Darwinism and cultural change.
Evolutionary models of cultural change have acquired an important role in attempts to explain the course of human evolution, especially our specialization in knowledge-gathering and intelligent control of environments. In both biological and cultural change, different patterns of explanation become relevant at different 'grains' of analysis and in contexts associated with different explanatory targets. Existing treatments of the evolutionary approach to culture, both positive and negative, underestimate the importance of these distinctions. Close attention to grain of analysis motivates distinctions between three possible modes of cultural evolution, each associated with different empirical assumptions and explanatory roles.
Philosophy Program, The Graduate Center, City University of New York, 365 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10016, USA. pgodfreysmith@gmail.com
Peter
P
Godfrey-Smith
D000223:Adaptation, Psychological; D005075:Biological Evolution; D003468:Cultural Evolution; D056348:Emotional Intelligence; D036262:Empirical Research; D004777:Environment; D056084:Genetic Fitness; D005828:Genetics, Population; D006801:Humans; D007100:Imitative Behavior / Q000502:physiology; D019359:Knowledge; D007858:Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D010802:Phylogeny; D012641:Selection, Genetic