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Cited by 50Language and cultural evolutionPhilosophy and History of ScienceEvolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior

Reasons to be fussy about cultural evolution

Open access
Morin, Olivier·2016·Biology & Philosophy
DOI 10.1007/s10539-016-9516-4PMC PMC4944120
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Abstract

that raise similar objections to cultural attraction theory, a research trend in cultural evolution putting special emphasis on the fact that human minds create and transform their culture. Both papers are sympathetic to this idea, yet both also regret a lack of consilience with Boyd, Richerson and Henrich's models of cultural evolution. I explain why cultural attraction theorists propose a different view on three points of concern for our critics. I start by detailing the claim that cultural transmission relies not chiefly on imitation or teaching, but on cognitive mechanisms like argumentation, ostensive communication, or selective trust, whose evolved or habitual function may not be the faithful reproduction of ideas or behaviours. Second, I explain why the distinction between context biases and content biases might not always be the best way to capture the interactions between culture and cognition. Lastly, I show that cultural attraction models cannot be reduced to a model of guided variation, which posits a clear separation between individual and social learning processes. With cultural attraction, the same cognitive mechanisms underlie both innovation and the preservation of traditions.

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  • There is general agreement that culture exhibits the key properties of evolutionary systems: variation, transmission and selection.

    “While there are ongoing discussions on how far the analogy between cultural and genetic evolution should be pushed 54,55 , there is general agreement that culture exhibits the key properties of evolutionary systems: variation, transmission and selection.”

    From Machine culture (2023) · cites this paper as [55]

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  1. Morin O How traditions live and die 2016 Cambridge Oxford University Press

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Authors
Morin, O.
Affiliations
Max Planck Society (DE)
Corresponding author
Morin, Olivier
ORCID
Morin, Olivier
Venue
Biology & Philosophy
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Published
2016-02-29
Volume
31
Issue
3
Pages
447-458
ISSN
  • 0169-3867 (ISSN-L)
  • 1572-8404
DOI
10.1007/s10539-016-9516-4
PMC
PMC4944120
OpenAlex
W2302261170
Cited by
50
References
40
Citations by year
2026: 2 · 2025: 3 · 2024: 6 · 2023: 3 · 2022: 1 · 2021: 12 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 8 · 2018: 4 · 2017: 4 · 2016: 2
FWCI
61.72
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Biology & Philosophy (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • MPG.PuRe (Max Planck Society) (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • Max Planck Digital Library (submittedVersion, other-oa)
Funders
European Research Council (609819)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Cultural Studies › Language and cultural evolution
  • Social Sciences › Arts and Humanities › History and Philosophy of Science › Philosophy and History of Science
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Experimental and Cognitive Psychology › Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior
Keywords
cultural evolution, cultural transmission, imitation, teaching, argumentation, ostensive communication, selective trust, context bias, content bias, innovation, tradition preservation

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