Evolution and Culture: A Fyssen Foundation Symposium

Front Cover  ......Page 1
Title Page  ......Page 4
Copyright  ......Page 5
Contents......Page 6
Series Foreword......Page 8
Acknowledgments......Page 10
Pierre Jaisson......Page 12
Notes......Page 17
The Big Questions......Page 19
Why Did Culture Happen (more or less) Only Once? What Exactly Is the “X-Factor” in Our Lineage?......Page 20
Cognitive Candidates for the X-Factor......Page 29
Some Crucial Properties of Culture—Reminders from an Island Culture......Page 35
An Example: The Culture of Rossel Island, Papua New Guinea......Page 36
System Complexity Without Any Single Designer......Page 38
Multiplicity and Variation......Page 40
Vertical Transmission and Cladistic Character......Page 42
Horizontal Transmission and Cultural Diffusion......Page 43
The Cumulative Nature of Cultural Transmission......Page 45
Cultures Include Functionless or even Deleterious Elements......Page 47
Culture, Group Selection, and the Feedback to Biology......Page 48
Conclusion......Page 51
Notes......Page 54
References......Page 55
I Emergence of Culture in Evolution......Page 61
Mutualism Distinguished from Parasitism......Page 63
What Gives the System New Properties?......Page 66
Mutualism and the Tempo of Evolution......Page 67
References......Page 69
Robert A. Foley......Page 71
Culture and Evolution......Page 72
Was There a Cultural Revolution?......Page 74
What Is the Pattern of Cultural Preconditions Among Earlier Hominins?......Page 78
What Was the “Cultural Status” of Different Hominin Taxa?......Page 84
What Was “Happening” as Cultural Properties Evolved?......Page 87
Conclusions......Page 90
References......Page 91
Cladistics......Page 97
Ancestral Use of Resources......Page 98
A Political Portrait of the Common Ancestor......Page 99
A Hypothesis on Moral Origins......Page 100
A Hypothesis on the First Sanctioning......Page 101
Early Moral Communities......Page 102
An Important Residual Problem......Page 103
Could Social Control Have Affected Selection Mechanics?......Page 104
Effects of the Egalitarian Syndrome......Page 105
What About Direct Competition Between Groups?......Page 111
Further Evidence of Altruism......Page 112
Summary......Page 114
References......Page 115
Robert Boyd and Peter J. Richerson No Consensus on Cooperation......Page 123
Sociobiology Deepens the Puzzle......Page 125
Solutions to the Puzzle......Page 126
The “Heart on Your Sleeve” Hypothesis......Page 127
The “Big Mistake” Hypothesis......Page 128
Manipulation Hypotheses......Page 130
Moralistic Reciprocity Hypotheses......Page 132
Cultural Group Selection......Page 135
Why Group Selection Normally Does Not Work......Page 136
Variation Is Maintained by Moralistic Reciprocity......Page 138
Variation Is Maintained by Conformist Social Learning......Page 140
Is the Model Empirically Plausible?......Page 143
Rates of Change......Page 145
Conclusion......Page 147
References......Page 148
Darwinian Perspectives on Culture......Page 151
Cultural Replicators: A Central or a Peripheral Phenomenon?......Page 155
Notes......Page 161
References......Page 162
Dan Sperber......Page 165
Cognitive Causal Chains......Page 170
Social Cognitive Causal Chains......Page 172
Mental Representations and Public Productions (Including Public Representations)......Page 174
Cultural Cognitive Causal Chains......Page 175
Conclusion......Page 179
References......Page 182
II Brain, Cognition, and Evolution......Page 185
Neural Substrates......Page 187
Cognitive Mechanisms......Page 190
Why Did a Theory of Mind Evolve?......Page 192
References......Page 196
Wolf Singer......Page 199
Triggers of Cultural Evolution......Page 200
Neuronal Prerequisites......Page 201
The Structure of Representations......Page 205
The Signature of Assemblies......Page 208
Behavioral Correlates of Response Synchronization......Page 210
Synchronization and Attention......Page 211
Conclusion and Outlook......Page 215
References......Page 216
Michael Tomasello......Page 221
The Biological Adaptation for Culture Is Uniquely Human......Page 222
Uniquely Human Cognition Is a Historical Phenomenon......Page 224
The Ontogeny of Uniquely Human Cognition......Page 227
Conclusion......Page 232
References......Page 233
Marc D. Hauser The Moral Menu......Page 237
Decisions, Perseveration, and the Brain......Page 238
When Passion Gets in the Way......Page 239
Pure Kuhnian Perseveration......Page 243
Dissecting Perseveration: Kuhnian versus Cartesian Errors......Page 247
Do the Right Thing......Page 252
Helping Another in Pain......Page 253
When to Cooperate......Page 257
How to Do the Right Thing......Page 259
References......Page 260
The Formal Relation Between the Integers and the Reals......Page 265
Evidence for the Ancestral Status of the Real Numbers Other Vertebrates Measure and Remember Uncountable Magnitudes......Page 267
Other Vertebrates Count and Remember Numerosity......Page 269
Adding Numerosities......Page 273
Subtracting Durations and Numerosities......Page 274
Dividing Number by Duration......Page 275
Ordering Numerosities......Page 276
Evidence that Humans Represent Numerosity with Mental Magnitudes Symbolic Size and Distance Effects......Page 277
Nonverbal Counting in Humans......Page 278
Where the Integers Come From......Page 283
The Problem of Exact Equivalence......Page 284
Is There a Discrete Foundation for Integers in the Perception of Small Numerosities?......Page 286
Summary......Page 288
References......Page 289
David Premack and Marc D. Hauser......Page 293
References......Page 296
Contributors......Page 297
Index......Page 299