociality. By producing multiple behavioral equilibria, including group-beneficial equilibria, cultural evolution endogenously generates a mechanism of equilibrium selection that can favor prosociality. Finally, in the novel social environments left in the wake of these cultural evolutionary processes, natural selection is likely to favor prosocial genes that would not be expected in a purely genetic approach. © 2003 Published by Elsevier B.V.
954 citations
TL;DR: A combination of archeological and ethnohistorical evidence indicates that, over an approximately 8,000-year period, from the beginning of the Holocene until European explorers began arriving in the eighteenth century, the societies of Tasmania lost a series of valuable skills and technologies as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: A combination of archeological and ethnohistorical evidence indicates that, over an approximately 8,000-year period, from the beginning of the Holocene until European explorers began arriving in the eighteenth century, the societies of Tasmania lost a series of valuable skills and technologies. These likely included bone tools, cold-weather clothing, hafted tools, nets, fishing spears, barbed spears, spear-throwers, and boomerangs. To address this puzzle, and the more general question of how human cognition and social interaction can generate both adaptive cultural evolution and maladaptive losses of culturally acquired skills, this paper constructs a formal model of cultural evolution rooted in the cognitive details of human social learning and inference. The analytical results specify the conditions for differing rates of adaptive cultural evolution, and reveal regimes that will produce maladaptive losses of particular kinds of skills and related technologies. More specifically, the results suggest that the relatively sudden reduction in the effective population size (the size of the interacting pool of social learners) that occurred with the rising ocean levels at the end of the last glacial epoch, which cut Tasmania off from the rest of Australia for the ensuing ten millennia, could have initiated a cultural evolutionary process that (1) kept stable or even improved relatively simple technological skills, and (2) produced an increasing deterioration of more complex skills leading to the complete disappearance of some technologies and practices. This pattern is consistent with the empirical record in Tasmania. Beyond this case, I speculate on the applicability of the model to understanding the variability in rates of adaptive cultural evolution.
841 citations
Cites background from "On Modeling Cognition and Culture: ..."
...It’s also worth noting that the probability of an exact copy is zero—there is no “replication” in this model (cumulative cultural evolution does not require “replicators”: Henrich and Boyd (2002))....
[...]
...…of human minds were perfect, the transmission process would still result in a range of errors because behavioral (phenotypic) displays provide learners with only incomplete information from which to mentally reconstruct the underlying skill, strategies and abilities (Henrich and Boyd 2002)....
[...]
TL;DR: Understanding how and when culturally evolved adaptations arise requires understanding of both the evolution of the psychological mechanisms that underlie human social learning and the evolutionary (population) dynamics of cultural systems.
Abstract: Humans are unique in their range of environments and in the nature and diversity of their behavioral adaptations. While a variety of local genetic adaptations exist within our species, it seems certain that the same basic genetic endowment produces arctic foraging, tropical horticulture, and desert pastoralism, a constellation that represents a greater range of subsistence behavior than the rest of the Primate Order combined. The behavioral adaptations that explain the immense success of our species are cultural in the sense that they are transmitted among individuals by social learning and have accumulated over generations. Understanding how and when such culturally evolved adaptations arise requires understanding of both the evolution of the psychological mechanisms that underlie human social learning and the evolutionary (population) dynamics of cultural systems.
793 citations
TL;DR: It is argued that studying culture within a unifying evolutionary framework has the potential to integrate a number of separate disciplines within the social sciences and to borrow further methods and hypotheses from biology.
Abstract: We suggest that human culture exhibits key Darwinian evolutionary properties, and argue that the structure of a science of cultural evolution should share fundamental features with the structure of the science of biological evolution. This latter claim is tested by outlining the methods and approaches employed by the principal subdisciplines of evolutionary biology and assessing whether there is an existing or potential corresponding approach to the study of cultural evolution. Existing approaches within anthropology and archaeology demonstrate a good match with the macroevolutionary methods of systematics, paleobiology, and biogeography, whereas mathematical models derived from population genetics have been successfully developed to study cultural microevolution. Much potential exists for experimental simulations and field studies of cultural microevolution, where there are opportunities to borrow further methods and hypotheses from biology. Potential also exists for the cultural equivalent of molecular genetics in "social cognitive neuroscience," although many fundamental issues have yet to be resolved. It is argued that studying culture within a unifying evolutionary framework has the potential to integrate a number of separate disciplines within the social sciences.
621 citations
Cites background or methods from "On Modeling Cognition and Culture: ..."
...Even in this case, however, evolutionary models are still applicable (Henrich & Boyd 2002)....
[...]
...…theory of evolution with little understanding of genes or Mendelian inheritance, a theory of cultural evolution likewise does not necessarily have to rest on the existence of memes or particulate cultural transmission, a topical issue but one of great contention (Henrich & Boyd 2002; Aunger 2000b)....
[...]
TL;DR: A computer tournament in which entrants submitted strategies specifying how to use social learning and its asocial alternative (for example, trial-and-error learning) to acquire adaptive behavior in a complex environment found strategies that relied heavily on social learning were found to be remarkably successful, even when asocial information was no more costly than social information.
Abstract: Social learning (learning through observation or interaction with other individuals) is widespread in nature and is central to the remarkable success of humanity, yet it remains unclear why copying is profitable and how to copy most effectively To address these questions, we organized a computer tournament in which entrants submitted strategies specifying how to use social learning and its asocial alternative (for example, trial-and-error learning) to acquire adaptive behavior in a complex environment Most current theory predicts the emergence of mixed strategies that rely on some combination of the two types of learning In the tournament, however, strategies that relied heavily on social learning were found to be remarkably successful, even when asocial information was no more costly than social information Social learning proved advantageous because individuals frequently demonstrated the highest-payoff behavior in their repertoire, inadvertently filtering information for copiers The winning strategy (discountmachine) relied nearly exclusively on social learning and weighted information according to the time since acquisition
572 citations
References
More filters
Book•
01 Jan 1962
TL;DR: A history of diffusion research can be found in this paper, where the authors present a glossary of developments in the field of Diffusion research and discuss the consequences of these developments.
Abstract: Contents Preface CHAPTER 1. ELEMENTS OF DIFFUSION CHAPTER 2. A HISTORY OF DIFFUSION RESEARCH CHAPTER 3. CONTRIBUTIONS AND CRITICISMS OF DIFFUSION RESEARCH CHAPTER 4. THE GENERATION OF INNOVATIONS CHAPTER 5. THE INNOVATION-DECISION PROCESS CHAPTER 6. ATTRIBUTES OF INNOVATIONS AND THEIR RATE OF ADOPTION CHAPTER 7. INNOVATIVENESS AND ADOPTER CATEGORIES CHAPTER 8. DIFFUSION NETWORKS CHAPTER 9. THE CHANGE AGENT CHAPTER 10. INNOVATION IN ORGANIZATIONS CHAPTER 11. CONSEQUENCES OF INNOVATIONS Glossary Bibliography Name Index Subject Index
38,750 citations
TL;DR: Upon returning to the U.S., author Singhal’s Google search revealed the following: in January 2001, the impeachment trial against President Estrada was halted by senators who supported him and the government fell without a shot being fired.
23,419 citations
TL;DR: Using methods developed by population biologists, a theory of cultural evolution is proposed that is an original and fair-minded alternative to the sociobiology debate.
Abstract: How do biological, psychological, sociological, and cultural factors combine to change societies over the long run? Boyd and Richerson explore how genetic and cultural factors interact, under the influence of evolutionary forces, to produce the diversity we see in human cultures. Using methods developed by population biologists, they propose a theory of cultural evolution that is an original and fair-minded alternative to the sociobiology debate.
4,592 citations
"On Modeling Cognition and Culture: ..." refers background or methods in this paper
...Formal models of cultural evolution (e.g. Boyd & Richerson 1985) provide an important tool for understanding cultural phenomena....
[...]
...Empirically, psychological evidence for conformity from pre-1984 studies is summarized in Boyd and Richerson (1985)....
[...]
...…of cultural representations.2 1These scholars use the term “Neo-Darwinian” for such models even when they are explicitly derived from disease epidemiology (Cavalli-Sforza & Feldman 1981:46-53), learning theory (see Boyd & Richerson 1985, Chapter 4), or cognitive psychology (Lumsden & Wilson 1981)....
[...]
...If the mental representations that underlie the success of the best trackers can be accurately copied, the mean tracking success of the population will increase through time (Boyd & Richerson 1985, Ch. 8) because good trackers will leave more cultural ‘descendants.’...
[...]