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Sievers B, Welker C, Hasson U, Kleinbaum AM, Wheatley T. Consensus-building conversation leads to neural alignment. Nat Commun 2024; 15:3936. [PMID: 38729961 PMCID: PMC11087652 DOI: 10.1038/s41467-023-43253-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/04/2020] [Accepted: 11/03/2023] [Indexed: 05/12/2024] Open
Abstract
Conversation is a primary means of social influence, but its effects on brain activity remain unknown. Previous work on conversation and social influence has emphasized public compliance, largely setting private beliefs aside. Here, we show that consensus-building conversation aligns future brain activity within groups, with alignment persisting through novel experiences participants did not discuss. Participants watched ambiguous movie clips during fMRI scanning, then conversed in groups with the goal of coming to a consensus about each clip's narrative. After conversation, participants' brains were scanned while viewing the clips again, along with novel clips from the same movies. Groups that reached consensus showed greater similarity of brain activity after conversation. Participants perceived as having high social status spoke more and signaled disbelief in others, and their groups had unequal turn-taking and lower neural alignment. By contrast, participants with central positions in their real-world social networks encouraged others to speak, facilitating greater group neural alignment. Socially central participants were also more likely to become neurally aligned to others in their groups.
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Affiliation(s)
- Beau Sievers
- Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, 03755, USA.
- Department of Psychology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, 94305, USA.
| | - Christopher Welker
- Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, 03755, USA
| | - Uri Hasson
- Princeton Neuroscience Institute and Department of Psychology, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ, 08544, USA
| | - Adam M Kleinbaum
- Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, 03755, USA
| | - Thalia Wheatley
- Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, 03755, USA
- Santa Fe Institute, Santa Fe, NM, 87501, USA
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2
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Lima M, Gayo EM, Estay SA, Gurruchaga A, Robinson E, Freeman J, Latorre C, Bird D. Positive feedbacks in deep-time transitions of human populations. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2024; 379:20220256. [PMID: 37952621 PMCID: PMC10645116 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2022.0256] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 12/08/2022] [Accepted: 06/07/2023] [Indexed: 11/14/2023] Open
Abstract
Abrupt and rapid changes in human societies are among the most exciting population phenomena. Human populations tend to show rapid expansions from low to high population density along with increased social complexity in just a few generations. Such demographic transitions appear as a remarkable feature of Homo sapiens population dynamics, most likely fuelled by the ability to accumulate cultural/technological innovations that actively modify their environment. We are especially interested in establishing if the demographic transitions of pre-historic populations show the same dynamic signature of the Industrial Revolution transition (a positive relationship between population growth rates and size). Our results show that population growth patterns across different pre-historic societies were similar to those observed during the Industrial Revolution in developed western societies. These features, which appear to have been operating during most of our recent demographic history from hunter-gatherers to modern industrial societies, imply that the dynamics of cooperation underlay sudden population transitions in human societies. This article is part of the theme issue 'Evolution and sustainability: gathering the strands for an Anthropocene synthesis'.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mauricio Lima
- Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, RM 8320000, Chile
- Center of Applied Ecology and Sustainability (CAPES), Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, RM 8320000, Chile
| | - Eugenia M. Gayo
- Center of Applied Ecology and Sustainability (CAPES), Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, RM 8320000, Chile
- Departamento de Geografía, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, RM 8320000, Chile
| | - Sergio A. Estay
- Center of Applied Ecology and Sustainability (CAPES), Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, RM 8320000, Chile
- Instituto de Ciencias Ambientales y Evolutivas, Universidad Austral de Chile, Valdivia 5090000, Chile
| | - Andone Gurruchaga
- Center of Applied Ecology and Sustainability (CAPES), Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, RM 8320000, Chile
| | - Erick Robinson
- School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, 852879, USA
- Native Environment Solutions LLC, Boise, ID, 83250, USA
| | - Jacob Freeman
- Anthropology Program, Utah State University, Logan, UT, 84322, USA
- The Ecology Center, Utah State University, Logan, UT, 84322, USA
| | - Claudio Latorre
- Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, RM 8320000, Chile
| | - Darcy Bird
- Department of Anthropology, Washington State University, Pullman, 99164, USA
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3
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Ellis EC. The Anthropocene condition: evolving through social-ecological transformations. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2024; 379:20220255. [PMID: 37952626 PMCID: PMC10645118 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2022.0255] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 02/28/2023] [Accepted: 09/13/2023] [Indexed: 11/14/2023] Open
Abstract
Anthropogenic planetary disruptions, from climate change to biodiversity loss, are unprecedented challenges for human societies. Some societies, social groups, cultural practices, technologies and institutions are already disintegrating or disappearing as a result. However, this coupling of socially produced environmental challenges with disruptive social changes-the Anthropocene condition-is not new. From food-producing hunter-gatherers, to farmers, to urban industrial food systems, the current planetary entanglement has its roots in millennia of evolving and accumulating sociocultural capabilities for shaping the cultured environments that our societies have always lived in (sociocultural niche construction). When these transformative capabilities to shape environments are coupled with sociocultural adaptations enabling societies to more effectively shape and live in transformed environments, the social-ecological scales and intensities of these transformations can accelerate through a positive feedback loop of 'runaway sociocultural niche construction'. Efforts to achieve a better future for both people and planet will depend on guiding this runaway evolutionary process towards better outcomes by redirecting Earth's most disruptive force of nature: the power of human aspirations. To guide this unprecedented planetary force, cultural narratives that appeal to human aspirations for a better future will be more effective than narratives of environmental crisis and overstepping natural boundaries. This article is part of the theme issue 'Evolution and sustainability: gathering the strands for an Anthropocene synthesis'.
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Affiliation(s)
- Erle C. Ellis
- Department of Geography & Environmental Systems, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Baltimore, MD 21250, USA
- Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford, 34 Broad St, Oxford OX1 3BD, UK
- Leverhulme Centre for Nature Recovery, Environmental Change Institute, School of Geography & Environment, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3QY, UK
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4
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Lamm E, Finkel M, Kolodny O. Human major transitions from the perspective of distributed adaptations. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2023; 378:20210401. [PMID: 36688390 PMCID: PMC9869454 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2021.0401] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/24/2023] Open
Abstract
Distributed adaptations are cases in which adaptation is dependent on the population as a whole: the adaptation is conferred by a structural or compositional aspect of the population; the adaptively relevant information cannot be reduced to information possessed by a single individual. Possible examples of human-distributed adaptations are song lines, traditions, trail systems, game drive lanes and systems of water collection and irrigation. Here we discuss the possible role of distributed adaptations in human cultural macro-evolution. Several kinds of human-distributed adaptations are presented, and their evolutionary implications are highlighted. In particular, we discuss the implications of population size, density and bottlenecks on the distributed adaptations that a population may possess and how they in turn would affect the population's resilience to ecological change. We discuss the implications that distributed adaptations may have for human collective action and the possibility that they played a role in colonization of new areas and niches, in seasonal migration, and in setting constraints for minimal inter-population connectivity. This article is part of the theme issue 'Human socio-cultural evolution in light of evolutionary transitions'.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ehud Lamm
- The Cohn Institute for History and Philosophy of Science and Ideas, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 69978, Israel
| | - Meir Finkel
- The Cohn Institute for History and Philosophy of Science and Ideas, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 69978, Israel
| | - Oren Kolodny
- Department of Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior, Institute for Life Sciences, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem 9190401, Israel
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5
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Cowley SJ, Gahrn-Andersen R. How systemic cognition enables epistemic engineering. Front Artif Intell 2023; 5:960384. [PMID: 36825254 PMCID: PMC9941702 DOI: 10.3389/frai.2022.960384] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/02/2022] [Accepted: 12/30/2022] [Indexed: 02/09/2023] Open
Abstract
Epistemic engineering arises as systems and their parts develop functionality that is construed as valid knowledge. By hypothesis, epistemic engineering is a basic evolutionary principle. It ensures that not only living systems identify the differences that make differences but also ensure that distributed control enables them to construct epistemic change. In tracking such outcomes in human life, we stress that humans act within poly-centered, distributed systems. Similar to how people can act as inert parts of a system, they also actively bring forth intents and vicariant effects. Human cognitive agents use the systemic function to construct epistemic novelties. In the illustration, we used a published experimental study of a cyborg cockroach to consider how an evoneered system enables a human subject to perform as an adaptor with some "thought control" over the animal. Within a wide system, brains enable the techniques to arise ex novo as they attune to the dictates of a device. Human parts act as adaptors that simplify the task. In scaling up, we turn to a case of organizational cognition. We track how adaptor functions spread when drone-based data are brought to the maintenance department of a Danish utility company. While pivoting on how system operators combine experience with the use of software, their expertise sets off epistemically engineered results across the company and beyond. Vicariant effects emerge under the poly-centered control of brains, persons, equipment, and institutional wholes. As a part of culture, epistemic engineering works by reducing entropy.
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Affiliation(s)
- Stephen J. Cowley
- Department of Language and Communication, University of Southern Denmark, Slagelse, Denmark
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6
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Watsjold BK, Ilgen JS, Regehr G. An Ecological Account of Clinical Reasoning. ACADEMIC MEDICINE : JOURNAL OF THE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICAN MEDICAL COLLEGES 2022; 97:S80-S86. [PMID: 35947479 DOI: 10.1097/acm.0000000000004899] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/15/2023]
Abstract
PURPOSE The prevailing paradigms of clinical reasoning conceptualize context either as noise that masks, or as external factors that influence, the internal cognitive processes involved in reasoning. The authors reimagined clinical reasoning through the lens of ecological psychology to enable new ways of understanding context-specific manifestations of clinical performance and expertise, and the bidirectional ways in which individuals and their environments interact. METHOD The authors performed a critical review of foundational and current literature from the field of ecological psychology to explore the concepts of clinical reasoning and context as presented in the health professions education literature. RESULTS Ecological psychology offers several concepts to explore the relationship between an individual and their context, including affordance, effectivity, environment, and niche. Clinical reasoning may be framed as an emergent phenomenon of the interactions between a clinician's effectivities and the affordances in the clinical environment. Practice niches are the outcomes of historical efforts to optimize practice and are both specialty-specific and geographically diverse. CONCLUSIONS In this framework, context specificity may be understood as fundamental to clinical reasoning. This changes the authors' understanding of expertise, expert decision making, and definition of clinical error, as they depend on both the expert's actions and the context in which they acted. Training models incorporating effectivities and affordances might allow for antiableist formulations of competence that apply learners' abilities to solving problems in context. This could offer both new means of training and improve access to training for learners of varying abilities. Rural training programs and distance education can leverage technology to provide comparable experience to remote audiences but may benefit from additional efforts to integrate learners into local practice niches.
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Affiliation(s)
- Bjorn K Watsjold
- B.K. Watsjold is assistant professor, Department of Emergency Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, Washington; ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4888-8857
| | - Jonathan S Ilgen
- J.S. Ilgen is professor, Department of Emergency Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, Washington; ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4590-6570
| | - Glenn Regehr
- G. Regehr is professor, Department of Surgery, and senior scientist, Centre for Health Education Scholarship, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada; ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3144-331X
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7
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Mastrogiorgio A, Felin T, Kauffman S, Mastrogiorgio M. More Thumbs Than Rules: Is Rationality an Exaptation? Front Psychol 2022; 13:805743. [PMID: 35282257 PMCID: PMC8912947 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2022.805743] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/30/2021] [Accepted: 01/03/2022] [Indexed: 01/12/2023] Open
Abstract
The literatures on bounded and ecological rationality are built on adaptationism-and its associated modular, cognitivist and computational paradigm-that does not address or explain the evolutionary origins of rationality. We argue that the adaptive mechanisms of evolution are not sufficient for explaining human rationality, and we posit that human rationality presents exaptive origins, where exaptations are traits evolved for other functions or no function at all, and later co-opted for new uses. We propose an embodied reconceptualization of rationality-embodied rationality-based on the reuse of the perception-action system, where many neural processes involved in the control of the sensory-motor system, salient in ancestral environments have been later co-opted to create-by tinkering-high-level reasoning processes, employed in civilized niches.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Teppo Felin
- Huntsman School of Business, Utah State University, Logan, UT, United States.,Saïd Business School, University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom
| | - Stuart Kauffman
- Institute for Systems Biology (ISB), Seattle, WA, United States
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8
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Greif H. Adaptation and its analogues: Biological categories for biosemantics. STUDIES IN HISTORY AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE 2021; 90:298-307. [PMID: 34794099 DOI: 10.1016/j.shpsa.2021.10.016] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/03/2021] [Revised: 08/22/2021] [Accepted: 10/26/2021] [Indexed: 06/13/2023]
Abstract
"Teleosemantic" or "biosemantic" theories form a strong naturalistic programme in the philosophy of mind and language. They seek to explain the nature of mind and language by recourse to a natural history of "proper functions" as selected-for effects of language- and thought-producing mechanisms. However, they remain vague with respect to the nature of the proposed analogy between selected-for effects on the biological level and phenomena that are not strictly biological, such as reproducible linguistic and cultural forms. This essay critically explores various interpretations of this analogy. It suggests that these interpretations can be explicated by contrasting adaptationist with pluralist readings of the evolutionary concept of adaptation. Among the possible interpretations of the relations between biological adaptations and their analogues in language and culture, the two most relevant are a linear, hierarchical, signalling-based model that takes its cues from the evolution of co-operation and joint intentionality and a mutualistic, pluralist model that takes its cues from mimesis and symbolism in the evolution of human communication. Arguing for the merits of the mutualistic model, the present analysis indicates a path towards an evolutionary pluralist version of biosemantics that will align with theories of cognition as being environmentally "scaffolded". Language and other cultural forms are partly independent reproducible structures that acquire proper functions of their own while being integrated with organism-based cognitive traits in co-evolutionary fashion.
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Affiliation(s)
- Hajo Greif
- Warsaw University of Technology, Faculty of Administration and Social Sciences, Plac Politechniki 1, 00-661 Warsaw, Poland.
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9
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Abstract
Creativity generates novel solutions to tasks by processing information. Imagination and mental representations are part of the creative process; we can mull over ideas of our own making, and construct algorithms or scenarios from them. Social scenario-building can be viewed as a human cognitive "super-power" that involves abstraction, meta-representation, time-travel, and directed imaginative thought. We humans have a "theater in our minds" to play out a near-infinite array of social strategies and contingencies. Here we propose an integrative model for why and how humans evolved extraordinary creative abilities. We posit that a key aspect of hominin evolution involved relatively open and fluid social relationships among communities, enabled by a unique extended family structure similar to that of contemporary hunter-gatherer band societies. Intercommunity relationships facilitated the rapid flow of information-"Culture"-that underpinned arms-races in information processing, language, imagination, and creativity that distinguishes humans from other species.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mark V. Flinn
- Department of Anthropology, Baylor University, Waco, TX, United States
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10
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Rodríguez Arce JM, Winkelman MJ. Psychedelics, Sociality, and Human Evolution. Front Psychol 2021; 12:729425. [PMID: 34659037 PMCID: PMC8514078 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.729425] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/23/2021] [Accepted: 09/06/2021] [Indexed: 12/20/2022] Open
Abstract
Our hominin ancestors inevitably encountered and likely ingested psychedelic mushrooms throughout their evolutionary history. This assertion is supported by current understanding of: early hominins' paleodiet and paleoecology; primate phylogeny of mycophagical and self-medicative behaviors; and the biogeography of psilocybin-containing fungi. These lines of evidence indicate mushrooms (including bioactive species) have been a relevant resource since the Pliocene, when hominins intensified exploitation of forest floor foods. Psilocybin and similar psychedelics that primarily target the serotonin 2A receptor subtype stimulate an active coping strategy response that may provide an enhanced capacity for adaptive changes through a flexible and associative mode of cognition. Such psychedelics also alter emotional processing, self-regulation, and social behavior, often having enduring effects on individual and group well-being and sociality. A homeostatic and drug instrumentalization perspective suggests that incidental inclusion of psychedelics in the diet of hominins, and their eventual addition to rituals and institutions of early humans could have conferred selective advantages. Hominin evolution occurred in an ever-changing, and at times quickly changing, environmental landscape and entailed advancement into a socio-cognitive niche, i.e., the development of a socially interdependent lifeway based on reasoning, cooperative communication, and social learning. In this context, psychedelics' effects in enhancing sociality, imagination, eloquence, and suggestibility may have increased adaptability and fitness. We present interdisciplinary evidence for a model of psychedelic instrumentalization focused on four interrelated instrumentalization goals: management of psychological distress and treatment of health problems; enhanced social interaction and interpersonal relations; facilitation of collective ritual and religious activities; and enhanced group decision-making. The socio-cognitive niche was simultaneously a selection pressure and an adaptive response, and was partially constructed by hominins through their activities and their choices. Therefore, the evolutionary scenario put forward suggests that integration of psilocybin into ancient diet, communal practice, and proto-religious activity may have enhanced hominin response to the socio-cognitive niche, while also aiding in its creation. In particular, the interpersonal and prosocial effects of psilocybin may have mediated the expansion of social bonding mechanisms such as laughter, music, storytelling, and religion, imposing a systematic bias on the selective environment that favored selection for prosociality in our lineage.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Michael James Winkelman
- School of Human Evolution and Social Change, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, United States
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11
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Stiner MC. The challenges of documenting coevolution and niche construction: The example of domestic spaces. Evol Anthropol 2021; 30:63-70. [PMID: 33382521 DOI: 10.1002/evan.21878] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/16/2019] [Revised: 03/09/2020] [Accepted: 11/24/2020] [Indexed: 11/12/2022]
Abstract
This essay delves into some of the challenges of studying the coevolution of humans and domestic spaces. These constructed arenas center on food preparation, and as part of the heritable niche they can shift the opportunities for, and constraints on, social interaction and cooperation in evolutionary time. Domestic spaces are widely evidenced in the archeological record, but investigators have made little progress in demonstrating causal links between proposed feedback spirals and constructed spaces of any sort. Bridging fine-scale and large-scale processes in coevolutionary systems is a complex problem that must engage higher levels of generative evolutionary theory. Archaeology nonetheless stands to offer a great deal to larger research programs by documenting and analyzing the pathways of change based on site formation processes along with evidence from subsistence refuse and technology. Choice models remain valuable tools for investigating aspects of the fine-scale feedback processes involved.
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Affiliation(s)
- Mary C Stiner
- School of Anthropology, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, USA
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12
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Mallory F. In Defence of a Reciprocal Turing Test. Minds Mach (Dordr) 2020. [DOI: 10.1007/s11023-020-09552-5] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/22/2022]
Abstract
AbstractThe traditional Turing test appeals to an interrogator's judgement to determine whether or not their interlocutor is an intelligent agent. This paper argues that this kind of asymmetric experimental set-up is inappropriate for tracking a property such as intelligence because intelligence is grounded in part by symmetric relations of recognition between agents. In place, it proposes a reciprocal test which takes into account the judgments of both interrogators and competitors to determine if an agent is intelligent. This form of social interaction better tracks both the evolution of natural intelligence and how the concept of intelligence is actually used within our society. This new test is defended against the criticisms that a proof of intelligence requires a demonstration of self-consciousness and that semantic externalism entails that a non-embodied Turing test is inadequate.
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13
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Bond MO, Gaoue OG. Prestige and homophily predict network structure for social learning of medicinal plant knowledge. PLoS One 2020; 15:e0239345. [PMID: 33031437 PMCID: PMC7544085 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0239345] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/23/2020] [Accepted: 09/04/2020] [Indexed: 12/03/2022] Open
Abstract
Human subsistence societies have thrived in environmental extremes while maintaining biodiversity through social learning of ecological knowledge, such as techniques to prepare food and medicine from local resources. However, there is limited understanding of which processes shape social learning patterns and configuration in ecological knowledge networks, or how these processes apply to resource management and biological conservation. In this study, we test the hypothesis that the prestige (rarity or exclusivity) of knowledge shapes social learning networks. In addition, we test whether people tend to select who to learn from based on prestige (knowledge or reputation), and homophily (e.g., people of the same age or gender). We used interviews to assess five types of medicinal plant knowledge and how 303 people share this knowledge across four villages in Solomon Islands. We developed exponential random graph models (ERGMs) to test whether hypothesized patterns of knowledge sharing based on prestige and homophily are more common in the observed network than in randomly simulated networks of the same size. We found that prestige predicts five hypothesized network configurations and all three hypothesized learning patterns, while homophily predicts one of three hypothesized network configurations and five of the seven hypothesized learning patterns. These results compare the strength of different prestige and homophily effects on social learning and show how cultural practices such as intermarriage can affect certain aspects of prestige and homophily. By advancing our understanding of how prestige and homophily affect ecological knowledge networks, we identify which social learning patterns have the largest effects on biocultural conservation of ecological knowledge.
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Affiliation(s)
- Matthew O. Bond
- Department of Botany, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, Honolulu, Hawai‘i, United States of America
| | - Orou G. Gaoue
- Department of Botany, University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, Honolulu, Hawai‘i, United States of America
- Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Tennessee at Knoxville, Knoxville, Tennessee, United States of America
- Faculty of Agronomy, University of Parakou, Parakou, Benin
- Department of Geography, Environmental Management and Energy Studies, University of Johannesburg, APK Campus, Johannesburg, South Africa
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14
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Abstract
The target article "Thinking Through Other Minds" (TTOM) offered an account of the distinctively human capacity to acquire cultural knowledge, norms, and practices. To this end, we leveraged recent ideas from theoretical neurobiology to understand the human mind in social and cultural contexts. Our aim was both synthetic - building an integrative model adequate to account for key features of cultural learning and adaptation; and prescriptive - showing how the tools developed to explain brain dynamics can be applied to the emergence of social and cultural ecologies of mind. In this reply to commentators, we address key issues, including: (1) refining the concept of culture to show how TTOM and the free-energy principle (FEP) can capture essential elements of human adaptation and functioning; (2) addressing cognition as an embodied, enactive, affective process involving cultural affordances; (3) clarifying the significance of the FEP formalism related to entropy minimization, Bayesian inference, Markov blankets, and enactivist views; (4) developing empirical tests and applications of the TTOM model; (5) incorporating cultural diversity and context at the level of intra-cultural variation, individual differences, and the transition to digital niches; and (6) considering some implications for psychiatry. The commentators' critiques and suggestions point to useful refinements and applications of the model. In ongoing collaborations, we are exploring how to augment the theory with affective valence, take into account individual differences and historicity, and apply the model to specific domains including epistemic bias.
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15
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Del Savio L, Mameli M. Human domestication and the roles of human agency in human evolution. HISTORY AND PHILOSOPHY OF THE LIFE SCIENCES 2020; 42:21. [PMID: 32458082 PMCID: PMC7250791 DOI: 10.1007/s40656-020-00315-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/04/2019] [Accepted: 05/08/2020] [Indexed: 05/09/2023]
Abstract
Are humans a domesticated species? How is this issue related to debates on the roles of human agency in human evolution? This article discusses four views on human domestication: (1) Darwin's view; (2) the view of those who link human domestication to anthropogenic niche construction and, more specifically, to sedentism; (3) the view of those who link human domestication to selection against aggression and the domestication syndrome; and (4) a novel view according to which human domestication can be conceived of in terms of a process of political selection. The article examines and compares these views to illustrate how discussions of human domestication can contribute to debates about how, and to what extent, human agency has affected human evolution.
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Affiliation(s)
| | - Matteo Mameli
- Department of Philosophy, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
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16
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Claessens S, Fischer K, Chaudhuri A, Sibley CG, Atkinson QD. The dual evolutionary foundations of political ideology. Nat Hum Behav 2020; 4:336-345. [PMID: 32231279 DOI: 10.1038/s41562-020-0850-9] [Citation(s) in RCA: 41] [Impact Index Per Article: 10.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/17/2019] [Accepted: 03/03/2020] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Abstract
Research over the last fifty years has suggested that political attitudes and values around the globe are shaped by two ideological dimensions, often referred to as economic and social conservatism. However, it remains unclear why this ideological structure exists. Here we highlight the striking concordance between these dual dimensions of ideology and independent convergent evidence for two key shifts in the evolution of human group living. First, humans began to cooperate more and across wider interdependent networks. Second, humans became more group-minded, conforming to social norms in culturally marked groups and punishing norm-violators. We propose that fitness trade-offs and behavioural plasticity have maintained functional variation in willingness to cooperate and conform within modern human groups, naturally giving rise to the two dimensions of political ideology. Supported by evidence from across the behavioural sciences, this evolutionary framework provides insight into the biological and cultural basis of political ideology.
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Affiliation(s)
- Scott Claessens
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Kyle Fischer
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Ananish Chaudhuri
- Department of Economics, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand.,CESifo, Munich, Germany
| | - Chris G Sibley
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Quentin D Atkinson
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand. .,Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena, Germany.
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Kivinen O, Piiroinen T. Evolutionary understanding of the human mind and learning – in accordance with transactional naturalism and methodological relationalism. Phys Life Rev 2019; 31:32-43. [DOI: 10.1016/j.plrev.2018.12.005] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/16/2018] [Revised: 10/02/2018] [Accepted: 12/27/2018] [Indexed: 10/26/2022]
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18
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Constant A, Ramstead MJD, Veissière SPL, Campbell JO, Friston KJ. A variational approach to niche construction. J R Soc Interface 2019; 15:rsif.2017.0685. [PMID: 29643221 PMCID: PMC5938575 DOI: 10.1098/rsif.2017.0685] [Citation(s) in RCA: 67] [Impact Index Per Article: 13.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/20/2017] [Accepted: 03/19/2018] [Indexed: 12/16/2022] Open
Abstract
In evolutionary biology, niche construction is sometimes described as a genuine evolutionary process whereby organisms, through their activities and regulatory mechanisms, modify their environment such as to steer their own evolutionary trajectory, and that of other species. There is ongoing debate, however, on the extent to which niche construction ought to be considered a bona fide evolutionary force, on a par with natural selection. Recent formulations of the variational free-energy principle as applied to the life sciences describe the properties of living systems, and their selection in evolution, in terms of variational inference. We argue that niche construction can be described using a variational approach. We propose new arguments to support the niche construction perspective, and to extend the variational approach to niche construction to current perspectives in various scientific fields.
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Affiliation(s)
- Axel Constant
- Laboratory of Experimental Psychology, Brain and Cognition Unit, KU Leuven, 3000 Leuven, Belgium .,Institute of Philosophy, KU Leuven, 3000 Leuven, Belgium.,Amsterdam Brain and Cognition Center, University of Amsterdam, Science Park 904, 1098 XH Amsterdam, The Netherlands
| | - Maxwell J D Ramstead
- Department of Philosophy, McGill University, 855 Sherbrooke Street West, H3A 2T7, Montreal, QC, Canada.,Division of Social and Transcultural Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, McGill University, 1033 Pine Avenue, Montreal, QC, Canada
| | - Samuel P L Veissière
- Division of Social and Transcultural Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, McGill University, 1033 Pine Avenue, Montreal, QC, Canada.,Department of Anthropology, McGill University, 855 Sherbrooke Street West, H3A 2T7, Montreal, QC, Canada
| | | | - Karl J Friston
- Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging, University College London, 12 Queen Square, London, WC1N 3BG, UK
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19
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Zeder MA. Why evolutionary biology needs anthropology: Evaluating core assumptions of the extended evolutionary synthesis. Evol Anthropol 2018; 27:267-284. [DOI: 10.1002/evan.21747] [Citation(s) in RCA: 35] [Impact Index Per Article: 5.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/26/2018] [Revised: 06/12/2018] [Accepted: 08/17/2018] [Indexed: 01/08/2023]
Affiliation(s)
- Melinda A. Zeder
- Department of AnthropologyNational Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution Washington District of Columbia
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Colino-Rabanal VJ, Rodríguez-Díaz R, Blanco-Villegas MJ, Peris SJ, Lizana M. Human and ecological determinants of the spatial structure of local breed diversity. Sci Rep 2018; 8:6452. [PMID: 29691460 PMCID: PMC5915451 DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-24641-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 11] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/22/2017] [Accepted: 03/26/2018] [Indexed: 02/01/2023] Open
Abstract
Since domestication, a large number of livestock breeds adapted to local conditions have been created by natural and artificial selection, representing one of the most powerful ways in which human groups have constructed niches to meet their need. Although many authors have described local breeds as the result of culturally and environmentally mediated processes, this study, located in mainland Spain, is the first aimed at identifying and quantifying the environmental and human contributions to the spatial structure of local breed diversity, which we refer to as livestock niche. We found that the more similar two provinces were in terms of human population, ecological characteristics, historical ties, and geographic distance, the more similar the composition of local breeds in their territories. Isolation by human population distance showed the strongest effect, followed by isolation by the environment, thus supporting the view of livestock niche as a socio-cultural product adapted to the local environment, in whose construction humans make good use of their ecological and cultural inheritances. These findings provide a useful framework to understand and to envisage the effects of climate change and globalization on local breeds and their livestock niches.
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Affiliation(s)
- Victor J Colino-Rabanal
- Area of Zoology, Department of Animal Biology, Parasitology, Ecology, Edaphology and Agronomic Chemistry, University of Salamanca, Campus Miguel de Unamuno, 37071, Salamanca, Spain.
| | - Roberto Rodríguez-Díaz
- Area of Physical Anthropology, Department of Animal Biology, Parasitology, Ecology, Edaphology and Agronomic Chemistry, University of Salamanca, Campus Miguel de Unamuno, 37071, Salamanca, Spain
| | - María José Blanco-Villegas
- Area of Physical Anthropology, Department of Animal Biology, Parasitology, Ecology, Edaphology and Agronomic Chemistry, University of Salamanca, Campus Miguel de Unamuno, 37071, Salamanca, Spain
| | - Salvador J Peris
- Area of Zoology, Department of Animal Biology, Parasitology, Ecology, Edaphology and Agronomic Chemistry, University of Salamanca, Campus Miguel de Unamuno, 37071, Salamanca, Spain
| | - Miguel Lizana
- Area of Zoology, Department of Animal Biology, Parasitology, Ecology, Edaphology and Agronomic Chemistry, University of Salamanca, Campus Miguel de Unamuno, 37071, Salamanca, Spain
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Heras-Escribano M, De Pinedo-García M. Affordances and Landscapes: Overcoming the Nature-Culture Dichotomy through Niche Construction Theory. Front Psychol 2018; 8:2294. [PMID: 29375426 PMCID: PMC5767241 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2017.02294] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/13/2017] [Accepted: 12/18/2017] [Indexed: 12/01/2022] Open
Abstract
In this paper we reject the nature-culture dichotomy by means of the idea of affordance or possibility for action, which has important implications for landscape theory. Our hypothesis is that, just as the idea of affordance can serve to overcome the subjective-objective dichotomy, the ideas of landscape and ecological niche, properly defined, would allow us to also transcend the nature-culture dichotomy. First, we introduce an overview of landscape theory, emphasizing processual landscape theory as the most suitable approach for satisfying both cultural and naturalist approaches. After that, we introduce the idea of affordance and we analyze a tension between sociocultural and transcultural affordances (affordances that depend on cultural conventions and affordances that depend on lawful information and bodily aspects of agents). This tension has various implications for landscape theory and ecological niches. Our proposal is that sociocultural and transcultural aspects of affordances could be systematically accommodated if we apply niche construction theory (the theory that explains the process by which organisms modify their selective environments) as a methodological framework for explaining the emergence of ecological niches. This approach will lead us to an integrative account of landscapes as the products of the interaction between human and environmental elements, making it a clear example of a concept that transcends the nature-culture dichotomy.
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Kivinen O, Piiroinen T. The evolution ofHomo Discens: natural selection and human learning. JOURNAL FOR THE THEORY OF SOCIAL BEHAVIOUR 2018. [DOI: 10.1111/jtsb.12157] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/15/2023]
Affiliation(s)
- Osmo Kivinen
- Research Unit for the Sociology of Education, RUSE; University of Turku; Finland
| | - Tero Piiroinen
- Research Unit for the Sociology of Education, RUSE; University of Turku; Finland
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Abstract
Accumulating evidence has made clear that experience-the knowledge an individual acquires during a lifetime of sensing and acting-is of fundamental biological relevance. Experience makes an impact on all adaptive systems, including the endocrine, immune, and nerve systems, and is of the essence, not only for the unfolding of an organisms' healthy status, but also for the development of malfunctional traits. Nevertheless, experience is often excluded from empirical approaches. A variety of complex interactions that influence life histories are thereby neglected. Such ignorance is especially detrimental for psychoneuroimmunology, the science that seeks to understand how the exquisite and dynamic interplay between mind, body, and environment relates to behavioral characteristics. This chapter reviews claims for incorporating experience as a member of good explanatory standing in biology and medicine, and more specifically claims that experiential knowledge is required to enable meaningful and relevant explanations and predictions in the psychoneuroimmunological realm.
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Affiliation(s)
- Elling Ulvestad
- Department of Microbiology, Haukeland University Hospital, Department of Clinical Science, University of Bergen, Bergen, Norway.
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24
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Brosnan SF, Postma E. Humans as a model for understanding biological fundamentals. Proc Biol Sci 2017; 284:rspb.2017.2146. [PMID: 29237858 DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2017.2146] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/26/2017] [Accepted: 10/30/2017] [Indexed: 12/15/2022] Open
Abstract
How special are humans? This question drives scholarly output across both the sciences and the humanities. Whereas some disciplines, and the humanities in particular, aim at gaining a better understanding of humans per se, most biologists ultimately aim to understand life in general. This raises the question of whether and when humans are acceptable, or even desirable, models of biological fundamentals. Especially for basic biological processes, non-human species are generally accepted as a relevant model to study topics for which studying humans is impractical, impossible, or ethically inadvisable, but the reverse is controversial: are humans 'too unique' to be informative with respect to biological fundamentals relevant to other species? Or are there areas where we share key components, or for which our very uniqueness serves to allow novel explorations? In this special feature, authors from disciplines including biology, psychology, anthropology, neuroscience and philosophy tackle this question. Their overall conclusion is a qualified yes: humans do tell us about biological fundamentals, in some contexts. We hope this special feature will spur a discussion that will lead to a more careful delineation of the similarities and the differences between humans and other species, and how these impact the study of biological fundamentals.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sarah F Brosnan
- Departments of Psychology, Philosophy and Neuroscience, Center for Behavioral Neuroscience, Language Research Center, Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA, USA
| | - Erik Postma
- Centre for Ecology and Conservation, College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Cornwall Campus, Penryn TR10 9FE, UK
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A qualitative analysis of social intelligence in nonprofit organizations: external knowledge acquisition for human capital development, organizational learning and innovation. KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT RESEARCH & PRACTICE 2017. [DOI: 10.1057/kmrp.2013.63] [Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/21/2022]
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Abstract
One of the challenges in evaluating arguments for extending the conceptual framework of evolutionary biology involves the identification of a tractable model system that allows for an assessment of the core assumptions of the extended evolutionary synthesis (EES). The domestication of plants and animals by humans provides one such case study opportunity. Here, I consider domestication as a model system for exploring major tenets of the EES. First I discuss the novel insights that niche construction theory (NCT, one of the pillars of the EES) provides into the domestication processes, particularly as they relate to five key areas: coevolution, evolvability, ecological inheritance, cooperation and the pace of evolutionary change. This discussion is next used to frame testable predictions about initial domestication of plants and animals that contrast with those grounded in standard evolutionary theory, demonstrating how these predictions might be tested in multiple regions where initial domestication took place. I then turn to a broader consideration of how domestication provides a model case study consideration of the different ways in which the core assumptions of the EES strengthen and expand our understanding of evolution, including reciprocal causation, developmental processes as drivers of evolutionary change, inclusive inheritance, and the tempo and rate of evolutionary change.
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Affiliation(s)
- Melinda A. Zeder
- Program in Human Ecology and Archaeobiology, Department of Anthropology, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, 10th and Constitution, Washington, DC 20560, USA
- Santa Fe Institute, 1399 Hyde Park Road, Santa Fe, NM 87501, USA
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Teaching and Learning in the Pleistocene: A Biocultural Account of Human Pedagogy and Its Implications for AIED. INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE IN EDUCATION 2017. [DOI: 10.1007/s40593-017-0153-0] [Citation(s) in RCA: 1] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 09/29/2022]
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Ulber J, Hamann K, Tomasello M. Young children, but not chimpanzees, are averse to disadvantageous and advantageous inequities. J Exp Child Psychol 2017; 155:48-66. [DOI: 10.1016/j.jecp.2016.10.013] [Citation(s) in RCA: 34] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/29/2016] [Revised: 10/31/2016] [Accepted: 10/31/2016] [Indexed: 11/30/2022]
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Ramstead MJD, Veissière SPL, Kirmayer LJ. Cultural Affordances: Scaffolding Local Worlds Through Shared Intentionality and Regimes of Attention. Front Psychol 2016; 7:1090. [PMID: 27507953 PMCID: PMC4960915 DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2016.01090] [Citation(s) in RCA: 100] [Impact Index Per Article: 12.5] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/27/2016] [Accepted: 07/05/2016] [Indexed: 11/13/2022] Open
Abstract
In this paper we outline a framework for the study of the mechanisms involved in the engagement of human agents with cultural affordances. Our aim is to better understand how culture and context interact with human biology to shape human behavior, cognition, and experience. We attempt to integrate several related approaches in the study of the embodied, cognitive, and affective substrates of sociality and culture and the sociocultural scaffolding of experience. The integrative framework we propose bridges cognitive and social sciences to provide (i) an expanded concept of ‘affordance’ that extends to sociocultural forms of life, and (ii) a multilevel account of the socioculturally scaffolded forms of affordance learning and the transmission of affordances in patterned sociocultural practices and regimes of shared attention. This framework provides an account of how cultural content and normative practices are built on a foundation of contentless basic mental processes that acquire content through immersive participation of the agent in social practices that regulate joint attention and shared intentionality.
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Affiliation(s)
- Maxwell J D Ramstead
- Department of Philosophy, McGill University, Montreal, QCCanada; Division of Social and Transcultural Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, McGill University, Montreal, QCCanada
| | - Samuel P L Veissière
- Division of Social and Transcultural Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, McGill University, Montreal, QCCanada; Department of Anthropology, McGill University, Montreal, QCCanada; Raz Lab in Cognitive Neuroscience, McGill University, Montreal, QCCanada; Department of Communication and Media Studies, Faculty of Humanities, University of JohannesburgJohannesburg, South Africa
| | - Laurence J Kirmayer
- Division of Social and Transcultural Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry, McGill University, Montreal, QC Canada
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Padmanabha H, Correa F, Rubio C, Baeza A, Osorio S, Mendez J, Jones JH, Diuk-Wasser MA. Human Social Behavior and Demography Drive Patterns of Fine-Scale Dengue Transmission in Endemic Areas of Colombia. PLoS One 2015; 10:e0144451. [PMID: 26656072 PMCID: PMC4684369 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0144451] [Citation(s) in RCA: 14] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 05/26/2015] [Accepted: 11/18/2015] [Indexed: 01/09/2023] Open
Abstract
Dengue is known to transmit between humans and A. aegypti mosquitoes living in neighboring houses. Although transmission is thought to be highly heterogeneous in both space and time, little is known about the patterns and drivers of transmission in groups of houses in endemic settings. We carried out surveys of PCR positivity in children residing in 2-block patches of highly endemic cities of Colombia. We found high levels of heterogeneity in PCR positivity, varying from less than 30% in 8 of the 10 patches to 56 and 96%, with the latter patch containing 22 children simultaneously PCR positive (PCR22) for DEN2. We then used an agent-based model to assess the likely eco-epidemiological context of this observation. Our model, simulating daily dengue dynamics over a 20 year period in a single two block patch, suggests that the observed heterogeneity most likely derived from variation in the density of susceptible people. Two aspects of human adaptive behavior were critical to determining this density: external social relationships favoring viral introduction (by susceptible residents or infectious visitors) and immigration of households from non-endemic areas. External social relationships generating frequent viral introduction constituted a particularly strong constraint on susceptible densities, thereby limiting the potential for explosive outbreaks and dampening the impact of heightened vectorial capacity. Dengue transmission can be highly explosive locally, even in neighborhoods with significant immunity in the human population. Variation among neighborhoods in the density of local social networks and rural-to-urban migration is likely to produce significant fine-scale heterogeneity in dengue dynamics, constraining or amplifying the impacts of changes in mosquito populations and cross immunity between serotypes.
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Affiliation(s)
- Harish Padmanabha
- Centro de Investigaciones en el Desarrollo Humano (CIDHUM), Universidad del Norte, Km 5 Via Puerto Colombia, Puerto Colombia, Colombia
- National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (SESYNC), University of Maryland, 1 Park Place, Suite 300, Annapolis, Maryland, 21401, United States of America
- * E-mail:
| | - Fabio Correa
- Instituto Nacional de Salud de Colombia, Avenida/calle 26 No. 51–20 - Zona 6 CAN, Bogotá, D.C., Colombia
| | - Camilo Rubio
- Instituto Nacional de Salud de Colombia, Avenida/calle 26 No. 51–20 - Zona 6 CAN, Bogotá, D.C., Colombia
| | - Andres Baeza
- National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center (SESYNC), University of Maryland, 1 Park Place, Suite 300, Annapolis, Maryland, 21401, United States of America
| | - Salua Osorio
- Instituto Nacional de Salud de Colombia, Avenida/calle 26 No. 51–20 - Zona 6 CAN, Bogotá, D.C., Colombia
| | - Jairo Mendez
- Instituto Nacional de Salud de Colombia, Avenida/calle 26 No. 51–20 - Zona 6 CAN, Bogotá, D.C., Colombia
| | - James Holland Jones
- Department of Anthropology/Woods Institute of the Environment, Stanford University, 450 Serra Mall, Building 50, Stanford, California, 94305–2034, United States of America
| | - Maria A Diuk-Wasser
- Department of Ecology, Evolution and Environmental Biology, Columbia University, 1200 Amsterdam Ave, New York, New York, 10027, United States of America
- Department of Epidemiology of Microbial Diseases, Yale University, 60 College St, New Haven, Connecticut, 06520, United States of America
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Bentley RA, O'Brien MJ. Collective behaviour, uncertainty and environmental change. PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. SERIES A, MATHEMATICAL, PHYSICAL, AND ENGINEERING SCIENCES 2015; 373:rsta.2014.0461. [PMID: 26460111 DOI: 10.1098/rsta.2014.0461] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/13/2023]
Abstract
A central aspect of cultural evolutionary theory concerns how human groups respond to environmental change. Although we are painting with a broad brush, it is fair to say that prior to the twenty-first century, adaptation often happened gradually over multiple human generations, through a combination of individual and social learning, cumulative cultural evolution and demographic shifts. The result was a generally resilient and sustainable population. In the twenty-first century, however, considerable change happens within small portions of a human generation, on a vastly larger range of geographical and population scales and involving a greater degree of horizontal learning. As a way of gauging the complexity of societal response to environmental change in a globalized future, we discuss several theoretical tools for understanding how human groups adapt to uncertainty. We use our analysis to estimate the limits of predictability of future societal change, in the belief that knowing when to hedge bets is better than relying on a false sense of predictability.
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Affiliation(s)
- R Alexander Bentley
- Department of Comparative Cultural Studies, University of Houston, Houston, TX 77204, USA
| | - Michael J O'Brien
- Department of Anthropology, University of Missouri, 317 Lowry Hall, Columbia, MO 65211, USA
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Jelbert SA, Singh PJ, Gray RD, Taylor AH. New Caledonian crows rapidly solve a collaborative problem without cooperative cognition. PLoS One 2015; 10:e0133253. [PMID: 26266937 PMCID: PMC4534463 DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0133253] [Citation(s) in RCA: 20] [Impact Index Per Article: 2.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/30/2014] [Accepted: 06/25/2015] [Indexed: 11/18/2022] Open
Abstract
There is growing comparative evidence that the cognitive bases of cooperation are not unique to humans. However, the selective pressures that lead to the evolution of these mechanisms remain unclear. Here we show that while tool-making New Caledonian crows can produce collaborative behavior, they do not understand the causality of cooperation nor show sensitivity to inequity. Instead, the collaborative behavior produced appears to have been underpinned by the transfer of prior experience. These results suggest that a number of possible selective pressures, including tool manufacture and mobbing behaviours, have not led to the evolution of cooperative cognition in this species. They show that causal cognition can evolve in a domain specific manner–understanding the properties and flexible uses of physical tools does not necessarily enable animals to grasp that a conspecific can be used as a social tool.
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Affiliation(s)
- Sarah A. Jelbert
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, New Zealand
- * E-mail:
| | - Puja J. Singh
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, New Zealand
- School of Psychology and Neuroscience, University of St Andrews, St Andrews, United Kingdom
| | - Russell D. Gray
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, New Zealand
| | - Alex H. Taylor
- School of Psychology, University of Auckland, Private Bag 92019, Auckland, New Zealand
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Gallagher S. Doing the math: Calculating the role of evolution and enculturation in the origins of geometrical and mathematical reasoning. PROGRESS IN BIOPHYSICS AND MOLECULAR BIOLOGY 2015; 119:341-6. [PMID: 26140996 DOI: 10.1016/j.pbiomolbio.2015.06.016] [Citation(s) in RCA: 5] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/23/2022]
Abstract
In this paper I review broadly embodied, phenomenological and evolutionary conceptions of the origin of mathematics. I relate these conceptions to Husserl's work on the origins of geometry, and recent research into the notion of extended expertise and the role of enculturation as they relate to mathematical reasoning. I suggest that the concept of 'affordance space' - the (abstract) range of possibilities provided by any change in body or environment - is a useful construct in working out the contributions of evolution and enculturation to mathematical reasoning.
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Affiliation(s)
- Shaun Gallagher
- Philosophy, University of Memphis, USA; Faculty of Law, Humanities and the Arts, University of Wollongong, Australia.
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37
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Fuentes A. Integrative Anthropology and the Human Niche: Toward a Contemporary Approach to Human Evolution. AMERICAN ANTHROPOLOGIST 2015. [DOI: 10.1111/aman.12248] [Citation(s) in RCA: 62] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.9] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/27/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Agustín Fuentes
- Department of Anthropology; University of Notre Dame; Notre Dame IN 46556
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39
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40
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Driscoll C. Constructive criticism: An evaluation of Buller and Hardcastle's genetic and neuroscientific arguments against Evolutionary Psychology. PHILOSOPHICAL PSYCHOLOGY 2014. [DOI: 10.1080/09515089.2013.785068] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Submit a Manuscript] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/26/2022]
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Taylor AH, Gray RD. Is there a link between the crafting of tools and the evolution of cognition? WILEY INTERDISCIPLINARY REVIEWS. COGNITIVE SCIENCE 2014; 5:693-703. [DOI: 10.1002/wcs.1322] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/28/2014] [Revised: 08/21/2014] [Accepted: 08/25/2014] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- Alex H. Taylor
- School of PsychologyUniversity of AucklandAucklandNew Zealand
| | - Russell D. Gray
- School of PsychologyUniversity of AucklandAucklandNew Zealand
- Department of PhilosophyAustralian National UniversityCanberraAustralia
- Max Planck Institute for History and the SciencesJenaGermany
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42
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Kim Sterelny: The Evolved Apprentice: How Evolution Made Humans Unique. Acta Biotheor 2014. [DOI: 10.1007/s10441-014-9212-1] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
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Hiscock P. Learning in Lithic Landscapes: A Reconsideration of the Hominid “Toolmaking” Niche. ACTA ACUST UNITED AC 2014. [DOI: 10.1007/s13752-013-0158-3] [Citation(s) in RCA: 76] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
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Jeffares B. Back to Australopithecus: Utilizing New Theories of Cognition to Understand the Pliocene Hominins. ACTA ACUST UNITED AC 2013. [DOI: 10.1007/s13752-013-0146-7] [Citation(s) in RCA: 8] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/25/2022]
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Abstract
Brains, it has recently been argued, are essentially prediction machines. They are bundles of cells that support perception and action by constantly attempting to match incoming sensory inputs with top-down expectations or predictions. This is achieved using a hierarchical generative model that aims to minimize prediction error within a bidirectional cascade of cortical processing. Such accounts offer a unifying model of perception and action, illuminate the functional role of attention, and may neatly capture the special contribution of cortical processing to adaptive success. This target article critically examines this "hierarchical prediction machine" approach, concluding that it offers the best clue yet to the shape of a unified science of mind and action. Sections 1 and 2 lay out the key elements and implications of the approach. Section 3 explores a variety of pitfalls and challenges, spanning the evidential, the methodological, and the more properly conceptual. The paper ends (sections 4 and 5) by asking how such approaches might impact our more general vision of mind, experience, and agency.
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Taff CC, Freeman-Gallant CR, Dunn PO, Whittingham LA. Spatial distribution of nests constrains the strength of sexual selection in a warbler. J Evol Biol 2013; 26:1392-405. [DOI: 10.1111/jeb.12141] [Citation(s) in RCA: 41] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/26/2012] [Revised: 01/05/2013] [Accepted: 02/03/2013] [Indexed: 11/28/2022]
Affiliation(s)
- C. C. Taff
- Animal Behavior Graduate Group and Department of Evolution & Ecology; University of California; Davis CA USA
| | | | - P. O. Dunn
- Department of Biological Sciences; University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee; Milwaukee WI USA
| | - L. A. Whittingham
- Department of Biological Sciences; University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee; Milwaukee WI USA
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48
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Cooperation in a Complex World: The Role of Proximate Factors in Ultimate Explanations. ACTA ACUST UNITED AC 2012. [DOI: 10.1007/s13752-012-0069-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 10/27/2022]
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49
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Sterelny K. Language, gesture, skill: the co-evolutionary foundations of language. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2012; 367:2141-51. [PMID: 22734057 PMCID: PMC3385681 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2012.0116] [Citation(s) in RCA: 85] [Impact Index Per Article: 7.1] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 01/27/2023] Open
Abstract
This paper defends a gestural origins hypothesis about the evolution of enhanced communication and language in the hominin lineage. The paper shows that we can develop an incremental model of language evolution on that hypothesis, but not if we suppose that language originated in an expansion of great ape vocalization. On the basis of the gestural origins hypothesis, the paper then advances solutions to four classic problems about the evolution of language: (i) why did language evolve only in the hominin lineage? (ii) why is language use an evolutionarily stable form of informational cooperation, despite the fact that hominins have diverging evolutionary interests? (iii) how did stimulus independent symbols emerge? (iv) what were the origins of complex, syntactically organized symbols? The paper concludes by confronting two challenges: those of testability and of explaining the gesture-to-speech transition; crucial issues for any gestural origins hypothesis.
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Affiliation(s)
- Kim Sterelny
- Department of Philosophy and Tempo and Mode, Australian National University, Australia.
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50
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Whiten A, Erdal D. The human socio-cognitive niche and its evolutionary origins. Philos Trans R Soc Lond B Biol Sci 2012; 367:2119-29. [PMID: 22734055 PMCID: PMC3385679 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2012.0114] [Citation(s) in RCA: 116] [Impact Index Per Article: 9.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 11/12/2022] Open
Abstract
Hominin evolution took a remarkable pathway, as the foraging strategy extended to large mammalian prey already hunted by a guild of specialist carnivores. How was this possible for a moderately sized ape lacking the formidable anatomical adaptations of these competing 'professional hunters'? The long-standing answer that this was achieved through the elaboration of a new 'cognitive niche' reliant on intelligence and technology is compelling, yet insufficient. Here we present evidence from a diversity of sources supporting the hypothesis that a fuller answer lies in the evolution of a new socio-cognitive niche, the principal components of which include forms of cooperation, egalitarianism, mindreading (also known as 'theory of mind'), language and cultural transmission, that go far beyond the most comparable phenomena in other primates. This cognitive and behavioural complex allows a human hunter-gatherer band to function as a unique and highly competitive predatory organism. Each of these core components of the socio-cognitive niche is distinctive to humans, but primate research has increasingly identified related capacities that permit inferences about significant ancestral cognitive foundations to the five pillars of the human social cognitive niche listed earlier. The principal focus of the present study was to review and integrate this range of recent comparative discoveries.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andrew Whiten
- Centre for Social Learning and Cognitive Evolution, School of Psychology, University of St Andrews, St Andrews KY16 9JU, UK.
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